DARE YOU TO by Katie McGarry Book Review
Series: Pushing the Limits, #2
Publication Date: May 28th 2013 by Harlequin Teen
Rating: 
– Acceptable | 
Book Summary: Ryan lowers his lips to my ear. “Dance with me, Beth.”
“No.” I whisper the reply. I hate him and I hate myself for wanting him to touch me again….
“I dare you…”
If anyone knew the truth about Beth Risk’s home life, they’d send her mother to jail and seventeen-year-old Beth who knows where. So she protects her mom at all costs. Until the day her uncle swoops in and forces Beth to choose between her mom’s freedom and her own happiness. That’s how Beth finds herself living with an aunt who doesn’t want her and going to a school that doesn’t understand her. At all. Except for the one guy who shouldn’t get her, but does….
Ryan Stone is the town golden boy, a popular baseball star jock-with secrets he can’t tell anyone. Not even the friends he shares everything with, including the constant dares to do crazy things. The craziest? Asking out the Skater girl who couldn’t be less interested in him.
But what begins as a dare becomes an intense attraction neither Ryan nor Beth expected. Suddenly, the boy with the flawless image risks his dreams-and his life-for the girl he loves, and the girl who won’t let anyone get too close is daring herself to want it all….
Book Review Overview:
- Katie McGarry got me to care about Ryan and Beth’s problems
- The cover says it all: steamy romance, no insta-love
- Despite my initial misgivings, I ended up enjoying Dare You To
When I first started to read Dare You To by Katie McGarry, I just wanted to do eyeroll after eyeroll. I must have been craving a lot of diversity in my reading at the moment because I kept thinking to myself: #whitepeopleproblems. Basically, everyone in Groveton, KY sounds white… there’s a dash of minorities when the main character goes back to Louisville, but that’s about it. I just felt distanced from the main characters because of this.
But you know what? Katie McGarry actually got me to care about the main characters, Ryan and Beth, so that was a big check plus in my book. I was able to empathize with Ryan and Beth and their not so perfect life. I even felt myself getting teary-eyed at some parts. McGarry knows how to get readers at their heartstrings. They did have legitimate reasons to be a bit whiny about their problems, but after a while it did start getting repetitive.
In terms of the romance, the cover says it all. Katie McGarry knows how to write a good kissing scene, and afterwards, you’ll just want to find your own boy to make out with. Though there’s instant attraction between Beth and Ryan, there’s a build up to their relationship. It doesn’t feel like insta-love, even if you know very early on that the two characters are bound to get together.
Despite my initial dislike for the setting and characters, I ended up liking Dare You To by Katie McGarry – definitely enough to check out the rest of her books.
About the AuthorKATIE MCGARRY was a teenager during the age of grunge and boy bands and remembers those years as the best and worst of her life. She is a lover of music, happy endings, and reality television, and is a secret University of Kentucky basketball fan. |
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