Nothing Like You by Lauren Strasnick

“You think he’s yours but he’s not, I thought. You think he’s yours but really he’s mine.”

When Holly loses her virginity to Paul, a guy she barely knows, she assumes their encounter is a one-night stand. After all, Paul is too popular to even be speaking to Holly, and he happens to have a long-term girlfriend, Saskia. But ever since Holly’s mom died six months ago, Holly has been numb to the world, and she’s getting desperate to feel something, anything—so when Paul keeps pursuing her, Holly relents. Paul’s kisses are a welcome diversion, and it’s nice to feel like the kind of girl that a guy like Paul would choose.

But things aren’t so simple with Saskia around. Paul’s real girlfriend is willowy and perfect… and nothing like Holly. To make matters worse, she and Holly are becoming friends. Suddenly the consequences of Holly’s choices are all too real, and Holly stands to lose more than she ever realized she had.(from Goodreads)

I found Nothing Like You on a whim. I was on vacation on my birthday and my husband was having trouble trying to decide what to give me. Of course in my mind I'm thinking, Really? You don't know? Books, it's always books. I don't ask for too much. So we went to the local Borders, and I found Nothing Like You, in hard cover. I wasn't sold on it immediately because, yes, I do judge a book by it's cover, so I kept looking. About two shelves down, there was a paperback cover that caught my attention, and lucky me, it turned out to be the same book!

Cover: I am drawn to covers like this one and I will pick it up every time. They remind me of summertime, of being young and carefree. I like the softness of the lighting, the delicate dress and the fact that she is barefoot. The cover on the hard back doesn't even compare. 

Favorite Line/Quote/Scene: Said by Nils to Holly after calling Paul's girlfriend the Anti-Holly, "That's a good thing, Hols. She's plain spaghetti." He looked at me lovingly. "No sauce." (page 17) After reading that, I knew Nils was going to be awesome and I was going to develop a book-crush on him. And that is exactly what happened. 

**SPOILER ALERT**

 I loved Holly and my heart broke for her over and over again. Even though she was sneaking around with a guy who has a girlfriend, she wasn't unlikable. She was a good friend to Nils, putting up his girlfriends of week. She was a good daughter to her father Jeff who was still grieving the loss of his wife. She wasn't sneaking around with her best friend's boyfriend. And once she did become friends with Paul's girlfriend, she did try to break it off with him. Maybe a little too late, but still she wanted to do the right thing.

There was a time when I feared the book may go down the cliched "promiscuous girl's gotta learn a lesson" route. When Holly kept getting nauseous when thinking about telling Saskia or Saskia finding out or anyone finding out (for that matter) about her and Paul, I was afraid that the nausea was really caused by a pregnancy. And then when the random mention of the Agnes of God movie, my heart sank, yep, she's going to end up pregnant. But she wasn't, and everyone did find out about her and Paul. And then my heart broke again.

I liked the short quick chapters, but this book went by too fast for me. I was left wanting just a little bit more. Lauren Strasnick's next book is Her and Me and You. It is not a follow-up to Nothing Like You, but I do hope there is one in the future.