COURTNEY REVIEWS: CHOICES (CHOICES #1) by SYDNEY LANE

Series: Choices #1
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Publisher: Self-Published
Publication Date: 6/22/13
Format: ebook
Pages: 206
Source: Author
Rating: 3.5 stars

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Choices is a new adult contemporary romance intended for audiences 18+. Although Choices is included in a series, each book can stand alone.

Choices

Fate brought her here, but will her choices destroy her dreams?

Quincy Priest made all the right choices in her small town, black-and-white life. But being perfect is tiring. So. Very. Tiring.

Wanting desperately to step out of her sister's shadow, Quincy jumps at the opportunity to attend college with her best friend. The quiet bookworm with family secrets comes out of her shell. But when Quincy meets not one, but two perfect guys, she has to make a choice. In doing so, she might forfeit the relationship she secretly longed to find.

Declan. Sweet, handsome, and perfect. He makes her feel cherished for the first time in her life.

Brody. Sexy, hot, and irresistible. He could tear down her carefully built walls.

Before she can become the woman she wants to be, Quincy will make mistakes. And suffer one unimaginable loss.

I have been really struggling to find the words that would adequately describe how I feel after reading Choices by Sydney Lane. I liked it, a lot, but there were a few things that I stopped and thought maybe weren't perfect while I was reading it...and unfortunately I can't ignore that, either. Final rating: 3 1/2 Stars

Choices is a new adult title of the 'will she get with this cute boy or that one'...and I was pleasantly surprised by the other elements that it involved. Quincy and her best friend move to Knoxville to go to the University of Tennessee, and you find out quick that Quincy is running from her good girl reputation due to reasons that were the very interesting part (aka, spoiler alert if I tell you). She sees the sexy boys on campus in class, and happens (not accidentally) to see them again at a frat party. We have lots of angst and frustration on who should she pick, who's heart should she break...and I was frustrated with her...but didn't want her to settle either. Love triangle-centric story that I actually enjoyed!

The parts I got hung up on were a little bit of the sentence structure to the writing...I felt like there was a lot of explaining and telling going on when the scenes could have held up on their own (they were really good!) I hate saying stuff like that, because it is sometimes more subjective how much that bothers you...but there ya go. The other was how warm (not even hot) and (ice) cold Brody was for a while. There interactions in the beginning make it hard for me to believe that he was a contender for her love until certain scenes finally led me there...because of how small their exchanges were. Later, I believed it...but I was scratching my heard for a few percent there.

The story meant a lot, putting that aside, because there elements that I got vibes that are deeply personal for the author. With the dedication, and notes after, you can pick up on this...and that story arc was touching, sad, and so hard to understand if you haven't been around people like that. This means, this story has the pre-requisite psychiatric component that seems to find me all of the time! Gah, lol. I don't even search for it, and it finds me!

The Choices Series

   

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About the author

Sydney Lane lives in Nashville, TN with her husband and children. Growing up in Smalltown, USA, Sydney dreamed of being a writer. After spending an outrageous amount of money to go to college, Sydney finally decided to follow her heart. With her babies in bed and husband neglected, she worked by the light of her laptop and wrote Choices. Sydney is very active in charity work for anti-bullying and depression awareness groups.

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