Review: The Hazards of Skinny Dipping by Alyssa Rose Ivy♥

The Hazards of Skinny Dipping by Alyssa Rose Ivy
Release Date: May 17, 2013
Format: ebook, 248 pages
Source: Review copy for blog tour
Buy It: Amazon | B&N

Description from Goodreads:
This isn't a deep book about first loves or self-discovery. If you want a book like that, I'd be happy to recommend one, but I don't have that kind of story to tell. Instead my story is about rash decisions and finding out that your dream guy is bad in bed. It's the story of when I finally went skinny dipping, and how my life was never the same again. Oh, and it's also the story of my freshman year of college and realizing Mr. Right might have been there all along.


I feel like I should start this review by saying that I'm pretty sure I've found a new author I need to start reading EVERYTHING of. Seriously.

Because The Hazards of Skinny Dipping? Um, yeah, it was FANTASTIC. I started reading this book at, like, 3 AM on a school night. Or maybe it was a weekend. All I know is that I was about to go to sleep, but I was stalling by playing with my Kindle...which means it was a school night, because why would I be stalling on a weekend? ANYWAY. I started reading it at some ungodly hour. I'm not going to say I pulled an all-nighter and read the whole thing. That, my friends, would be a lie. But I DID, however, spend the whole next day wishing I was at home reading this book and whining to anyone who would listen about how I needed to go home and reeeeeeeeeeead!

Also, Reeeeeed.

There is a difference. But I do love them both.

Since I'm a booklover and all, you'd think I get all eager about books all the time like that. But honestly? I don't. I'm actually pretty good about reading during free time during school/at home. Of course, there are always those special books and stuff that I get all excited about (HAZARDS being one of them), but it doesn't happen as often as you'd think.

Don't throw rocks at me for saying that.

But, anyway. HAZARDS. This book was just IN MY BRAIN. Once I started it, it just would not leave me alone and I loved every single second of it.

Character Rundown:
Juliet: Wicked sense of humor, admirable backbone, and snark up the yin-yang, this chick is my kind of MC. Her narration was truly what made this story come to life, and she is added to my not-so-long list of female characters that I not only like, but LOVE.

Reed: I loved this boy from the moment we shot him, backwards-hat and all. He is so my boy. He wasn't really cookie-cutter at all, he was just...real. Nice, but not overly and unbelievably so. Funny. Mature. Attractive. Or, at least the picture I have painted in my mind of him is attractive. ...very much so.

Plot. First and foremost I love how skinny dipping began this story and then played a part all the way through. And I DON'T mean that Juliet goes skinny dipping every five pages. I just mean that the story began and then everything is all the snowball effect of that and I liked that. I was not very impressed with the...conflict? Conflict that sprang up between my two favorite characters in this story. I just don't feel like what happened was worth as big of a deal as it was given. Other than that, though, this story...it got me, y'all.

Romance. So, I'm just going to pretend Douchebag Dylan never existed, because he's not worth anything. Not even an iota of concentration right now. So I'll move on to Reed--the boy where my focus is on one hundred and ten percent. Reed and Juliet...they just had IT. Their banter was perfect, and their interactions were the greatest. I heart these two.

I also feel it is worth mentioning that Alyssa Rose Ivy wrote some of my favorite dialogue in this book. Part of the reason I'm so in love with this book, and now this author.

The ending. Skinny dipping through and through, you guys.

Overall, Alyssa Rose Ivy has written a wonderful New Adult novel that swept me away and stuck in my mind all the way through. She also created some magnificent characters that are so completely REAL, I can't help but love them. (Except Dylan. I've no love for Mr. Douchebag.)

♥Jessica(: