Blurb:
For Nell Becker, life is a competition she needs to win.
For Jackson Hart, everyone is a pawn in his own game.
They both have everything to lose.
Nell wants to succeed at everything—school, sports, life. And victory is sweeter when it means beating Jackson Hart, the rich, privileged, undisputed king of Cedar Woods Prep Academy. Yet no matter how hard she tries, Jackson is somehow one step ahead. They’re a match made in hell, but opposites do attract.
Drawn to each other by their rivalry, Nell and Jackson fall into a whirlwind romance that consumes everything in their lives. But when a devastating secret exposes their relationship as just another game, how far will Nell go to win?
Visceral and whip-smart, Laurie Devore’s Winner Take All paints an unflinching portrait of obsessive love, toxic competition, and the drive for perfection.
Goodreads:
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Sometimes I read books and can’t help but make playlists to go with them. Sometimes I read epic books and sometimes they are just… ok.
This book is my 1st 5 star of 2018.
This book was soooo fucked yo!
This book was all this….
Yellow diamonds in the light I was standing side by side
As your shadow crosses mine
What it takes to come alive
It’s the way I’m feeling, I just can’t deny
But I’ve gotta let it go
I could do this review in all Rihanna Gifs but I won’t. If you want to full effect of how the book will make you feel watch the video on YouTube.
This is not your typical YA love story. This was cutting, sharp, toxic and unputdownable. This broached a lot of different issues, from anxiety, to drugs to drinking to self sabotage. Throughout the whole book I didn’t know whether I liked the MCs, if I liked the secondary characters, if I liked anyone at all.
BUT! Laurie Devore wrote this book so freaking good that I just did not want to stop reading and “We Found Love” was on a constant repeat in my head because that toxic burn of knowing something isn’t good or right for you and wanting it anyway?
As a mom of a teen I pray to God my daughter does not have this kind of savage drive to best someone. But she is my mini me so I can’t guarantee that won’t happen. But not anywhere close to Nell.
And my worst nightmare is being like Nell’s mom. Or making my daughter feel like how Nell felt. I don’t want perfection, I just want someone who knows right and wrong, left from right, north to south. I don’t want my mini me to ever feel like she has to slip some pills or worry about the boy she’s dating cause I would hate him. I mean I might right? God lets pray that doesn’t happen LOL. But not because he’s a rich privileged white kid. He was born into that.
I won’t try to make her decisions for her though.
As a mom I don’t want a toxic relationship for my kids. But as a mom who was a teen I know all about toxic love and maybe just maybe this is why I couldn’t wait to see how it ended and then I didn’t want it to end because then it would just be the end….
As a blogger it really sucks when you can’t formulate into words how great you thought a book was. All you can do is make your friends read it and then make your friend’s friends read it. And then you know, those friends, they your people.
Mare~
