Review: Winging It (Corrigan Falls Raiders #3) by Cate Cameron

 *I recieved an ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. This does not in any way affect my opinion, and all thoughts expressed in this review are unbiased and my own.*

Title: Winging It
Author: Cate Cameron
My rating: 4.5 sweet, romantic hearts
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary, Romance
Pub. date: May 16th 2016
Publisher: Entangled: Crush
Synopsis: Disclaimer: This Entangled Teen Crush book contains adult language, ice-melting kisses, and a swoon-worthy hero. This fake relationship romance will have you wishing for a hockey player of your own…

Natalie West and Toby Cooper were best friends growing up, on and off the ice. But when Toby’s hockey career took off, their friendship was left behind. Now Natalie has a crazy plan to land her crush—Toby’s biggest rival—and she needs Toby’s help to pull it off.

When Nat asks Toby to be her fake boyfriend, he can’t say no. Not when it means getting his best friend back. But Natalie is all grown up now, and spending time with her—even when it’s just playing hockey together—stirs up a lot of feelings, old and new. Suddenly pretending to be interested in her isn’t hard at all…if only she wanted him and not his enemy.

Hockey tore them apart. Can it put them back together? (synopsis from Goodreads)

My thoughts: It wasn’t as good as Playing Defense, but I still loved reading it. It was a sweet, romantic, light read, just like I’d expected, which was great. The reading experience wasn’t quite five stars, but it was close.

   Natalie and Toby used to be great friends, but they drifted apart after Toby and Natalie’s friend, Dawn, broke up. When Toby’s cousin Scott, who Nat has a big crush on, moves back into town, Nat asks Toby for help. She wants to pretend they’re together in order to make Scott notice her. I’m still kind of mad at her for using Toby like that, but I’ll forgive it. It’s stupid and selfish, but I’ll forgive it because she grows throughout the book.

   At first, I wasn’t a big fan of Natalie because of the way she used Toby, but when I got to know her better, and she went through character development, I started liking her more and more. By the end of the book, I loved her.

I loved Toby!

   I loved Toby from the start, though. He’s a great character, and I loved following his thoughts. He’s just such a nice guy. Although I love reading about goodhearted bad boys, and brooding, sarcastic guys, reading about guys that are just really good guys is great, too.

   The plot was good, it held a good pace throughout the book, it was never slow, but it wasn’t too fast, either. For a Contemporary romance book, it held a perfect pace. I didn’t like the plot as much as I liked it in Playing Defense, which is the biggest reason why my rating is 4.5 and not 5 stars, but otherwise, it was a great read.

A fun, romantic, light read!

   The writing was good, the characters were realistic and relatable, there was character development, which I absolutely loved, there was a totally swoon-worthy boy, the plot held a perfect pace. It was exactly what I expected it to be, and what I wanted it to be.