BOOK REVIEW - CRASH INTO YOU by KATIE MCGARRY - PUSHING THE LIMITS # 3 - HARLEQUIN TEEN - YA CONTEMPORARY ROMANCE

By: Katie McGarry
Published By: Harlequin Teen
Released: Available Now
Details: Paperback from publisher for honest review, 447 Pages

RATING: 4.5 ISAIAHHHH STARS!

Blurb: Goodreads  

From acclaimed author Katie McGarry comes an explosive new tale of a good girl with a reckless streak, a street-smart guy with nothing to lose, and a romance forged in the fast lane

The girl with straight As, designer clothes and the perfect life-that's who people expect Rachel Young to be. So the private-school junior keeps secrets from her wealthy parents and overbearing brothers...and she's just added two more to the list. One involves racing strangers down dark country roads in her Mustang GT. The other? Seventeen-year-old Isaiah Walker-a guy she has no business even talking to. But when the foster kid with the tattoos and intense gray eyes comes to her rescue, she can't get him out of her mind.

Isaiah has secrets, too. About where he lives, and how he really feels about Rachel. The last thing he needs is to get tangled up with a rich girl who wants to slum it on the south side for kicks-no matter how angelic she might look.

But when their shared love of street racing puts both their lives in jeopardy, they have six weeks to come up with a way out. Six weeks to discover just how far they'll go to save each other.


BOOK REVIEW by Michelle:

Anybody who has read Pushing The Limits and has met Noah and Echo knows that Katie Mc knows how to write a contemporary romance.

She brings the feelings to her writing and she makes us break out the tissues and do some mopping up.

Isaiah has been a character I have been waiting on for a HEA. I simply have loved him from the start and haven’t known much about him other than his friendships with Noah, Echo and Beth.

All these characters have done it tough and needed support from each other and counselors. They have made their own family that they can trust and who are loyal to them.

Isaiah and Beth had some sorting out to do. Isaiah made my heart bleed in Dare You To.

It bled all over the pages.

Katie cracked my heart open with Isaiah's pain.

I really like Beth and Echo. Noah is kind of the wiser one, I feel. Almost like the leader of this group that have come together. Noah is there when Isaiah needs him.

Warm fuzzies.

Enter Rachel the girl Isaiah would end up loving, but he took on a debt to a dangerous teenage thug because of Rachel’s naivety. It wasn’t his debt, but he owned it and stepped up to the plate. He had money issues before this happened.

He needed this debt like a hole in the head.

Rachel’s character I had a frustrating time with in Crash Into You. She is from a very wealthy family. She has waaayyy too over protective , hypocritical brothers, a mum who made a child to try keep Colleen’s spirit alive but left her alive daughter feeling invisible.

I liked Rachel more when she had her Mustang and she was being herself. I thought she suited Isaiah. 

I wasn’t sure of Rachel when she gave up without much of a fight allowing Isaiah, somebody she didn’t know, to take over her debt. Sure she was naive, but she is from a very wealthy family. Now if she was poor or middle class, I could understand that more, it gave me a more validated reason why she accepted Isaiah's help. 

We do learn she has family issues, but Isaiah does too.

Isaiah also has money issues and he needs to feed and clothe himself and pay rent. 

He is putting himself through school.

Bravo to Isaiah.

He never complains.

He makes no apologies for his appearance. Never judge a book by its cover, something Rachel's family needed to learn.

"This is who I am, Rachel. Accept it or not. The tattoos won't wash off. The earrings will never change. I am who I am and nothing more. I'm loyal to a chosen few, I always keep my word and I'll protect you with my life. I scare the hell out of most people, but you will never have anything to fear from me."

Rachel saw how Isaiah was living, yet I didn't feel like she really took the time to stop and think about his situation. She accepted him for who he was without much hesitation. 

She saw Isaiah for the good guy he was.

I watched Isaiah hanging on by a thread to his life. He and Noah virtually couldn’t feed themselves, late on rent and Isaiah is fighting so hard the whole book to get the money to pay Eric for Rachel's debt.

There is one thing Isaiah is awesome at.

It is cars.

But there is a legal and illegal side to what he loves and he has to choose which side to stay on.

For his future.

The future he is trying so hard to make a reality.

I just loved him so much more watching him not hesitate to overcome the obstacles he needed to keep Rachel safe.

Beth let a good catch go.

My heart ExPlOdEd watching Isaiah have so much going against him, but he doesn't waiver. He knows no different. His life is a struggle. He just accepts it and tries to live each day as it came. 

Fight each battle the best way he knows how.

He makes mistakes. He is a kid from the foster care system. He has done everything to survive. Every day is a financial or emotional struggle.

Then ... Ethan and West do what they did to Rachel and I just fumed. They didn’t just do it to Rachel, they did it to Isaiah without knowing. I just thought they were so selfish and who actually does that. Just takes and shrugs it off.

You are family. 

Boys!

I got angry at Rachel for not jumping up and down and demanding it back and meaning it. I get her reasoning's, but, I still got my crank on.

I felt at times Rachel was a doormat who Ethan claims as his twin, his best friend but he still belonged to that over protective , hypocritical boys club.

This is a rich family that is very dysfunctional. Their parents do care about them , yet none of them felt like they could talk to their own parents about their problems.

5 kids enabled their parent’s behavior.

I wanted to tell Rachel to get a job to help pay her debt. I am so glad she found some of her own money, sold some jewelry. It made me have a higher opinion of her.

She took some responsibility for her actions.

Yes, they were her actions and I think she forgot that sometimes along the way.

Isaiah was her Knight before he really knew her.

I am a little over protective of Isaiah. Heheeee! 

I just felt like Isaiah needed a break and he just wasn’t getting it. I wanted Rachel to stand up to her family earlier on, for Isaiah and herself.

He did it for her without hesitation.

I wanted her to be his Angel. I wanted Isaiah to be saved, for once.

Rachel was upset about her family issues, which really just needed her telling everybody how she felt.

I know, easier said then done, and then we saw what Isaiah was going through, well, comparing notes she still had it more comfortable.

Her money issues were brought on by her own naivety. It was like watching a relay race and everybody passing the baton to help her out. 

Rachel has more than one Knight.

I'm not being totally hard on Rachel as I do understand her reluctance to talk to her family. I gained more compassion for her character when she finally stepped up to the plate and what happened. 

I really like Courtney. 

I really like Logan. When he came to my attention in Dare You To , I knew he was going to be a great character. I love he and Isaiah get along.

Abby is such a great character as you don’t know what she is going to do next. She decides eventually what side of the fence she wants to sit on and when she does she comes through. She has things hinted about her past, I am interested to get a book about Abby’s story.

I know West’s book is up next and l’m looking forward to reading about him.

I definitely know that Katie made me feel Crash Into You. I think it is the first time I have gotten a tad peeved at the female lead.


* whispers * It may be because of my fictional love for Isaiah.

The one thing for certain is Katie writes a darn emotional read. 

You will feel. You can't help but feel.

Michelle