Review: One Tiny Lie by K.A. Tucker

Title: One Tiny Lie (Ten Tiny Breaths #2)
Author: K.A. Tucker
Published: June 11th 2013
Add It: Goodreads
Purchase: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | The Book Depository

Livie has always been the stable one of the two Cleary sisters, handling her parents' tragic death and Kacey's self-destructive phase with strength and maturity. But underneath that exterior is a little girl hanging onto the last words her father ever spoke to her. “Make me proud,” he had said. She promised she would...and she’s done her best over the past seven years with every choice, with every word, with every action.
Livie walks into Princeton with a solid plan, and she’s dead set on delivering on it: Rock her classes, set herself up for medical school, and meet a good, respectable guy that she’s going to someday marry. What isn’t part of her plan are Jell-O shots, a lovable, party animal roommate she can’t say ‘no’ to, and Ashton, the gorgeous captain of the men’s rowing team. Definitely him. He’s an arrogant ass who makes Livie’s usually non-existent temper flare and everything she doesn’t want in a guy. Worse, he’s best friends and roommates with Connor, who happens to fits Livie’s criteria perfectly. So why does she keep thinking about Ashton?
As Livie finds herself facing mediocre grades, career aspirations she no longer thinks she can handle, and feelings for Ashton that she shouldn’t have, she’s forced to let go of her last promise to her father and, with it, the only identity that she knows.

I knew going into this that most people didn’t find this better than Ten Tiny Breaths or anything near the goodness that was TTB. Since TTB was a little rough for me because I didn’t connect with Kacey that much, I was seriously scared to read One Tiny Lie. Those negative-ish and 'meh' reviews didn't really help the cause. Oh, well, let's get on with it and hear what I had to say

“Life has a funny way of creating it's own tests. It throws curve balls that make you do and think and feel things that are in direct conflict with what you had planned and don't allow you to operate in terms of black and white.”

The beginning was so good. The first chapter was completely random, because Kacey basically called Livie out on being too stoic and not having fun and enjoying herself and, of course, the always weird Dr. Stayner. HOW DOES THIS GUY EVEN OWN A LICENCE?

There is no way this guy would be working if he was an actual, real person. Ok, ok, this is fiction, yes, but still, I’m not a fan of his. Seriously, am I the only one who thinks this guy is a total creep? O.o Anyhow, the second chapter had me laughing out loud and that happened a lot before Kacey went home from the uni Livie starts classes at. Then everything basically fell apart.

Livie was a good student before and I’m not opposed to exploring one’s wild side, especially during college. Ashton was pretty great and even though their chemistry was sizzling hot, I found their actions to be something along the lines of wtf. You see, Ashton has a girlfriend. Even if the girlfriend is half across the world and it’s basically a façade on his part, still, he has one. Livie gets a boyfriend—Ashton’s best friend (and lol, I didn’t see the best friends relationship between them at all. If it wasn’t for mentioning it, I could not have guessed they were best friends). Still, they try to resist their attraction, but of course they cannot help themselves and I did not appreciate the cheating in this case.

The plot was almost non-existent what with Livie learning how to party and drown jell-o shots one after another, the chemistry build-up and cheating? It just wasn’t for me, to be honest with you. I did appreciate the epilogue—that was a nice touch. I hated the way Livie and Ashton were together together during their first time, or rather how it all lead to that. Livie was so out of character for me and it literally made me sick. Even if you love someone and they love you, it’s never okay to do that to other people (like the guy’s girlfriend and your own boyfriend). It was just all sorts of “wtf whyyyyyyy are you doing this I don’t understand??!!!”

The few good things about this novel were: the mentioning (and few showings) of Trent, Kacey and Livie’s relationship, the beginning (with the exception of the first chapter), the writing and the epilogue.

All in all, it was hot, yes. It was sweet and by the end of the novel Livie had grown into a different person, and not necessarily a bad one, but the actions that lead to the epilogue were just plain random and made me all kinds of frustrated. There wasn’t much of a plot and the college world was pretty much under developed, plus the middle part just dragged since we all knew what was coming anyway. All in all, pretty much disappointed in this book since I expected so much more.

Overall rating: 2.3 out of 5.0
Stars: ★★

Meet the author

Website | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads