Review of To All The Boys I've Loved Before by Jenny Han

Format: Hardback
Genres: Contemporary, Romance,
Pages: 368
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Release Date: 15/04/2014
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Book Depository ¦ Amazon UK/US ¦ 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.

This is the first book of Jenny Han's I've read and sadly, I was a little disappointed. I know she has a huge fan base after her Summer series but I never got round to reading those, mainly due to the main character being called Belly which I just couldn't take. I loved the concept of this book - girl writes a letter to every major crush she's ever had and somehow they get sent and she has to deal with the consequences.

But there weren't actually any consequences. Sure it was a cute story and I enjoyed it but I was never worried about the main character. She was the cute funny type and I knew within a few chapters she'd never get into any fights or have anyone truly hate her, because she never was a threat. If she got into a fight with her sisters it was resolved quickly and easily. She lets both boys, Peter and Josh, just walk all over her.

There were 5 guys she sent letters to and like most readers were probably wondering, I was wondering how she'd deal with all the repercussions of her actions. Lucas, Kenny and some guy I don't even remember were crossed out pretty quickly, which left Josh and Peter. Oh look a love triangle. Cue sighs. 

Josh I never understood properly and I was expecting a lot more from his and Lara Jean's story than we actually got. Peter was nice in some places and an ass in others, pretty much two different people. He just walked all over Lara Jean and I didn't understand why he kept leading her on. However, when he was actually around he was really fun and it was the interactions between him and Lara Jean that kept me reading all the way through the book.

I didn't like the ending. The last 30 pages felt like everything was rushed to a hasty conclusion with a pretty bow and some of the major issues of the story were never touched upon. Like Peter constantly going back to his ex girlfriend, for example. Overall it's a cute, fun story but I was annoyed in a few places and bored in others.