Review: Never Been Kissed by Melody Carlson

Elise's mom got a new job and so as a result they've had to move to a new town about 40 miles away for her junior year of high school. Elise is hoping to get off to a great start, but so far she only has one friend...a freshman girl in her apartment complex. Fortunately, an old friend from her old school introduces to her a gorgeous guy at her new school before classes begin. As a result, Elise has a fantastic first day in which she's warmly welcomed into the popular crowd.

But the second day of school, things change. Elise can't figure out what's happened, but Asher (the gorgeous guy) emails her later and explains that his girlfriend was jealous...can they keep their relationship secret for awhile. Elise agrees and so begins their separate public and private lives relationships.

But then something happens and pretty soon the whole school thinks that Elise sent a nude photo of herself to Asher. Elise knows she didn't do this, but no one seems to believe her and she has to prove her innocence.

The first half of this book started out great for me. I found it really interesting and enjoyed watching the story unfold. The second half dragged a little bit because I was pretty sure of what was going on way back in the beginning and as a result, Elise's naivite just got on my nerves. Now I'm an adult reading this and it's possible I've seen a bit more of the world, but I suspect teen girls who have to be so much more savvy about this stuff would also guess straight away.

Another thing I found annoying was that this was a story using ideas of sexting, but Elise barely used her phone or email. I just didn't find that very realistic for a girl of 15 years of age, whose mother hasn't put any limitations on her use of said items.

Additionally, the faith elements bordered on cheesy and uncomfortable at times for me and never went beyond a surface exploration.

So while I found the first part of the book to be quite compelling, I feel it ultimately failed to live up to its promise.

Available now at your favorite bookseller from Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group

Rating: 3.5/5
Things You Might Want to Know: Christian fiction
Source of Book: Received from publisher for revew
Publisher: Revell Books