katie m. stout » The Novel Hermit

A teen escapes to a boarding school abroad and falls for a Korean pop star in this fun and fresh romantic novel in the vein of Anna and the French Kiss.

Grace Wilde is running—from the multi-million dollar mansion her record producer father bought, the famous older brother who’s topped the country music charts five years in a row, and the mother who blames her for her brother’s breakdown. Grace escapes to the farthest place from home she can think of, a boarding school in Korea, hoping for a fresh start.

She wants nothing to do with music, but when her roommate Sophie’s twin brother Jason turns out to be the newest Korean pop music superstar, Grace is thrust back into the world of fame. She can’t stand Jason, whose celebrity status is only outmatched by his oversized ego, but they form a tenuous alliance for the sake of her friendship with Sophie. As the months go by and Grace adjusts to her new life in Korea, even she can’t deny the sparks flying between her and the KPOP idol.

Soon, Grace realizes that her feelings for Jason threaten her promise to herself that she’ll leave behind the music industry that destroyed her family. But can Grace ignore her attraction to Jason and her undeniable pull of the music she was born to write? Sweet, fun, and romantic, this young adult novel explores what it means to experience first love and discover who you really are in the process.

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Welcome to a special Essential Reading post! As part of the Hello, I Love You blog tour, I wanted Katie to pick books that would be a must read for her characters! And voila! It’s short and sweet.

For those who do not know what Essential Reading is, it is a feature on my blog where I ask authors to share five to seven books (children’s, YA, general fiction, romances, nonfiction, and all) that they or their characters love, or has impacted their lives or their characters’s lives.

Let’s see what Katie picked, shall we?

**BOOKS THE CHARACTERS IN HELLO, I LOVE YOU WOULD LOVE (AND WHY!)**

by Katie M. Stout

I don’t talk much about literature in Hello, I Love You, because the book is so centered on music. However, I think my characters would enjoy these books:

Hello, I Love You by Katie M. Stout
June 9, 2015
St. Martin’s Griffin
Website | Twitter | Goodreads
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | The Book Depository
* E-ARC courtesy of Netgalley + St. Martin’s Press

A teen escapes to a boarding school abroad and falls for a Korean pop star in this fun and fresh romantic novel in the vein of Anna and the French Kiss.

Grace Wilde is running—from the multi-million dollar mansion her record producer father bought, the famous older brother who’s topped the country music charts five years in a row, and the mother who blames her for her brother’s breakdown. Grace escapes to the farthest place from home she can think of, a boarding school in Korea, hoping for a fresh start.

She wants nothing to do with music, but when her roommate Sophie’s twin brother Jason turns out to be the newest Korean pop music superstar, Grace is thrust back into the world of fame. She can’t stand Jason, whose celebrity status is only outmatched by his oversized ego, but they form a tenuous alliance for the sake of her friendship with Sophie. As the months go by and Grace adjusts to her new life in Korea, even she can’t deny the sparks flying between her and the KPOP idol.

Soon, Grace realizes that her feelings for Jason threaten her promise to herself that she’ll leave behind the music industry that destroyed her family. But can Grace ignore her attraction to Jason and her undeniable pull of the music she was born to write? Sweet, fun, and romantic, this young adult novel explores what it means to experience first love and discover who you really are in the process.

myreview

[note note_color=”#BFD1D1″ text_color=”#ffffff”]I received this book for free from St. Martin’s Press in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.[/note]

First sentence: “Big Brother, I want you to know something: It wasn’t your fault, not any of it. “

Ever wonder what happens when you decide to run off to go to boarding school in South Korea? Yes? (If you’re thinking, “why would she go to boarding school there?” me too, folks. Me too.)

Hello, I Love You is about what happens when an American teenager, Grace Wilde, runs off to South Korea to escape the pressure of being part of a well-known family in the music industry and the tragedy that had befell on her family. She attempts to adjust to her new life at a boarding school in Korea, and along the way, she encounters her roommate’s twin brother, Jason, who’s an arrogant but insecure Korean pop star and who she constantly clashes with. And of course, love blossoms in the air, and soon the issues of their past come to the surface, forcing them to face it head on.