Don't You Wish: Review

Title: Don't You Wish
Author: Roxanne St. Claire
Release Date: July 2012
Published By: Delacorte Books
Pages: 368
Goodreads Rating: 3.93 stars

Review: When unpopular Annie Nutter gets zapped through one of her dad's crazy inventions and turns into rich, beautiful, and popular Ayla Monroe, she thinks nothing could be better. She lives in glitzy Miami, parties backstage at concerts, hits the clubs with her friends, and has the most gorgeous boyfriend she could imagine. But on the inside, she's still Annie, and not everything is as great as it seems. Soon she's confronted with a choice to make: should she stay or should she go?

I had my reservations about DON'T YOU WISH, and at first I thought my worries came true because the start of the book was slow-going for me. Annie seemed relatively flat at the beginning and I found her complaints to be rather tiresome. However, as the book progressed, the plot grabbed me more and more, and Annie definitely matured and became much more likeable and readable. 

The other main concern I had before starting this book was that the plot would be cliche because, let's be honest, this kind of plot-line has been done too many times to count in the past, whether it be through parallel universes or wishing or a bizarre invention that lands the nerd girl in the queen bee's body. Fortunately, the story quickly revealed its own unique way of dealing with this kind of plot, so for that reason, this book stands out among others with similar stories.

This isn't usually the case for me, but one of my favorite parts of this book was the romance. Because of length constraints and by nature of being a subplot, I often find that the romances I read in novels don't really grab me that much, but this was certainly not the case here. Annie/Ayla's romance with Charlie built up slowly but steadily, and it was definitely one of the better romances I've read. For sure, I wouldn't mind knowing him in real life!

All in all, DON'T YOU WISH surprised me with how much I enjoyed it. I came in expecting a cliche book with an irritating main character, and while that seemed true for the first chapter or so, the quality of the novel soon emerged. This stands out from other books with similar plots and has a great romance, to boot. I recommend this to any fans of Fair Coin, or anyone who wants a different type of "wishing" book.