OnlineBookClub.org

[Following is the official OnlineBookClub.org review of "A Minor Happy Ending" by Shaan Ranae.]

A Minor Happy Ending by Shaan Ranae is a romance novel based on two young people and the struggles they face to keep their relationship going. Dyllan Prescott is eighteen, fresh out of school, and has a wonderful group of friends. She loves them dearly, but even more so, she loves her kind and adoring boyfriend, Nick. However, Dyllan's happy rhythm is thrown off when thoughts of seductive meetings and wet dreams of the very attractive Jace begin to seep into her mind.

Appalled at having these thoughts while dating sweet Nick, Dyllan attempts to ignore them. However, all too soon, Jace expresses his feelings towards her, which in turn leads to confused thoughts and misguided decisions. Feeling more guilty towards Max, her best friend and Nick's sister, and not for her boyfriend, Dyllan is lost on what to do. Who will she choose? The ever-loving Nick or the intoxicating and perhaps daredevil Jace? If she does choose Jace, will she be able to handle the secret he has kept from everyone?

Sometimes authors are able to write books with young characters as their protagonists that adults can easily enjoy. Unfortunately, this is not one of them. It was extremely difficult for me to identify with this group of immature characters and their rash decisions. One immature aspect that I particularly did not like or understand was the female friends calling each other derogatory names when they simply addressed one another. I could overlook once or twice, but when they use these names almost every time they spoke with one another, I just wanted to skip ahead. In general, I felt the immaturity of the characters was pushed too hard.

Another aspect that I found distracting was the amount of sexual scenes throughout the book. As a romance fan, these types of scenes are usually enjoyable, however, picturing eighteen-year-old teenagers having this much sexual encounters was disturbing to me. I felt the amount of these scenes were forced and just thrown into the storyline simply because the author could.

A third issue I had with this book was the unexplained Jace's secret. Without giving too much away, only a fraction of this young man's secret is given, and I was unable to figure out the rest. It may or may not have been intentional, but in turn, it made the story even less believable.

It was extremely difficult to rate this book because I can see perhaps those who are young and extremely hormonal enjoying this read, but I simply did not. With all the reasons listed above and the grammatical errors included, I rate this book a 2 out of 4 stars. For those who like young, immature romance, this might be a good read. However, for those who enjoy truer and deeper love stories, you might want to pass and find a more suitable romance novel.

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A Minor Happy Ending
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Like hsimone's review? Post a comment saying so!

I am sorry you didn't enjoy the story. Thank you for the great and insightful review.

Thank you, gali. I had high hopes of liking it, and maybe I was just the wrong audience. Either way, it was too much of an immature read for me. The good thing is, I have seen others who like this book, so it looks like the author has had some success with it!

Thanks for giving a thorough, objective review. I like that you gave detailed reasons for the issues you had with the book. A lot of useful, constructive criticism for the author to use.

This was a very honest review. I'm sorry you didn't enjoy this book. I think that it would be hard for some people, me included, to enjoy this book for the same reasons you didn't enjoy it. That being said, there are lots different people out there today with lots of different tastes in reading. It's too bad, though, that along with the immaturity of some parts of the story, there are grammatical errors also. I appreciate your insightful review.

bookowlie wrote:Thanks for giving a thorough, objective review. I like that you gave detailed reasons for the issues you had with the book. A lot of useful, constructive criticism for the author to use.

Thank you, bookowlie, for your thoughtful response. I hope I was constructive enough, and I hope the author will find them useful.

-- 17 May 2016, 18:28 --

Amheiser wrote:This was a very honest review. I'm sorry you didn't enjoy this book. I think that it would be hard for some people, me included, to enjoy this book for the same reasons you didn't enjoy it. That being said, there are lots different people out there today with lots of different tastes in reading. It's too bad, though, that along with the immaturity of some parts of the story, there are grammatical errors also. I appreciate your insightful review.

Thank you for your comments, Amheiser. I absolutely agree with you, there are a variety of people out there who enjoy all types of reads. Hopefully, those who enjoy this type of book, pick it up. Thank you for your thoughts.

Good review! You were fair and explained what you did like along with what you didn't like. I too would be put off by the immaturity and shallowness.

Thank you, Shelle! Reading the summary to this book, I just wasn't expecting it be this immature. However, there's something for everyone. This one just wasn't for me.