I Want it That Way by Ann Aguirre

As Long as You Love Me by Ann Aguirre

The Shape of My Heart by Ann Aguirre

Series: The 2B Trilogy
Author: Ann Aguirre
 Rating: 4.25/5 stars

I’d like to start out by reiterating how much I love Ann Aguirre. Ever since I discovered her Sirantha Jax series a couple of years ago I have been eager to read anything she writes. My favorite thing about her has always been how well she writes relationships, so you can see why I was tickled pink to read her New Adult Romance novels. And you know what? The relationships were every bit as wonderful as I’d hoped they’d be.

I was chosen to receive a review copy of As Long as You Love Me after entering the Ann Aguirre’s Reviewer giveaway. I would just like to thank Ann Aguirre and Mel Jolly over at Author RX for selecting me as a winner. As it turns out, As Long as You Love Me ended up being my favorite book of the trilogy! But I’m getting a little ahead of myself…
                                                                                                                                                      

I Want it That Way

Of the three female leads in this series, I probably relate to Nadia’s personality the most. She’s a very determined and goal-oriented person, traits which helped her achieve her dreams and fight for what she wanted… Even if what she wanted was a studious/sexy single father who lived in the apartment below her. That’s a goal I can really get behind. :-) I thought the love story was really sweet, especially so because of the added element of Nadia’s relationship with Ty’s son (which was almost as fulfilling as the main romance itself). I’ll say it again: I love how Aguirre writes relationships, even the ones that aren’t amorous. I came away from this series loving the platonic relationships as much as the romantic ones.

I struggled with the rating of this one because I really enjoyed it, but at the end of the day there were a couple of things I wish had been done a tad differently. The pacing in certain places was a little off for me, dragging out conflicts a bit longer than I thought necessary. Because of that, I think it gave me more time to focus on my least favorite plot element. I tend to get a little frustrated with the “I love you, but I can’t be with you because of X,” where “X” is often a foolish reason fabricated in the character’s mind solely to keep the conflict drawn out. It’s not the first time I’ve seen it, and it likely won’t be the last, but it wears on me a little bit. That said, I’ve never seen it handled quite as well as it was in I Want it That Way, so that’s something. I still came away from the novel with the feel goods and the satisfaction I’d hoped for.

4/5 stars
                                                                                                                                                      

As Long as You Love Me

While I related to Nadia in the first book personality-wise the most, the love story between Lauren and Rob was the one that really sang to me. Most of us have that person we crushed on throughout grade school – the one we would go out of our way to pass in the hallway, doodle his/her initials in our notebooks, and daydream about romantic possibilities with every spare moment (or was it just me?). Well, what if you got the chance to see what could have been with that person? That’s what Lauren got to do, and I got to live vicariously through her. It was awesome! All of the little moments she had with Rob were like little sparks of electricity flashing off the pages and I felt the emotional tingle of every last one of them. Perhaps this one appealed to me so much because of my specific ideal for a fantasy relationship, but the way it sits, As Long as You Love Me is now one of my favorite books ever. Okay, I’m done gushing.

…almost. I love this one so much it almost raises my ratings of the other two by extension – as I look back on the trilogy, I do so with a ton of affection and I think that’s in no small part due to book #2.

5/5 stars
                                                                                                                                                      

The Shape of My Heart

This one was my least favorite of the trilogy, but only because I found parts of it a tad depressing. The first third of the book focuses on Courtney and Max as they attend a funeral and, having suffered a loss in the family relatively recently, it made me a little sad. On top of that, we learned about all of the hardships Max went through as a kid and I basically just felt bad… until the romance started kicking in. I am confident, though, that the negative feels I had were specific to my circumstances, and I don’t think other readers will be similarly affected. Aguirre does a great job focusing on the relationship first, and on all of the peripheral events second, and if I hadn’t been so fixated, I would’ve enjoyed the story a lot more (although I enjoyed the love story from the very first moment). The awesome thing about Aguirre is, even when elements of the book made me sad, I still had that oddly addictive urge to keep reading. All of her books do that to me, though – she’s just such a great writer!

Fast forward to the last 2/3 of the book, and it was nothing but pure New Adult entertainment all the way through. Courtney was such a cool girl to read about, and I love that her personality stood out as distinct from the other two heroines. She is also one of the first bisexual characters I’ve ever seen as the main POV, so it’s nice to see a bit of diversity. I found her to be the least relatable of the three, and not because  she was bisexual, but because she approached life in a very “zen” way. It would drive me nuts not knowing what I was going to do next, yet she managed to tackle all of her problems without constantly stressing about them. She was always very true to herself, and getting to immerse myself in her perspective was easily my favorite element to the story.

3.5/5 stars
                                                                                                                                                      

Overall, if you’re a New Adult fan, I deem this series definitely worth your time. The romance is evoking, the characters are memorable, and the writing is superb! The 2B Trilogy will go down as three very compelling reasons why Ann Aguirre remains one of my all-time favorites!

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