Meg & Linus, from Hanna Nowinski

Hello, dearies! Today we’re going to talk about of a book that has one of the prettiest covers I’ve seen in 2017: Meg & Linus, from Hanna Nowinski! I have received my review copy from Xpresso Book Tours through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review and this is it! Thank you, guys! And mega thanks to the wonderful Giselle ❤ ❤

Can friendship, Star Trek, drama club, and a whole lot of coffee get two nerdy best friends through the beginning of their senior year of high school?

Meg and Linus are best friends bound by a shared love of school, a coffee obsession, and being queer. It’s not always easy to be the nerdy lesbian or gay kid in a suburban town. But they have each other. And a few Star Trek boxed sets. They’re pretty happy.

But then Sophia, Meg’s longtime girlfriend, breaks up with Meg. Linus starts tutoring the totally dreamy new kid, Danny, and Meg thinks setting them up is the perfect project to distract herself from her own heartbreak. But Linus isn’t so sure Danny even likes guys, and maybe Sophia isn’t quite as out of the picture as Meg thought she was. . . .

From crowdsourced young adult imprint Swoon Reads, comes Meg & Linus by Hanna Nowinski, a fun friendship story about two quirky teens who must learn to get out of their comfort zones and take risk – even if that means joining the drama club, making new friends, and learning how to stand on your own.

Me after finishing this book:

Just remembering that those were my impressions and opinion as a reader =)

This book was really cute and a refresh in YA in terms of thematics. Meg & Linus are two sides of the same coin, with a unique perspective on how not to treat your friends after a break up. It was so nice to read a book focused on friendship rather than romance for a change! Nowinski did a wonderful job with characters construction and plot developing. This book only didn’t make it to the big five stars to me because of two reasons: a) I wasn’t as invested in the narrative as I thought I’d be, but I guess that’s because; b) Meg & Linus is my 15^th first person narrated book in less than a month. I really am not a fan of this narrative style and I’m really saturated of it at the moment, regardless of the quality of the books. I think it’s a classic ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ situation, oops! >.<

The narrative style is first person with alternating points of view between Meg and Linus. While they didn’t crawl under my skin and made me want to slap them (effects of usual first person narratives on me), I also missed being out of their thoughts and seeing the story in a more broad perspective. Does this make sense? Probably not, haha! Nowinski’s writing style was refreshing, with awesome humor catches, nerdy references and relating situations.

I didn’t quite know what to expect from the plot of Meg & Linus, but it had quite a few twists and I had fun following these two around. Of course, there are no over complicated points or a mystery to be solved, but life itself is already a handful, especially for teenagers. Things get wild real quick, haha!

Meg and Linus, as characters, were great – each in their own way. Again, the problem was me. I couldn’t connect with them or relate to half of the story. And this sucks hard for me because I love gay romances and Linus was living a real cute one. I need therapy.

BUT I DID SAVE A DIALOGUE FOR YOU, GUYS. Because it was so cute aaaand BECAUSE NOTHING SELLS THE BOOK BETTER THAN QUOTES =D

Linus: Can I tell you something really sappy, and will you promise not to laught at me if I do?

Meg: No. I’m absolutely going to laugh at you. But you can still tell me.

Linus: I really missed you, Meg. Although right now, I’m desperately trying to remember why.

Meg: Aw. You’re right. That was incredibly sappy!

This cover. I feel in love as soon as I saw it. I’m such a hard goner for black with metallic colors, you guys have no idea. This panda was a crow in its past life FOR SURE. The inversion with the pink and blue on the names, the simple illustrations along the way, the handwritten type font of the title… I CAN’T STOP FANGIRLING ABOUT THIS COVER.

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Overall, if you like your drama spiced with humor, nerd and pop culture, YA and LGBT reads, you totally should pick up Meg & Linus!

Thank you so much for reading this review! Also, thanks so much to Xpresso Book Tours and NetGalley for my review copy =D Bellow, you’ll find more info on the book and the author!

Meg & Linus

by Hanna Nowinski

Published by: Swoon Reads

Publication date: April 18^th, 2017

Genres: YA Contemporary, LGBT

Meg & Linus is available in both ebook and paperback formats!

Amazon | B&N | Kobo

Hanna Nowinski is a language enthusiast and trained translator for German and English who lives in the middle of nowhere, Germany. She has wanted to be a writer since she learned that books were made by real people. As a kid, she made up her own bedtime stories, mostly sending her stuffed animals on adventures around the world. She loves books, music, coffee, and getting way too emotionally invested in TV shows. Meg & Linus is her debut novel.

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With love,