ARC Review: Bookishly Ever After by Isabel Bandeira

Bookishly Ever After
Author: Isabel Bandeira
Series: Ever After #1
Genre: YA, Contemporary, Romance
Release Date: January 12th 2016

Book Length: 350 pages
Publisher: Spencer Hill Press

In a perfect world, sixteen-year-old Phoebe Martins’ life would be a book. Preferably a YA novel with magic and a hot paranormal love interest. Unfortunately, her life probably wouldn’t even qualify for a quiet contemporary. But when Phoebe finds out that Dev, the hottest guy in the clarinet section, might actually have a crush on her, she turns to her favorite books for advice. Phoebe overhauls her personality to become as awesome as her favorite heroines and win Dev’s heart. But if her plan fails, can she go back to her happy world of fictional boys after falling for the real thing?

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Review

FACT: Bookish people are the best. So when I came across a book about a fellow bookworm who lives vicariously through her books-like many of us do-, I knew I had to read it.

Phoebe would much rather live in her fictional fantasy worlds but unfortunately her best friend is determined to reintroduce Phoebe to reality and keep her nose out of books. When Phoebe finds out that Dev, the hottest guy in band likes her she can only take advice from her most loved heroines and try to integrate their actions into her reality.

This is possibly the cutest book on the planet; seriously I just adored all the characters. I felt instantly connected to Phoebe, she shows all the telltale signs of a book addict: staying up until the early hours reading, counting down the days till your most anticipated release, the nervous and excitement that comes with meeting your favorite author and obviously, completely and utterly crushing on those swoon-worthy book boyfriends. Phoebe has no idea how to flirt, dress the part or come across as the alluring, beautiful, funny characters she reads about, she’s only interested in her books and knitting. So cute!

“Too bad real boyfriends aren't as awesome as book boyfriends.”

Is this not the quote of the year?  

Fellow fangirls around the world are all mourning how very true this is!

            Bookishly Ever After basically follows Phoebe’s journey to become the ultimate heroine, to who looks good, says the right thing and ultimately gets her man. Dev our love interest is a pretty outgoing clarinet player that dreams of becoming a Bollywood star, can I just say how awesome it was read about a bi-racial relationship? It was totally refreshing and I hope to see more of this in future books. The relationship between Phoebe and Dev was so sweet and endearing, sometimes I felt so sorry for Phoebe because it was the type of relationship where you don’t notice how attractive a person is until someone points it out? So you’ve always been their friend and then you tend to question everything you say or do from that point onwards. When Phoebe finally realizes that Dev has just stepped out of one of her fantasy books and he could be her real life book boyfriend, she’s terrified, nervous and completely out of her element.

My only problem with this book was not the romance but the direction of the relationship between Phoebe and Dev, it was never going anywhere. There was a lot of back and forth between the two and the plot just seemed to be stuck in a state of limbo. Outside of this I thoroughly enjoyed the book and I would definitely recommend it to fellow readers as the writing was fantastic and I loved how we were given snippets from Phoebes books and saw how she would try to recreate a special moment; not all were successful but it was so much fun to read about. I will definitely be continuing with the Ever After series and I can’t wait to see what Isabel comes up with next! Also those snippets were so good that I now want Isabel to write her own YA fantasy, I would buy it in a heartbeat.