Rating: ★★★★★
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Goodreads Synopsis:
When his dad is caught embezzling funds from half the town, Rob goes from popular lacrosse player to social pariah. Even worse, his father’s failed suicide attempt leaves Rob and his mother responsible for his care.
Everyone thinks of Maegan as a typical overachiever, but she has a secret of her own after the pressure got to her last year. And when her sister comes home from college pregnant, keeping it from her parents might be more than she can handle.
When Rob and Maegan are paired together for a calculus project, they’re both reluctant to let anyone through the walls they’ve built. But when Maegan learns of Rob’s plan to fix the damage caused by his father, it could ruin more than their fragile new friendship…
This captivating, heartfelt novel asks the question: Is it okay to do something wrong for the right reasons?
I am in such a Contemporary mood right now and this book was the icing on the cake! I thoroughly enjoyed it. I burned through it in a matter of hours! The writing was easy to read and flowed nicely, the characters were flawed and amazing and the romance was perfection! I want more! Which means I might be heading to the book store to see if I can grab some more of Brigid Kemmerer’s Contemporary Fiction!
Call It What You Want is told from the perspectives of Rob, the once popular high school jock whose life fell apart when his father was caught embezzling half the towns money and Meagan, the perfect overachieving student, who let the pressure get to her and was caught cheating on her SAT’s. Together they navigate their way through an unlikely friendship, love and the blurred line between what is right and what is wrong.
I really did enjoy this! All the characters, even the minor ones, where intriguing in their own right and I really loved the overall tone of mortality and what it looks like for different people. There was a lot of representation in this book, which I also thought was great. It covered a lot of important issues such as suicide attempts (and the devastating aftermath for the family), racism and privilege, teen pregnancy and focused heavily on individual characters morals and how nothing is every truly just black and white, which really gets you thinking about your own!
There were times when I was actually talking to this book! I wanted to shake some of these characters and tell them “No! Don’t do that!” It was really immersive, I honestly wish I didn’t burn through it as fast as I did because I already miss the characters! The romance was awesome. Although, I am always a little confused as to where these totally ripped, “sexy as hell” teenage boys come from, because… come on? Y’all seem to be skipping the awkward stage these days and I am not down for that!
But overall this was a great read! I will definitely be reading it again at some point and would highly recommend it! Because of this, I am giving Call It What You Want 5 stars!
Reading Sumpton 