Blog Tour + Review: Only For You by Genna Rulon

Only For You

By Genna Rulon

Release Date: September 24, 2013

Source: Blog Tour

Summary: All Everleigh Carsen wanted to do was complete her final semester at Hensley University and begin the life she carefully planned. 

When a wave of violent crime seizes campus, Everleigh is persuaded to attend a school sponsored self-defense seminar by her best friend, where she meets volunteer instructor, Hunter Charles. After Everleigh’s biting sarcasm induces Hunter to eject her from class, a tempestuous relationship is born. 

Everleigh is determined to forget the striking man, but fate—that fickle shrew—continuously intervenes. Unable to escape him, she declares Hunter an enemy combatant. The only complication…Hunter is resolutely pursuing vindication…by any means necessary. Verbal warfare ensues, and despite Everleigh’s ingenious efforts, in Hunter, she has finally found her equal.

Only For You is a compelling tale of friendship, desire, and redemption—brimming with intelligent characters, witty dialogue, unexpected twists, profound sorrow, unfettered hope, and love’s unassailable perseverance.

Review: New Adult has become one of my favorite genres, so I love finding new novels in that genre to read. When I saw that this one was about a college senior who falls for the self defense instructor at her school where a string of attacks have occurred, I couldn't wait to see how their relationship would turn out.

In her final semester at Hensley University, Everleigh can't wait to graduate and take over the coffee shop she's worked at for years. The series of recent personal attacks against females on campus, though, leaves the female population feeling scared and defenseless. Everleigh's best friend and roommate Sam convinces her to take self defense classes together. What Everleigh doesn't expect is to find the instructor to be so hot, and so invigorating at the same time. Soon, though, it seems everywhere she goes there he is, and they start to form a friendship where they both want more, but aren't willing to take the risk…yet. 

This book held so much potential. The story sounded very intriguing and the characters sounded like they'd be fun to read about. Sadly, the author's writing style detracted way too much from the story and I found myself really disliking the main character. Let's start with the writing. The author overused her adjectives wayyyyyyyyyy too much (I have this same problem too and have to consciously cut them out) and it seemed like she had a thesaurus next to her the entire time she was writing. There were way too many words that I could not even imagine any normal college student using and instead of writing normal narrative, the author used as many different variations of words she could think of, which made reading it feel choppy and unnatural. 

Going onto the main character, I really wasn't a fan of Everleigh. She sounded so full of herself and I hated how she knew she could seduce anyone she wanted to because she was so good looking. Not to mention, she's supposed to be super poor and her mom just died, but she buys coffee ALL THE TIME (despite working at a coffee shop where I'm pretty sure she can get it for free), has a ton of clothes, and constantly eats at the dining halls for what seems like every meal. Being a college student, I know all of that racks up, not to mention her paying for car insurance and gas money. Her life just didn't seem realistic and her personality really rubbed me the wrong way. 

What saved the book for me was definitely the ending. I really didn't see the twist the author threw in coming (the part with Hunter, not the part with Sam…I kinda saw that one coming). Everleigh and Hunter's relationship seemed to dragggggg on, but I understand why and liked how it grew instead of being an instant thing. 

While this story had potential, I didn't like the main character and the author's writing really distracted from what was happening in the story. I understand some people have big vocabularies, but using all of the words you know in your writing is distracting and not natural at all. This one had a pretty good romance, but didn't leave me begging for me.