Review: To All The Boys I've Loved Before (To All The Boys I've Loved Before #1) by Jenny Han

Book Title: To All The Boys I've Loved Before (To All The Boys I've Loved Before #1)

Author: Jenny Han

Publish Date:  April 15th, 2014

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books For Young Readers 

Genre: YA Contemporary

Series: Book 1 in To All The Boys I've Loved Before duology

Book Link: Goodreads

Purchase Links: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, The Book Depository

Synopsis from Goodreads:

To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before is the story of Lara Jean, who has never openly admitted her crushes, but instead wrote each boy a letter about how she felt, sealed it, and hid it in a box under her bed. But one day Lara Jean discovers that somehow her secret box of letters has been mailed, causing all her crushes from her past to confront her about the letters: her first kiss, the boy from summer camp, even her sister's ex-boyfriend, Josh. As she learns to deal with her past loves face to face, Lara Jean discovers that something good may come out of these letters after all.

Disclaimer: library book.

Review:

This BOOK! I am going to be gushing about it all the way through this review so it may be a really short review or it could be really long. It was perfection all the way through. The writing was beautiful, the characters were well developed and gahhhh, this book was everything I want every other book to be. It was my first Jenny Han book which really makes me realize I need to read all of her books. Especially if they are this fabulous.

I thought for sure the romance would be my favorite part of the book but it wasn't. My favorite parts all had to do with Lara Jean and her sisters and their dad. Very rarely are single dads portrayed in YA books and especially single dads with only daughters. Throw in the fact that the sisters are half Korean and you've really got a wonderfully unique book that will definitely appeal to all sorts of readers.

I loved Lara Jean. She was flawed, which is one thing I really love in books. She's human, she makes mistakes. She fell for her older sister, Margot's boyfriend for goodness sake. She's not great in the kitchen, but she's working on it. 

I didn't feel like I really got to know Margot as well as  I wanted to, but I think that was mostly because she wasn't in the book a whole heck of a lot. But I do feel like I got to know her through Lara Jean and Kitty and even through Josh, her ex boyfriend. 

Kitty was an awesome kid and it took me back to remembering how badly I wanted a sister growing up. Kitty was vastly different from her older sisters. She was more outgoing and less reserved than both Margot & Lara Jean were.

Now with the boys, I found myself loving one of them at the beginning and hating the other one. By the time the book ended, my feelings had completely reversed. Talk about confused. I totally understood how Lara Jean could feel confused and conflicted. It made sense to me given all she knew about both boys.

There was definitely more than met the eye with this book. I LOVED this book. I loved that so much focus was on family and despite what the synopsis said, this book didn't focus as much on the boys as I was expecting. I mean, the boys were there but Lara Jean's family played such major roles in this book which was what really made me fall in love with it. 5 stars to this book. It's definitely something you should pick up if you haven't already.