Isla and the Happily Ever After

I am livid.I thought [b:Talon 17331828 Talon (Talon, #1) Julie Kagawa https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1397581124s/17331828.jpg 24035257] was the most disappointing book I'd read. I was wrong. This takes the cake. I loved [b:Anna and the French Kiss 6936382 Anna and the French Kiss (Anna and the French Kiss, #1) Stephanie Perkins https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1358271931s/6936382.jpg 7168450] and [b:Lola and the Boy Next Door 9961796 Lola and the Boy Next Door (Anna and the French Kiss, #2) Stephanie Perkins https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1358271832s/9961796.jpg 7149084]. I expected to love this just as I did those. And really, the writing is just as good. The setting is just as spectacular as the others.It's just everything else that sucked.For starters, I feel like this story, unlike the others, is lazy and underdeveloped. It seems like Isla and Josh's relationship is built almost entirely on sex. Look, I knew going into this that this would be the most sex-focused of the books. It said it would be ‘sexy' on the cover flap. But this? This is not love. This is lust. I read this for a love story, and that is not what I got.But you want to know the worst part about this book? Isla. Freaking. Martin. This chick is the protagonist and I honestly can't stand her. I've read my fair share of crappy lead characters, but Isla is probably the worst. She's bratty and whiny, and besides the fact that she reads, I share little to nothing in common with her. Here's just two things I really hated about her in particular.She's a stalker. No, really. She is. She's been “in love” (lust) with Josh ever since she was a freshman- she's now a senior. She knows everything about him. She's googled him. Googled his parents. She knows where he hangs out with his friends, where he doesn't go, she just knows that he must speak perfect French. It doesn't even get better when they're dating. Once they're dating, her stalker resources are put towards her extreme jealousy and possessiveness. I personally do not like these traits at all. Had Isla been a male character, these traits- her stalking, jealousy, and possessiveness- would have raised immediate red flags. Just because she's female doesn't mean she's immune from this same judgment.Second of all, she treats Kurt, her best friend, and Hattie, her younger sister, like crap. She doesn't care about them at all as long as she's with Josh. And then she has the audacity to blame them for her own mistake? It's disgusting, honestly. And don't even get me started on the insta-love vibes coming from Josh...To be completely honest, I think I disliked this book so much because I couldn't stand Isla. It just ruined the story for me, and I'm really disappointed in this book as a whole.