Bully (The Fall Away Series) by Penelope Douglas

Synopsis: My name is Tate.

He doesn’t call me that, though. He’ll barely refer to me at all, and he’ll hardly ever speak to me.

But he still won’t leave me alone.

We were best friends once. Then he turned on me and made it his mission to ruin my life. I’ve been humiliated, shut out, and gossiped about all through high school. His pranks and rumors got worse as time wore on. I even went to Europe for a year, just to avoid him.

But I’m done hiding from him now, and there’s no way I’ll allow him to ruin another year. He might not have changed, but I have.

It’s time to fight back.

Getr it on Amazon: http://amzn.to/1OJCIs7

Add it to your TBR list: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20803953-bully?ac=1

Rated:  3.5 Stars

This was an interesting read for me.  It could really go either way for me.  And I like it when I can’t decide if I liked it or not because then the book did what few others do and that is really make me think.    This is an NA romance running a little over 300 pages.  Suitable for ages 18+ due to sexual situations and some violence, also, there is an attempted rape scene so, trigger warning.

This book started out great! I was all revved up to cheer Tate on while she didn’t take any more crap from Jared after her year abroad.   But then it kind of got all out of whack.  She was doing well with taking back her life, she was quite literally fighting back!  I do love me an assertive female lead.  Then the guilt started, and I think she was right in her feelings of guilt, two wrongs don’t make a right.  Once she started to find out the real reason why he was so cruel to her, she realized he was only taking it out on her and he didn’t really hate her.

I think I resent his controlling alpha male personality.  He showed no vulnerability in the first half of the book.  And I was looking for a little foreshadowing so I tried to withhold my judgment of him.  But, alas, it was too little too late.  The theme seemed to be forgiveness.  He went too far is his bullying in my opinion.  You know the saying, “you always hurt the ones you love”?  I am a believer in this saying and even though in the end he came around and apologized (Which, IMO, he didn’t do well enough for me) I just didn’t feel the sincerity in his actions. I am an emotional reader and go based on how the book makes me feel.  And while I am well aware this is fiction, I think this book hit a little too close to home for me and I like to have an escape.   I still recommend this book to read.  I liked it.  It just didn’t blow me away in the way I was expecting.