Cait’s Review of “Plus One” by Kelsey Rodkey

By: Cait Marie

Blurb

They say that those who can’t do, teach.

Lahey Johnson is notorious for helping her friends and classmates find love. Sure, she’s never had a boyfriend herself. But she could. If she wanted to. Right? She just hasn’t had a reason to focus on her own love life—but now, with her detested cousin Summer’s sweet sixteen coming up, she’s got the ultimate reason: revenge.

Lahey will do anything to prove that she can get a date to Summer’s party—anything, including juggle six prospective suitors in seven days. She’s matched people before—all she needs to do is figure out who these guys are looking for and become that girl. Easy.

The only issue? Her older sister’s irritating friend Adler has decided to take a front-row seat to the spectacle that is Lahey’s life. He can bother her all he wants—nothing will distract Lahey from her goal of one-upping Summer.

But as the party creeps closer, the panic sets in.

Can a matchmaker ever really meet her own match?

Review

It’s official… Kelsey Rodkey is now one of my favorite YA authors. I’ve read all three of her books in the last couple weeks, and I absolutely love them. They seem to just keep getting better too.

This one was really fun. Lahey is desperately trying to find someone to take as her plus one to her cousin’s birthday. So, she starts asking out various classmates on dates to choose which guy is the best to outshine her cousin. Of course, none go according to plan. And she can’t figure out why when she’s such a good matchmaker for other people.

Worse than that, her older sister’s friend Adler keeps witnessing the disastrous dates. He’s also there to step in as needed though. The two used to be friends, but when she tried to use her matchmaking skills on him, he got angry and they’ve been bickering and teasing each other since.

Their dynamic was great. It was easy to tell that beneath the arguing, they still both cared about each other a lot, and seeing them grow closer again was the best. This book had like all my favorite tropes rolled into one, so that was fantastic.

I will say, however, that Lahey is very similar to the main female characters in Rodkey’s other books. On their own, they’re fine, but because I read them all back to back, it felt a little repetitive. Everything else was varied and wonderful. It’s just those main female characters. All three have been very outgoing and ambitious, and all three start off being fairly self-centered. It’s a common theme in each book that they realize how selfish they’ve been and then try to make things right. Again, on its own, there’s nothing wrong with this. I really enjoy it. But the main female characters all feel like the same person just with different interests, hobbies, etc.

There were a couple minor things that bothered me about this book, but not enough to deter me. For example, Adler showing up at all these different places coincidentally when Lahey has her dates is one thing, but the fact that he works at like three of them felt a little unrealistic. Like he just HAPPENS to work several jobs and they’re where she goes? He was a waiter at a restaurant, worked or volunteered at the animal shelter, worked at the ice rink, and worked as a mechanic in his mom’s garage. First of all, I’m no stranger to working multiple jobs, but how??? This is so much. And he just HAPPENS to be in the different places at the same time as she goes to them. It felt a little too convenient.

The other thing was that I didn’t feel like there was enough closure on a few of the side characters’ stories. I know realistically not everything would wrap up at the same time, but I think there could be a little more of an ending or at least a hint of one for these other characters. Especially when they were made such a big deal in the story.

Regardless, I enjoyed this book so much that I stayed up until 6 am listening to the audiobook. Rodkey’s writing, at least in audio (I haven’t physically seen the writing), is so effortless and easy to get into. Everything flows so well, the pacing is perfect, and it all just feels natural. If you’re looking for some YA romance, I definitely recommend this book and her others.