Official Review: Bound to You by Skylar Nightingale

[MatthewAlexander]

[Following is the official OnlineBookClub.org review of "Bound to You" by Skylar Nightingale.]

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1 out of 4 stars

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Bound to You by Skylar Nightingale follows the paths of Nina Stevens and Terry Rayborn, two strangers living very different lives until their paths cross. Nina, a regular college student with a best friend, loving parents, and the perfect boyfriend. Terry, an international superstar, fighting the “player” image, and looking for love. When a bit of luck causes their paths to cross, their lives are changed forever—but emotional obstacles may keep them apart.

The thing that I like best about this book is, unfortunately, the only think I like about this book. That isn’t to say I had to struggle to find something to like about the book once I had finished it; I knew from the beginning what I appreciated this about the book. This redeeming quality was the diversity of the characters within the book. In most young adult novels, many, if not all, of the characters are white. This is especially true of protagonists, or main characters in general. Nightingale’s book is full of diversity, especially among the women, all of which were described as being beautiful. The main character especially highlighted the idea that women of color are gorgeous; she even goes into a line of work that for many years has been dominated by white women. If more books were written with the amount of diversity that Bound to You portrayed, it could change the way that young people of color view themselves.

That being said, I disliked many more things about Bound to You than I liked. The biggest problem I had was with the plot itself, unfortunately. It went in circles of he likes her and she likes him and but he cheated on her, or, she cheated on him. There was nothing more to it than that. Not to mention the idea of someone normal getting the chance to meet their favorite artist and that artist just so happens to fall madly in love with them is something straight out of a middle schooler’s diary. The entire book had that air about it: the relationships between characters were petty, the plot abounded younger than something you’d normally find in a young adult book, and the “intimate” scenes sounded like they were written by someone who’s completely unfamiliar with intimacy. It was very juvenile.

The writing itself made it difficult to read as well. There was very little variance in sentence structure, making the entire work choppy. Where the work was lacking in details pertaining to the story itself, it was bogged down in useless information—for example, the precise height of everyone mentioned. The narrative switched between the point of views of Nina and Terry; the problem with that was that Terry’s point of view didn’t advance the plot at all. It merely told, from his point of view, the same time frame as Nina’s point of view. It dragged things on for an unnecessarily long time.

Therefore, despite the impressive amount of diversity, I rate Bound to You 1 out of 4 stars. It was simply hard to read due to the juvenility and choppy writing style. If work were done to vary the sentence structure and make the story itself more mature, the corrections and diversity (particularly the extremely successful person of color main character) could make Bound to You something very special. As it is, though, I can’t give it anything more than one star.

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Bound to You
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Like glitterywords483's review? Post a comment saying so!

[Shelle]

Great review! I can appreciate the diversity represented in the book, but it's too bad there was nothing else redeeming about the story.

[Heidi M Simone]

I appreciate how honest you are in your review. I'm sorry you didn't enjoy the book, but I can understand the frustration when a plot goes around in circles.

Like you and Shelle have said, I can appreciate the diversity of characters. As you have said, most young adult books, the characters are either white or appear to be, so it's nice to have a change. Great review!

[kimmyschemy06]

That was very honest. It seems like the book is less substantial than it should be. Good job on the review.

[Skylar01]

Thank you for the honest review. Thank you for taking the time to read my book.

[MatthewAlexander]

Thank you for the honest review. Thank you for taking the time to read my book.

Of course, I appreciate the time and effort you put into it! Very grateful for the opportunity.