Review: Slammed series by Colleen Hoover

I actually read this series a while back (early part of the year), but I loved it so much that I figured I'd  post my two cents on it.

Slammed (#1)

(Blurb): Following the unexpected death of her father, 18-year-old Layken is forced to be the rock for both her mother and younger brother. Outwardly, she appears resilient and tenacious, but inwardly, she's losing hope.

Enter Will Cooper: The attractive, 21-year-old new neighbor with an intriguing passion for slam poetry and a unique sense of humor. Within days of their introduction, Will and Layken form an intense emotional connection, leaving Layken with a renewed sense of hope.

Not long after an intense, heart-stopping first date, they are slammed to the core when a shocking revelation forces their new relationship to a sudden halt. Daily interactions become impossibly painful as they struggle to find a balance between the feelings that pull them together, and the secret that keeps them apart

Mini Review

Slammed was a great introductory book to the series. There's this exciting, yet forbidden, relationship that develops between Will and Layken that has you flipping through the pages with anticipation - wondering what they'll do next. (And hoping that it's every bit of forbidden that you could imagine ;-)). You're also introduced to the concept of slam poetry, which is what the characters connect over; the art of words. I've kind of heard of slam poetry before, but I've never experienced it any way. Colleen has a beautiful writing technique that is full of emotion and hits on various aspects of life that we can all relate too. Overall, it's a beautiful contemporary romance full of "head versus heart".

Point of Retreat (#2)
 
(Blurb): Hardships and heartache brought them together…now it will tear them apart.

Layken and Will have proved their love can get them through anything; until someone from Will’s past re-emerges, leaving Layken questioning the very foundation on which their relationship was built. Will is forced to face the ultimate challenge…how to prove his love for a girl who refuses to stop ‘carving pumpkins.’

Mini Review

This is really the 2nd half of the series - book 3 is more of a re-imaging. In Point of Retreat Will and Layken's relationship is taken to a whole new level as Layken finds her personal demons taking over her life and Will has some major career decisions to make. Both Will and Layken are forced to re-evaluate their relationship, and what it really means to be there for each other through thick and thin. 

I felt that Layken was a little melodramatic at times. She said she understood Will's thoughts on their situation, but often acted otherwise. This type of relationship definitely drew out the tension, however, I found myself tiring of it about mid-way through. Once Will and Layken start communicating - as in actually conveying feelings to each other rather than both expecting the other to be a mind reader - the story unfolds beautifully. Poetry is once again used as a communication method, and just as before, it's wonderfully done!

 This Girl (#3)

(Blurb): Layken and Will’s love has managed to withstand the toughest of circumstances and the young lovers, now married, are beginning to feel safe and secure in their union. As much as Layken relishes their new life together, she finds herself wanting to know everything there is to know about her husband, even though Will makes it clear he prefers to keep the painful memories of the past where they belong. Still, he can’t resist his wife’s pleas and so he begins to untangle his side of the story, revealing for the first time his most intimate feelings and thoughts, retelling both the good and bad moments, and sharing a few shocking confessions of his own from the time when they first met.

In This Girl, Will tells the story of their complicated relationship from his point of view. Their future rests on how well they deal with the past in this final installment of the beloved Slammed series.

Mini Review

This third installment was a little more of a re-imaging than a completely new installment, per se. It picks back up where Point of Retreat left off and then has a series of flashbacks that are told in Will's POV. It's kind of nice because it fills you in on some of the inbetween - like what happened between Will and Layken's mom and what Will was actually thinking when he was giving Layken emotional whiplash. While it has some new scenes in it and a few new poetry pieces, there's very little that is actually new. And for the most part, I could have went without this third installment. It really didn't offer up anything that I felt was missing in the first two books, as I didn't feel that Will needed to explain his actions any more than what they already were.  The flashbacks were sometimes hard to follow as well because the present and past sometimes merged together - or perhaps I just missed the breaks between.

If you really, really love Will or want his POV, you might consider picking this third piece up. But for the most part I'd say save your money on this one.

Ratings:

Writing quality: ***** (Book 1, 2) and **** (Book 3)
Character development: *****
Plot progression: ****
Romance: Great character tension, no explicit scenes