Love Me Never by Sara Wolf

Synopsis:
Previously published as Lovely Vicious, this fully revised and updated edition is full of romance, intrigue, and laugh-out-loud moments.

Don’t love your enemy. Declare war on him.

Seventeen-year-old Isis Blake hasn’t fallen in love in three years, nine weeks, and five days, and after what happened last time, she intends to keep it that way. Since then she’s lost eighty-five pounds, gotten four streaks of purple in her hair, and moved to Buttcrack-of-Nowhere, Ohio, to help her mom escape a bad relationship.

All the girls in her new school want one thing—Jack Hunter, the Ice Prince of East Summit High. Hot as an Armani ad, smart enough to get into Yale, and colder than the Arctic, Jack Hunter’s never gone out with anyone. Sure, people have seen him downtown with beautiful women, but he’s never given high school girls the time of day. Until Isis punches him in the face.

Jack’s met his match. Suddenly everything is a game.

The goal: Make the other beg for mercy.

The game board: East Summit High.

The reward: Something neither of them expected.

    

My Review:
4.5 stars — This is actually the second time I’ve read this book…I read the original incarnation a few years ago, and when I saw it was being released again with some changes, I decided to try for it on NetGalley and give it another read.  Of course since it’s been over 2 years since I read it, I honestly didn’t notice the changes, b/c I have a terrible memory for the details of a plot.  But I can honestly say that I enjoyed it just as much as the first time I read it.

Isis. Was. Everything.  She was, quite frankly, HILARIOUS.  Seriously, I have never read a character with this much snark, this much sass…her internal thoughts had me in stitches, and the bantering she engaged in — particularly with Jack — was just delightful to read.  And it wasn’t just witty repartee, sometimes Isis would devolve into childish humour too, and I enjoyed the range she showed — she was more than just one thing.  I started highlighting, and soon realized I would be highlighting half the book if I kept that up.  And it wasn’t just this aspect of Isis that made her such a fascinating heroine for me.  Isis was so completely damaged, and the moments where we got to see just how much broke my heart.  Being so completely convinced of your own unworthiness…ERGH!!  It just hit so close to home sometimes…not to that degree, but empathizing with her was just natural for me.  My heart is still aching for her.  (and let’s not even get started on her home situation)

Jack, on the other hand, was a conundrum.  He was so horrible sometimes — unabashedly so — and it would be so easy to hate him.  But he was given depth.  And while it doesn’t excuse his behavior, I did end up feeling for him as a character.  At the same time, he scared the shit out of me towards the end there.  I’m afraid to find out more about what happened back in middle school, and I’m worried for his state of mind.  That boy needs help.

While I enjoyed the secondary characters, for me it was Jack and Isis that carried the story.  And the uniqueness of the plot.  Not that it didn’t have a lot of common themes, but it just went about things in such a different way that I feel like it’s nothing I’ve read before.

I can’t wait to read the next book.  I wish I had gotten it before it was picked up for republishing, b/c it’s going to be so hard to wait til November to get my greedy little hands on the next installment.