Ann Reviews: Just Like The Movies by Kelly Fiore

Title: Just Like The Movies 

Author: Kelly Fiore

Series: If Only... #7 (series can be read out of order)

Pages: 279

Format: Hardback

Rating: 4/5

Blurb: Pretty and popular track star Marijke Monti is confident about almost everything – she’s got great friends, a great family, and she’s on her way to the State Track Championship. In fact, the only thing Marijke isn’t confident about is her relationship with Tommy Lawson. 

Lily Spencer has spent her entire high school career preparing for the future – she’s participated in every extracurricular activity and volunteer committee she could. But, at home, she watches her mother go on date after date with dud-dudes, still searching for “the one.” Lily realizes that she’s about to graduate and still hasn’t even had a boyfriend. 

While they live on each other’s periphery at school, Lily and Marijke never seemed to have much in common; but, after a coincidental meeting at the movie theater, Lily gets an idea – why can’t life be like a movie? Why can’t they set up their perfect romantic situations, just in time for their senior prom, using movie techniques?

Once the girls come up with the perfect plans, they commit themselves to being secret cohorts and, just like in the movies, drama ensues.

"You know what would be great? If life could be like the movies."

I really enjoyed this book but I was very annoyed when I got to about the second chapter and it spoiled the ending of Pitch Perfect for me, as I had not seen it yet. I would recommend that you watch some of the romantic films before you read this book because it may well spoil some endings for you if you don’t. But if you are more of a film buff you will probably like the references.

The characters in this book developed as the book continued and as the main characters Marijke and Lily become friends and start to change one another for the better. I could relate to Lily more as she is more like me. She tried to stay in the background of things until Marijke pushed her to be more self-confident and to be noticed instead of being in the background. Marijke was also a good character because she develops as she becomes friends with Lily and realises that there is more to life than running and her boyfriend.

I liked the way the plot developed and how the ending wasn’t just in the last chapter but it was thought through and strategically written so that not everything good happened in the last few chapters. The plot was predictable yet I still loved it.

This was a well written book and I enjoyed it. I was in a bit of a reading slump when I read this book because I had a lot of homework to do but I didn’t want to put it down and I had finished it after about 2-3 days. Overall it was a very enticing book and I liked it. 

The only bad thing about it was that it was very focused on love and there were not really any mention to how the characters changed and became bolder and more active in school life. It would have been better if it had mention something other than the love side of things. 

Overall I would recommend that you read this book because although I didn't like that it was very 'lovey dovey' it was a good book and I enjoyed it. A good short read for if you are looking to read something when you don't know what to read next.

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