Title: Under The Peaches
Series: Teaching Love #1
Author: Shana Vanterpool
Genre: NA Romance
Release Date: February 28, 2017
Unwanted. A word eighteen-year-old Kaelyn Jefferies knows better than most. Given up at birth, she knows nothing of love. Now she navigates this world blind, worrying only about her present to survive. And sometimes when you’re the only guide you have, you don’t always do what’s best for yourself.
After another confrontation with her bully, Kaelyn flees to her hiding spot to be alone and nurse her wounds. Instead, she finds Julian Ean, the gorgeous twenty-four-year-old calculus teacher the other girls whisper about, nursing a few of his own. Until that moment, Mr. Ean was simply a man she passed in the halls. Afterwards, he is impossible to ignore … to forget.
Mr. Ean only wanted to help Kaelyn. Patch her up and show her she was worth so much more than she was giving herself. He didn’t mean to fall in love with a student. It’s wrong, he knows it, but he can’t help himself around her. Not when her pain feels like his.
Kaelyn didn’t mean to fall in love with a teacher. It’s wrong, she knows it, but after Mr. Ean shows her what a real smile feels like, there’s no going back after that …
Book one in the Teaching Love Series, comes a poignant coming-of-age novel showcasing the beauty of strength and the delicious lure of forbidden love by Shana Vanterpool.
I fell in love with this book at first page pretty much. I do not know if it happens to you, but there are books where I know I am going to love them very quickly.
This makes me realize how sometimes how important first lines may be. Now that I am writing this, I realize that there are books, I love at first line (not to be taken too literally) and there are those, that I fall in love with slow and steady as I am reading. There isn’t at the end a big difference in which type if better or a scale of love I have for it, but I now realize the distinction.
But let us go back to the review and forego my usual inner debates all typed up and focus on Kaelyn and Julian. As the reader, we are thrown into the deep end of Kaelyn’s life as a high schooler very quickly and I can tell you my friends that it is not pretty. We can see early on the relationship and bond that develops pretty quickly between Kaelyn and Julian.
I really do not want to go into too much details as I always tell you that it is best if you read the story and well, you do have the blurb just above to give you a good idea.
Overall, the Under the Peaches is really well written, so easy to read and flows beautifully. With a steady pace, I was done reading it in just one go. It is real, emotional and is not scared to cover hard topics like bullying and violence. If you are of an overly sensitive nature, there might be a few pages that I need to warn you about. However, those pages are really essential to the plot and to the development of the characters as individuals and together.
The book is highly emotionally charged, I mean I could not help myself being so invested in the Kaelyn and Julian’s life that there were parts where I was not so much in agreement with some things Julian said or done! Now, this is not me criticizing the book saying that there is something bad with it, but more like when you know your friend did or said something, you still love and support them but you may not agree with said comment or action!
Do you see where I am coming from?
I hope you do!!
So this is book 1 of the Teaching Love Series and I am not sure what will happen in book 2, for all I know book 2 cover a different couple all together or follows Kaelyn and Julian journey further. Now that I would love to know as there is so much more to their story IMHO.
Under the Peaches is a great book and I cannot wait to read more from Shana, I cannot believe I waited this long to do so, but I am getting there. I am going to highly recommend this book and I hope you enjoy it as much as I did and fall for Kaelyn and Julian just as I did!
Romance author, coffee drinker, and bad boy aficionado. Every second not spent breathing is an opportunity to write and read. I live in Northern California with my family and actress dog, Halle Bella. (Just Bella when she decides to cut the crap.) Escaping with a good book is something I live for and I write so others can do the same.
