Review::: Little Things by Madison Street

by Lora - 8:00 AM

4 out of 5 stars

This book was full of drama. Seriously, if you have an issue with domestic violence at all, this book will not be a good fit for you. I don’t have any such issues and the book was still a lot to take on.

Raya lives in a home with her mom and step-dad. The step-dad is abusive to her mom, but doesn’t touch Raya for the first part of the book. Once he hits her though the whole tone of the book changes.

Duke is the BEST! I would so love to have him as my boyfriend. He’s caring, attentive, and loves with his whole heart. Even though he’s dating Melanie in the beginning, he knows his heart has already been taken over by Raya. I think it was his natural need to protect and care for her that made him fall so hard and fast.

Raya moves away so that Duke can live his life without her as a distraction, but really all that does is make more of a distraction because Duke is dedicated to finding her and bringing her back home. This is when the real drama begins.

I enjoyed this story, but I felt like sometimes there was too much detail and then there were times when significant moments were just left out. I felt like both Raya and Duke were strong characters and they were characters I would love to know more about. For a debut novel, this is very good. Ms. Street can write scenes that make you want to jump right in the book and be part of the action.

The beginning was a great deal of scene setting and confusing with Duke and Melanie as boyfriend/girlfriend when I knew that he really wanted Raya. I did feel like Melanie wasn’t a very real character because she was so understanding of Raya & Duke’s feelings for each other. The fact that she stayed friends with Duke and so easily transitioned back to being friends with Raya, too was unbelievable.

I also felt like the ending was a letdown after all the details in the rest of the book. I felt like there were so many things I wanted to better understand and see how they were dealt with and the ending disappointed me.

Overall though it’s a great love story with strong feelings and loveable characters.