Flat Out Love by Jessica Park

Flat Out Love by Jessica Park
Series: Flat Out Love, #1
Source: Bought
Publisher: Self-published
Publication Date: April 11, 2011

He was tall, at least six feet, with dirty blond hair that hung over his eyes. His T-shirt read Nietzsche Is My Homeboy.

So, that was Matt. Who Julie Seagle likes. A lot. But there is also Finn. Who she flat out loves.

Complicated? Awkward? Completely.

But really, how was this freshly-minted Boston transplant and newbie college freshman supposed to know that she would end up living with the family of an old friend of her mother's? This was all supposed to be temporary. Julie wasn't supposed to be important to the Watkins family, or to fall in love with one of the brothers. Especially the one she's never quite met. But what does that really matter? Finn gets her, like no one ever has before. They have connection.


But here's the thing about love, in all its twisty, bumpy permutations—it always throws you a few curves. And no one ever escapes unscathed.

Flat Out Love was a good read for me, but I didn't like it nearly as much as I thought I would. I just couldn't get over the fact that Julie could be so...I don't know, judging I guess would be the word? That's not really right, but I'm sure you get the idea. She put me off just a little bit. Now, honestly, I read both this and the novella from Matt's POV, and I actually liked Matt more than I liked Julie. But when you read both, well, you realize how little Julie actually thinks about Matt. Whereas Matt thinks about her constantly. She's a really big part of his story, but he is almost nothing in hers. I think that may have been what put me off her, to tell the truth.

I mean, she was hilarious and she seemed like she'd be a lot of fun to hang out with, but she wasn't much more than that to me. She was constantly trying to fix the Watkins (especially Celeste) and she seems to have such a clear idea of what's "normal" and what's "not normal". Coming from a weird family myself, I really don't think that there is normal and not normal. Celeste was such a unique, bright kid. I really liked her, and I did want her to have more friends and everything, but she really wasn't that bad. Granted, yes, the "Flat Finn" thing really freaked me out, but I got over it.

But let's move on-- even though Matt really isn't a big part of Julie's story, I thought that they were adorable together whenever she gave him a chance. Matt was a funny, weird guy, but his nerdiness really was endearing. But...there was also another side of him, that, well, not gonna lie or anything-- kind of freaked me out. Daddy always said you don't bring crazy to the house, and he did a bunch of screwed up things. In his novella, though, you really get to see that what he was doing was for his family, not just to be weird. o.O

All in all, Flat Out Love was a good read, with awesome plotting and an interesting story, but the romance didn't grab me like I'd hoped it would. It didn't even really show up til the last bit of the book, honestly.