Kiss. Marry. Kill. Nineteen-year-old June Eyermann has always known exactly which of her favorite Byronic heroes goes where. She’d kiss moody and possessive Rochester from Jane Eyre and marry prideful but repentant Darcy from Pride and Prejudice, leaving obsessive and spiteful Heathcliff from Wuthering Heights to be chucked off a cliff—but no. She couldn’t leave any of her heroes behind. She lives for her favorite fictional worlds.
But June is about to get a serious wake up call when she returns home for the summer after her college freshman year. Stuck somewhere between feeling like a kid again under her parents’ roof and being forced to start acting like an adult with worries about her future career, June looks at the library volunteer position offered to her as a way to keep her sanity for the next few months before she can go back to school.
What June doesn’t expect to find at the library is her favorite romantic heroes brought to life—all in the same man. Obstinate, prideful and even a bit rude, Everett Rockford shouldn’t exactly be “dating material,” even if June’s heart rate accelerates whenever she’s near him. But after discovering his enigmatic past and witnessing a few fiery moments of tenderness, June can’t help but see Rochester, Darcy and even Heathcliff in Everett. If she’s going to make it through the summer without becoming a tragic heroine in her own story, she has to separate the man from the ideals of fiction in her head. Because if there’s one thing she knows about Byronic love stories, it’s that they don’t always end happily ever after.
If you're looking for a fun read, then you need to check out A Love for the Pages by Joy Penny. Anyone who has ever gone to college not knowing what they want to do for the rest of their life will sympathize with June, the protagonist of the story. Her overbearing stepfather thinks he knows what's best for June, and because he's paying for her college education, she has to listen. But come summertime, when he wants her to work for him, she revolts by taking a job at her local library. Enter one tall, dark and handsome stranger who literally knocks her off her feet and June is about to experience a summer she'll never forget.
At first I worried I wouldn't understand the Jane Austen references because I've never read any of her books before, but Penny does a good job of explaining the similarities without hitting you over the head with them. I found myself unable to put the book down at times because I couldn't wait to find out what happened next. Definitely pick this one up!
A Love for the Pages is definitely a contemporary romance, but it's so unlike other books in the New Adult genre that I've read. The inclusion and influence of so many great classics in this story made it something incredible for me. One of the first books I ever read was Jane Eyre when I was probably ten years too young for it at the time. Regardless, I loved that book. Over the years, I've returned to it many times. I fully hold it responsible for fueling my love of classics. A Love for the Pages is able to intertwine the feel of those great classics with a romantic contemporary. I really liked the character of June. To see how she relates her life to the classics was something that made me bond with her immediately. I think a lot of readers who are fans of the classics will see a part of themselves in June and bond with her in the same way. The romance for June and Everett did seem a bit rushed and simplified, though. I would have enjoyed being able to see their love bloom slowly, but that's just personal preference. Everett was a good fit for the role of June's love interest, though. For a debut, Joy Penny has hit it out of the park with A Love for the Pages. She's able to recall the feel of the classics with her very own spin in a satisfying love story. This is a book that I could definitely see myself revisiting and that's a huge thing for me. I'm not keen on rereading, but A Love for the Pages is such a quick and enjoyable read that I can't resist. Fans of Austen, the Brontë sisters, and other classics will fall in love with A Love for the Pages! - Pretty Little Pages.
