Loving Luke

As a whole, this book seemed like I'd love it. A nice hokey romance that starts in the midst of a problem instead of dragging you through the problem. It didn't quite lift off the page for me though.

Firstly I'd like to point out I had zero problems with the book starting after a major event. Luke made a bet. Harley found out about it and now he needs to fix the mess he made. My problem with it was how long it took to mention the parameters of the bet. Like the full details didn't drop until his apology which is way down past 70percent. Secondly, most importantly, how the hell did Harley find out? Not detailing the scene fine, but not expressing the specifics of the bet and how Harley found out was what made it hard to get into. 

Sometimes the sentences seemed wordy. A few seemed unnecessary altogether. Almost like the writing was clean, didn't notice much typos, but a second step of editing to make it clearer and flow better was needed.

I stopped reading at two spots. First when Luke gets a call from a guy he was intimate with previously. He did not have to say he's seeing someone but he could've cleary said chances are he wouldn't be free in the near future and if he was he would call back. Something that stated don't waste your time messaging me. The second point was when Harley checks his phone. 

I'm not into personal space violations, so that's a personal quirk. The plot quirk is I get the impression this guy has been texting Luke and Luke has been ignoring him. Any human knows that if you get multiple messages from someone and never respond you're ignoring them. We know what ghosting is. So if Harley did a good enough spy job there is no way he could think Luke was sleeping with him. Furthermore, why didn't luke say this? "Oh he's just some guy I messed with before and I thought ignoring him would make him go away." On simple truthful sentence, problem solved. The whole drama of kicking him out did not have to happen at all. I really couldn't connect with how either of them responded to this.

The bits of wisdom always seemed misplaced. Like the author was trying to learn the reader something instead of the character they were talking to. Something about where they fell made them stick out instead of blend in. 

Lukes best friend, she was the best thing in this novel. I loved her. Everything about her. She needed more page time. Her scenes got my biggest smiles. 

Most of the book after the big fight they let happen by not behaving like adults I did a lot of skimming. Just wanted to see when they'd get back together and then I skimmed some more to get to when they announced they were a couple.

I really wanted to love this book. I mean sports jock M/M romance even the good old nerd and jock YA variety is my thing. I was ready to enjoy this but without giving details of the bet, having Luke behave like a teen who can't form a simple sentence, occasional wordiness, Harley not stalking the messages well enough, and a few other things I just couldn't vibe with this story. 

I felt this book wanted to be a slow burn and used the wrong angle to get there. The bet, and a guy too stupid to say I'm seeing someone wasn't strong enough especially when he didn't actually see anyone while patching things up with Harley. There was nothing to get angry over. So much potential but the waiting for an apology seemed to be the only thing the story was concerned with when it had so much more great angles and plot points going for it.