Betwixt Book Tour: Review + Giveaway!

Author: Melissa Pearl

Beautiful, wild-child Nicole Tepper is hit by a car and left for dead. But when she wakes the next morning, Nicole finds herself in bed without a scratch. Perhaps she was more intoxicated than usual, as her mother is giving her the silent treatment and her friends are ignoring her as well. 

Things take a turn for the weird when Nicole soon discovers she is actually hovering between life and death. Her body is lying in the forest while her spirit is searching for anyone who can hear her. Unfortunately the only person who can is Dale Finnigan, the guy she publicly humiliated with a sharp-tongued insult that has left him branded.

Desperate, Nicole has no choice but to haunt Dale and convince the freaked-out senior to help her. Will he find her body before it's too late? Or will the guy who tried to kill her with his car, beat him there and finish her off before anyone finds out?

REVIEW: 

There are a lot of things that I loved about this book. It made me cry quite a few times. It's a book about second chances, how sometimes when things are at the lowest possible point, we are given a chance to change things, to make a decision, to make it all better. I am an optimist and I love such stories. So it made me happy.

The characters are very well developed. Even the secondary characters have depth and I so love it when an author puts effort into the characters. That's one thing that can make or break a book or me. 

Nicki's boyfriend abandoned her on an isolated road when she refused to have sex with him(what a jerk, right?).  Later she gets hit by a car and is lying injured and alone in a dark place. Her soul (I think) is free from her body (though she is not dead, yet) and hovers around but nobody can see or hear her. She sees how broken her parents are, how her friends don't really care and assume that she has run away. No one is looking for her. But this guy Dale, with whom she was nothing but mean, can actually hear her and he wants to help her. So they start a search to find Nicki's body and find out what happened to her. 

Nicki is an incredibly likeable character. Yes, she was mean to people, she partied, slept around and didn't let anyone in before the accident but she wasn't always like that. Things happened that changed her. She had reasons and I could understand her. This was her way of coping. It broke my heart that she thought she didn't deserve to live. She is not whiny (even though she has every right to be), she made me smile and was just so strong. 

Dale is amazing. I freakin' love him. He was just so sweet and nice and loyal and the list can go on. I was totally swooning over him. He is just genuinely a really nice guy. Dale is one of those characters that make a book better just by being there. He never gave up on Nicki and saw the good in her. 

It did bother me a little that he accepted that he could hear Nicki so easily. I would have run in opposite direction shouting, if I were in his situation but maybe Dale is just that good a guy and would help anyone who asked. 

"I want to catch you when you fall." He grins.

"And I want to kiss you every day, but not just because I'm saying goodbye."

The plot isn't really new. It's been explored in some movies and books already. But the characters are real and you can empathize with them. Even the boy who caused the accident, you feel pity for him. It's actually applause worthy that every character is so distinct from others. The romance is sweet and progresses well. It has a pretty good pace and you will be rooting for them to end up together and for Nicki's survival. It's emotional, it's well written with great characters.  What else can I say? Go and read it.
Also, for every copy of Betwixt sold $1 will be donated to Love146, it gives children, who are caught up difficult situation, a second chance. Now that is just plain awesome.

"I don't know what you think you've done to have the right to talk like that, but whether you like it or not, I'm finding you."

"Sometimes we just have to accept the fact we can't explain everything. Life happens, whether we want it to or not and we don't always have a reason why. Our job is to try and make some good come out of it."

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