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by Dakota Madison
Release date: January 19th 2014
Publisher: Time Books
A FRESHMAN, HER ROOMMATE, A GUY and A LIST...
THE FRESHMAN: Ana Alves came to college for one reason--to be the first person in her immigrant family to earn a degree. She doesn't want anything to derail her from her pre-med studies, especially a guy.
HER ROOMMATE: Nicki Payne is ready to party and she doesn't waste any time hooking up with a guy in a frat house bathroom. Her motto: College is a time to be young, wild and free.
A GUY: Christopher Knight is the easy-going English major with a sexy smile and killer body who sits next to Ana in her Shakespeare class. Ana finds Christopher intriguing. She just doesn't want to admit that she's falling for him.
THE HOOKUP LIST: A list of freshman girls who are ready for action that's circulated to the freshman guys via a weekly Listserv. When Nicki Payne is one of the first girls featured on The Hookup List, guys start knocking on her dorm door at all hours of the day and night looking to score...
But what happens when one of those guys is Christopher?
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Ana is pretty adorable and innocent. Her parents are from Brazil and have a strong Catholic background and so her upbringing is more conservative. She considers herself not to be on the extreme level but she hasn’t necessarily been exposed to things the way maybe others had. She was more interested in hanging with her boyfriend and family then partying in high school. I really liked Ana because even though she has this background she is also very laid back. Things might make her uncomfortable but she still tries. She goes to a party and checks it out. She just came across to me as very strong. She’s mature for her age and held steady through the entire book.
Christopher is interesting. I really liked him at first. He’s super smart (I love smart guys) and has a killer smile. He’s totally laid back with his clothes and dresses like a beach bum. He sounds like the total kind of guy I would have gone for. The thing that surprised me about him is his clinginess.( He keeps referring back to this Bethany girl who sounds like it’s not shocking he broke his heart and the way he is all torn up over Ana is kind of….umm...a little over the top. He just was very dramatic about his relationship with Ana. I don’t think I’ve ever read a character quite like him which honestly kept me totally intrigued.
The plot is loosely based around the hook-up list. Which as I said previously is a real thing at some colleges. Girls get a rating on their hook-up ability and then the list is published every week. Nikki, Ana’s roommate, is at the top of list. For some girls this is something to aspire to, for others not so much. It actually became more of a background thing for the story. We see more of the list itself through Nikki and Spencer. They were also a bit of the comic relief for the story and I really liked what they added. The main focus was Ana and Christopher's relationship and how they deal with their exes. The final part of the book actually took me off guard. I was like wait I wasn’t expecting that but it was interesting.
Overall this was a fun and interesting story. I wish they had gone into a little more about their families and if they would approve of their relationship. It seemed that there was a lot of pressure from them but it was only vaguely mentioned. I really loved Ana and I think she made the story. I wanted to be like, hey you are one awesome girl can we be friends. She kind of gives you that good mc buzz after reading.
