This Is What Happy Looks Like

This is just a really sweet summer book. I think it was all a little fast-paced at the beginning, and the whole thing with Ellie's father could've been explained more clearly for sure, but the two leads are likeable and well developed. Also, the ending was very sudden and a lot of things weren't explained. There's definitely room for a sequel, which I'd be more than happy to read.

This is What Happy Looks Like by Jennifer E. Smith was a very cute contemporary book. It contains parts that are adorable, funny, and heartwarming. I give it about a 3.5-4/5 star rating.

This books follows the strange long distance friendship between two pen pals, Ellie and Graham. Ellie lives in the middle of no where Maine and Graham is a new teenage movie star in California. They have no idea who each other are. They accidentally started talking one day when Graham sent Ellie an e-mail but it was meant for his friend. This is how their friendship started.

Now, I think it went very quickly from their e-mails to meeting in person. It was about the second or third chapter. Graham is just like “What if we move our movie set to Maine?!” And then when he gets there, he immediately (kinda stalkerish) looks for her and ends up accidentally asking out her best friend that was wearing her shirt!

This book was very cute but they didn't have much of a “spark” connection. It just seems kind of between the lines type of romance where the readers has to imagine their spark instead of reading it. Which kind of sucks but I believed that they genially liked each other.

I really enjoyed the parts where they were talking though e-mail but it was kind of strange that they even used that when they were together. Why didn't they just text or call? The e-mails would go straight to their phone so it is sort of the same thing. I really enjoyed the part where it showed Ellie's saved drafts for e-mails she was going to send out.

Overall, this was a good decent contemporary read. I almost read the entire thing during my short work shift because it was easy to breeze through. I would recommend it to anyone though that likes contemporary books and cute little romances.

*3.5 STARS.

(Review originally posted here at The Book Barbies.)

I read This Is What Happy Looks Like for the Spring into Summer Readalong. Thankfully, I enjoyed it a lot more than The Vincent Boys. I love how Jennifer E. Smith gets such unique titles, yet they match the book completely. This book had me smiling so much! And it had some fabulously quotable lines:

“How can you know it makes you happy if you've never experienced it?” – “There are different kinds of happy,” she said. “Some kinds don't need any proof.”

This Is What Happy Looks Like

Priceless

This Is What Happy Looks Like