Tuesday, May 12, 2015

Heat of the Moment ~ Lauren Barnholdt (earc) review [@HarperTeen @LaurenBarnholdt]

Heat of the Moment (Moment of Truth #1)
Harper Teen
May 12, 2015
304 pages
add to Goodreads/buy from TBD/or Amazon

Before graduation, I promise to...learn to trust. In the first book in the Moment of Truth series, Lyla discovers that trusting her head might be easy but trusting her heart is a whole other matter.

Each book in this paperback original series is told from the perspective of a different girl—Lyla, Aven, and Quinn—former best friends who wrote emails to their future selves back in freshman year about one thing they hope to accomplish before they graduate. When the emails get delivered on the first morning of their senior trip all three girls will spend the next three days trying to keep the promises they made to themselves four years ago. While each book follow’s one girl’s life-changing adventure, you have to read them all to get the whole story, including why they’re no longer friends and whether they can get their friendship back on track.

Lyla McAfee had all but forgotten the email that she wrote to herself freshman year and scheduled to be delivered right before graduation—the one promising that she’d learn to trust by the end of senior year. But when she receives it the first morning of her senior trip to Florida her life is sent into a tailspin. Soon she’s questioning her seemingly perfect relationship with her boyfriend, Derrick; her attraction to the school player, Beckett; and whether ending her friendship with Aven and Quinn, her former BFFs, was one of the biggest mistakes of her life.

The first book in a captivating summer trilogy, Heat of the Moment flawlessly balances romance and humor as Lyla embarks on her totally reluctant but completely irresistible journey of self-discovery. And readers will have a chance to discover whole truth about the fight that ended Lyla, Quinn, and Aven’s friendship in the next two installments of the series, coming out later the same summer!

I loved the idea of Heat of the Moment. Books that bring old friends back together and books that are set when there are about to be big changes in someone's life are ones I like to read.

With Heat of the Moment, I did not like it as much as I was expecting because I did not much like Lyla. She seemed to be overly critical of her mother, being annoyed with ways she thought her mother was acting that I felt were more true of Lyla's behavior.

When that was paired with her near obsession with losing her virginity on the class trip to Florida, I just couldn't take any more of Lyla. She is so focused on 'finally' sleeping with her boyfriend Derrick, no matter what problems they have - or encounter in Florida. There was not as much introspection on Lyla's part as I had hoped given that her promise of learning to trust was much more emotional and personal and not as much measurable or quantifiable.

I did like Beckett's character and thought that things between them played out well. Since I didn't like Lyla, I couldn't really understand what he saw in her, but I did like his character and the events that took place between them.

Despite Lyla's character not working for me, I did like Beckett and our introduction to Aven and Quinn, her former best friends. I am curious to read the next book in this trilogy because I would like to learn more about the girls' friendship and what happened between them, what happens with Aven and Quinn's emails and I'm hoping there's some growth in Lyla's character.

I found Heat of the Moment's main character, Lyla annoying and not very likable but did like the other characters, events in the book and what can potentially happen in the rest of the series.







review copy received thanks to the publisher via Edelweiss

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