Rosie is ready for her life to begin, because nothing says new life like going to university. After years of waiting and working hard, she's finally on the road that will secure her future.
Except university turns out to be not what she hoped or imagined, and although she's not exactly unhappy – really! – she might be a little bit worried that she doesn't really like her course much. Or her flatmates. Or really... anything? But it's normal to be homesick (right?) and everything will have settled in a month or two, and it's totally fine that her friends seem so much happier than she is, and that the doctors don’t seem to know what’s wrong with her mother.
But then she meets Jade, and everything starts to look a little brighter. At least, it does if she’s only looking at Jade. But is first love enough when everything else is falling apart?
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I am delighted to be sharing my review for Something Certain, Maybe as part of the blog tour to celebrate the release of this fab book.
Long time readers of my blog will know I am a UKYA fan. I have been for years and Sara Barnard's books are absolutely my sort of read. This book can be read as a stand alone title but does feature a main character Rosie who has popped up in two of Sara's previous titles Beautiful Broken Things (focused on Rosie's friend Caddy's story) and Fierce Fragile Hearts (focused on Rosie's friend Suzanne's story) and I would recommend reading all three because they are all brilliant.
There were several things I loved about this book. To start with I loved the fact that the majority of the book is set in and around The University of East Anglia which I loved from a geeky nostalgia point of view as I also went there to university. It meant the locations in the book were so vivid to me and completely brought alive the charm of the place which I think will really stand out whether you know the area or not.
I really like that Rosie doesn't have the typical university experience. A lot of books focus on the many great things to come out of the university experience such as making loads of friends and loving the course you are on but what about those people who don't experience those things. Rosie's experiences of finding being away hard and university being a really lonely are really realistic. It made the book so relatable.
I liked the relationships in the book. It was obviously brilliant to get more of the Caddy, Suzanne, Rosie friendship and seeing how life experiences had developed their relationship further. I also loved the romance in the book because it is really sweet. I also liked seeing how going to university changed the relationship between Rosie and her mum.
All in all a book I really loved from an author I can't get enough of. Highly recommended.
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