Friday 1 May 2015

YA review: Nowhere But Here by Katie McGarry

Title: Nowhere But Here
Author: Katie McGarry
Series: Thunder Road #1
Acquired: Review
Genre: Young Adult
Publisher: MIRA Ink
Release date: 26th May 2015

Seventeen year old Emily loves her life with great parents, good friends and living in a safe neighbourhood. But, she has a biological dad who she's curious about, even if she doesn't want to admit it. Instead of being her dad he chose life as a member of Reign of Terror, a motorcycle club.

An unexpected visit turns into a stay Emily never thought she would do and nothing is what she thought it was; not her dad, not the club and certainly not Oz, the guy she seems to be stuck with. 

Review
Katie McGarry is one of my go to authors. I have loved every single book in her Pushing the Limits series so I couldn't wait to get my hands on her new series. 

Protagonist Emily comes from a pretty conservative family but she knows that her biological father is a member of a motorcycle club. She's intrigued and curious about him but doesn't want to admit that in case she hurts her mother and father. Honestly, Emily came across as a bit bland to begin with. She has a normal life, normal friends and a normal family if you don't count her absent biological dad. That was the most intriguing thing about her to begin with and I wanted her to have a bit more to her than that. 

Luckily, Emily really comes into her own over the course of this book. Unexpected circumstances force her to spend time with Eli, her biological dad and the club he belongs to. She soon proves that she is someone not to be messed with and she is actually quite feisty... not what I was expecting at all. As the story panned out I found myself liking Emily more and more for proving me wrong. 

The Thunder Road series is very different from Pushing the Limits for many reasons, not that it's a bad thing. In fact, it's a really good thing. Honestly, some of the subject matter in the Pushing the Limits novels is quite depressing and there are many broken families. What I loved about this book was the sense of family and community within Reign of Terror. Emily doesn't really understand what she's told about the club and how they are with one another but Katie McGarry really shows this throughout the whole book. 

Oz was a part of that family and the one made to look after Emily while she was in town. I loved Oz from the beginning. He had that smoking hot bad boy thing going for him but through his narrative, you could also see there was a hell of a lot more to him than that. I think a lot of that came from being so close to the club and knowing what it meant to be a part of it all. When it came to Emily, he knew things he shouldn't about her but was also torn because of everything else he thought he knew about her. Oz was a pretty perfect main male character for me as he had everything I could possibly want. 

In regards to the plot, Nowhere But Here has a hell of a lot going on. Not only do we have to learn of Emily's real story, the truth about her dad and a million other things but there is some serious drama and heartbreak in these pages. I was not expecting to feel so much while reading this one and I just could not put it down. McGarry's writing is utterly addictive and I cannot get enough of her books. This one is absolutely fantastic!

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