P.S I Like You by Kasie West // book review

Actual rating: 4.7 CUTE ADORABLE CROOKED STARS

EVEN THE COVER IS CUTE OMGGGGGGGGGG

"Words brought us together though they almost kept us apart. You trusted me with your secrets and then you stole my heart"

Synopsis from Goodreads:

Signed, sealed, delivered…
While spacing out in chemistry class, Lily scribbles some of her favorite song lyrics onto her desk. The next day, she finds thatsomeone has continued the lyrics on the desk and added a message to her. Intrigue!
Soon, Lily and her anonymous pen pal are exchanging full-on letters—sharing secrets, recommending bands, and opening up to each other. Lily realizes she’s kind of falling for this letter writer. Only, who is he? As Lily attempts to unravel the mysteryand juggle school, friends, crushes, and her crazy family, she discovers that matters of the heart can’t always be spelled out…

You know that feeling when you're reading a book and you actually have to take a deep breath in between words or sentences because you feel like you need to get a hold of yourself after so much crying or laughing and all the feels? And you feel like you can't sleep in peace until you actually finish the book?

Yeah, for me, it was this book.

How does she do it? How does Kasie West always manage to make her books so full of emotions and feelings and SO UNPUTDOWNABLE?!!

If you are well aware, Kasie West is one of my favorite YA contemporary authors, I've probably read all of her books and still crave for more after finishing the last. This book was also one of my most anticipated books of the year and I have to say that this book is probably her best book yet - but then again, I'd probably said the same thing about her other books right after reading them. Ok, maybe this book is up the same level as On The Fence which I really really enjoyed and loved and GAH SO GOOD.

And if you've read Kasie West's writing, they were always the fluffy type of stories that makes you go "NGAWWWWWWWWWWWW" all the way through from the start til the very end. But this book, gosh it was not fluffy like the others but she still manage to make me swoon the same way. AND you have you idea how long I've wanted Kasie to make a love-hate relationship book and she did!!! Plus, it's a penpal story?!!! I'M SOLD.

I started reading this at 11 pm last night and by 2:15am I'm already 90% of the book. I literally flew through the pages I didn't even realize. I'd probably finished it then and there if it wasn't for the reason that I need to get my beauty sleep. I woke up early today and finished the whole thing and then broke down in a cry because it was just so adorable and beautiful and PERFECT. I think I'm having a bad case of a book hangover thanks to this book.

This book stars Lily Abbott as the main character in this book where she has a way with words and is passionate about music - specifically indie pop music. She spaces out often -especially during Chemistry where she spends the time to write in her favorite notebook - poems, lyrics and other things that she can do with words - until one day she was banned to ever write on the notebook during Chemistry, ever, by her Chemistry teacher. So other alternatives are that she write on paper (as if like she was taking notes) or vandalising her desk. She wrote song lyrics and what surprised her the next day is that, someone replied to her on the desk with the next line of the song lyric, and that's when sparks fly. One thing leads to another, and each and every day, she and her mystery guy got personal, sharing things they don't share with other people.

Let me tell you, it wasn't hard guessing who her mystery guy was. Pffft it was obvious. The fact that his name was appeared so many times throughout the first few chapters gave it out but it didn't ruin the story for me. It was still SO CUTE. Though, I'm not gonna mention his name so that you'd have to guess on your own - not like it was hard. But still.

One reason I like about this book is because I get to relate with Lily SO MUCH. She's quirky, awkward and has a weird fashion sense and she didn't care but at the same time, she does. She likes to talk by herself - mind her because THAT'S SO ME. She was average, not the richest person in school. She also has the craziest and weirdest family - with great parents, a supportive sister and 2 adorable little brothers to cope with every single day. She is me. I am her. We're one and the same. Also, the fact that I once had a pen pal too I'd known from omegle - which is a website where you meet and chat with people anonymously - and we exchanged emails back then and write to each other almost every day. I know the feeling of dreading of waiting for a reply. It was torturous but satisfying because writing to someone anonymously gave a sense of trustworthy and honesty in ourselves.

As I've told you before this was basically a love-hate relationship ish kinda story and you know why I LOVE LOVE LOVE love-hate relationships? THE TENSION. The ridiculous non-ending bantering. THE FREAKING SEXUAL TENSION. So they hate each other, but in other worlds - in this case in their letters - they can't resist each other. HOW MUCH BETTER CAN THIS STORY GET????

I love the family element in this story and I think lots of YA needed this kind of a great family relationship. Lily's crazy and chaotic family reminds me so much of The Garretts from My Life Next Door and Jonah's family in When We Collided. I just love books with strong family elements.

The friendship element, on the other hand was okay-ish? It didn't really affected me on a personal level. I didn't feel the bond between Isabel and her.

**SPOILER ALERT**

The time when everything fell into place for Lily, when her guitar broke and when she finally knew who her mystery guy was, I somehow felt for her. I cried with her every time she did because I feel her so much. I know those feelings and that's when I know that Lily was a character I've grown attached with.

I swoon everytime when Cade writes back. Especially those last few letters. And especially the time when Lily didn't get his letter and he recited and read the whole letter to her, because he said he had reread the letter so many times that he'd already memorised it. IT WAS SOOOOOOO CUTE I WAS DYING. I SWEAR THE TIME WHEN HE SAID THERE WAS A P.S. , I was fangirling so hard that I legit cried ok I'm not kidding.

"I think there might’ve been a P.S.,” he said. 

I couldn’t breathe again, only this time it had nothing to do with running. 

It had to do with his closeness and his voice, which had turned quiet, and his eyes that hadn’t left mine since he arrived. 

My voice had lowered, too. “P.S.? We haven’t written one of those before.”“ 

It felt like it needed one.”“It did need one.”“P.S.” He brushed a piece of hair off of my cheek. “I like you. A lot.”

*deep breaths* WHADDUP TITLE REFERENCE

*END OF SPOILER**

I swear I had lots to talk about this book but I'll probably only stop there. This is by far one of my favorite contemporaries, ever and I'd probably reread it if I had the chance. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. Please go read this book, for me? I'm sure it'd be worth it.

-naj