Review: Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins

My rating: ★★★★★
Book: Lola and the Boy Next Door
Author: Stephanie Perkins


In this companion novel to Anna and the French Kiss, two teens discover that true love may be closer than they think.

For budding costume designer Lola Nolan, the more outrageous, the outfit—more sparkly, more fun, more wild—the better. But even though Lola’s style is outrageous, she’s a devoted daughter and friend with some big plans for the future. And everything is pretty perfect (right down to her hot rocker boyfriend) until the dreaded Bell twins move back into the house next door.

When the family returns and Cricket—a gifted inventor and engineer—steps out from his twin sister’s shadow and back into Lola’s life, she must finally reconcile a lifetime of feelings for the boy next door.

I have no words to describe this. Stephanie Perkins does not fail to impress. She is definitely definitely on my list of top 10 authors, and both of her books are in my list of Top 10 Books now. I can not believe I have only just read her books, boy have i been missing out.

I was in love with Anna and the French Kiss, I didn't think Stephanie Perkins would be able to do any better than Anna but what can i say. she did.

I'm in love with her writing style. I think a lot of YA contemporary romance books have one problem, the stories are great but style of writing lets us down. Stephanie Perkins gets it just right, you get enough description in there to feel what the characters feel so you can empathize with them. Plus, the characters are so likeable you want them to ...well get together.

Lola is one confused chick, she has an older rock god boyfriend and everything is perfect but then Cricket returns. Cricket is this tall, handsome, loveable, down to earth guy who would do anything for anyone. But Lola has already given Cricket a chance and he left her. Whos ready for a second chance?

I just love Lola and Cricket, as charming as St. Clair is, Cricket is definitely my favourite (by a teeny tiny bit) I don't know, there is just something about him. He's clearly got the height, the strength on the outside but inside he's so soft and warm and caring, he's well dressed...basically,  he is the perfect guy. I even liked the fact that cricket didn't have much experience, it just worked for him. 

Just like Anna and the French Kiss I loved the setting; it wasn't in the city of love this time, it was in San Francisco.  I live in England so have not a single clue about what San Francisco is like but I sure did love the description of it. If it is actually anything like what it is in the book, I would love to visit there.

Okay so I finish reading Anna and I think wtf I need more..you cant just finish therethats crazy. So I sink into Lola and the Boy Next Door hoping I would find a story as good as Anna although I truly doubted it. And then out of nowhere...Anna and St Clair are back. I knew this was a companion novel, but I was shocked, I just sat there like... Whaaaaaaaaaaat. They were proper proper characters in Lola , and I was glad becaus e after Anna I didnt want to finish Anna and St. Clairs story I wanted to know what happend after, and we get to see them from a new pperspective, we see a new side to them.So a big thumbs up to Stephanie Perkins on that one for being nice enough to give up a bit more Etienne.

I think what was so great about Lola was that it was so different to Anna but so similar at the same time. This time Lola was feeling what Etienne was feeling throughout Anna.

The Cover...ahhhh perfection. It fits so well with the book, you can see the houses at the back and then there's the all important window that Anna and Cricket are standing in front of, and although I imagined Anna a little different the picture fits exactly with Lola in the book , and Cricket was exactly as I imagined him, I love his rubber bracelets, blue one of course. The cover was cute, and perfect for the book.

So, summing it all up, everything about this book was Perfect, from the inside out, and I would recommend it to EVERYONE, if your a girl I'm pretty sure you'll love it. Even if you don't usually read romances, give this at least a try. (You can read just Lola if you want, but I would recommend reading Anna first)

(I feel like i used perfect a lot in this review, but its the only word i could think of to show you how amazing this book is)