Alcohol and adolescents make a dangerous cocktail.

That’s the premise behind B. D. Rowe’s newly released New Adult romance CRASHING INTO YOU.

Summary from Goodreads:

Bookish college sophomore Sydney Baker wants Evan Taylor with every ounce of her being. The hottest stud on campus, Evan is six foot four, ripped, stacked with muscles. He’s even easy to talk to.

There’s just one problem: he’s her roommate Melanie’s boyfriend.

But when Melanie tragically dies after a night of wild partying, Sydney and Evan turn to each other in a time of intense grief. And it doesn’t take long for their close friendship to blossom into something more.

Unfortunately for Sydney, secrets from the past soon put her relationship with Evan to the test. Especially when a sexy blonde freshman makes her way into Evan’s life, and tries to rip away everything Sydney holds close to her heart.

My Review:

This book is currently on a blog tour, of which I am not a participant; I got a free reviewer’s copy through NetGalley. The premise sounded interesting, and I’m always down for a New Adult romance, but the story here didn’t grab me. ***This review contains some spoilers***

Background: Sydney’s a survivor of a car accident that killed three people–her drunk, at-fault boyfriend, and a mother and her young child. Sydney hardly drinks and acts as the DD for her friends now. Oh, and she’s still underage for alcohol.

While at school, Sydney struggles with the binge drinking she witnesses around her. She seeks to intervene to help kids not over-indulge–with mixed results. Secretly she pines for Evan, her roommate Melanie’s boyfriend.

It’s not so clear that Evan and Melanie are in trouble, romance-wise. And Sydney does nothing overt to damage their relationship. She and Evan are friends. They do some friend-type stuff: hanging out, studying for a mutual class. It is Evan who makes a move on Sydney. And she shuts him down, because Friend Code, and all that. Good girl. I don’t want to hate you.

The same night Evan puts the move on, Melanie dies from alcohol poisoning. Now Evan is free, but grieving, and Sydney blames herself for not stepping in the path of Melanie’s self-destructive alcohol issues. I can buy that.

Later that summer Sydney and Evan reunite. They behave as friends though Sydney wants more. And she eventually gets the whole Evan-chilada. The smexytimes are a bit overdone to me. Here’s why: throughout this story I felt Sydney read very teen-angsty and immature. She’s kinda petty, and jealous, and well, apart from the “DD-Be-Alcohol-Responsible” stuff she felt rather juvenile. Some people are adult-y in grade school. Sydney felt kiddie, despite being twenty y/o, thus the graphic sex gave me an awkward vibe.

Then school starts again. That this tale was swimming into dark waters wasn’t subtle–more fore-bludgeoning than foreshadowing–and we have Melanie’s Doppleganger appear on campus. Why is Sydney worried? She’s got her man. And the Look-a-like is Melanie’s younger sister. Do guys really want to date their dead ex-girfriend’s younger sister? I struggled with the logic. But it reinforced my feeling that Sydney is too immature to move forward with an adult relationship.

Sydney’s BIGGEST problem isn’t a boyfriend’s potentially-wandering eye, it’s how to develop the skills to cope with disappointment–sans alcohol. The very second she catches Evan in a lie what does Sydney do? Pound two cocktails and vomit in the bushes. Yeah. Great job being a mature adult, Syd.

The ending consists of a melodramatic twist that does a disservice to the story.  A fatality occurs and the plot value of it was nil, IMHO. It felt so unnecessary. What lesson did Sydney learn anyway? Don’t drive while consumed by jealousy? Meh. Not big enough to justify the death–and if it was designed to create plot problems for a sequel, well, I don’t like the characters nearly enough to hitch along for that ride.

I want to recommend the book to younger readers so they can learn how absolutely stupid it is to binge on alcohol–but I can’t because the smexytimes are icky-sticky for younger readers. Some New Adult-ers might relate with Sydney, but mostly I shook my head.

You can find CRASHING INTO YOU at Goodreads, Amazon or Barnes & Noble.

If nothing else, reading stinkers helps me to appreciate the awesome books that much more. The book  wasn’t awful, but the plot didn’t catch me like I thought it would, and the ending was a total downer.

As always, keep reading my friends!