Book Review: Confess

Title: Confess

Author: Colleen Hoover

Genre: New Adult, Romance

Published: 2015

Rating: 

Brief Overview: Auburn meets Owen, a successful young painter, and their flirtation quickly turns to something more. Both have secrets that could hinder their relationship, and only Owen knows how their pasts are connected to each other. Auburn must also confront the manipulative people in her life to help her get back the one thing she wants more than anything else.

Main Characters: 

Auburn: At first I was frustrated with Auburn's character. She's only 20 at the beginning of Confess, but seems both more mature and far more naive than any 20 year old I know. However, as I got further in, I felt the reasons for this were explained and I understood the character better. Auburn is self sacrificing and strong though the book often puts her in desperate situations. 

Owen: Owen is an unrealistic character in my opinion but I still love him (I think that's the point!) He is very mature, kind and giving for a character in his early 20's. He also whole-heartedly embraces a situation that most guys his age would run away from. (I wont give away any spoilers!)

He goes through something really awful at a young age which could explain his maturity, but unlike Auburn, Owen still didn't seem quite real to me. He is at first presented as the bad boy with a good heart we so often see in romance novels, but there really isn't anything "bad" about Owen at all. 

Impressions: Confess was a bit more of a cheesy romance novel than I was expecting. (I know some people love cheesy romance novels, but they aren't really my style.) In one part of the book, the characters let pizza burn when they are hungry to keep making out. Seriously who burns pizza? Have they ever had pizza??` (I feel like there is a joke about cheesiness somewhere in this pizza rant...)

Burnt pizza aside, there is a deeper story here and that's why I rated this book highly. Colleen Hoover is the best at putting in little unexpected twists and there are certainly twists in this story. Beyond the surface romance, there lies a story about family. The author juxtaposes each of the two main character's parent-child relationships and connects them to conclude the novel. The premise of the book does depend on coincidence (aka fate for you romance novel lovers) and I'm pretty cynical about these things, but in the end it was a sweet story about love and family.

If you liked Confess, you want to read: 
Ugly Love by Colleen Hoover