Bully by Penelope Douglas

My name is Tate. He doesn't call me that, though. He would never refer to me so informally, if he referred to me at all. No, he'll barely even speak to me. But he still won't leave me alone. We were best friends once. Then he turned on me and made it his mission to ruin my life. I've been humiliated, shut out, and gossiped about all through high school. His pranks and rumors got more sadistic as time wore on, and I made myself sick trying to stay out of his way. I even went to France for a year, just to avoid him. But I'm done hiding from him now, and there's no way in hell I'll allow him to ruin my senior year. He might not have changed, but I have. It's time to fight back. I'm not going to let him bully me anymore!--From back cover.

I really did enjoy this book but you can definitely tell it's Penelope Douglas' first book. I wish we got Jared's perspective because his actions didn't get explained until the very end. I also don't like how Tate thought and acted towards other women. It was just very catty and involved a lot of slut-shaming. I also thought that the bullying was so mild in here. It didn't create much tension because there was so little of it. Idk if that means I'm messed up or what but I just wanted more lol. Overall it was a decent story but not one of my favorite new adult romances.

good read, but Penelope Douglas's “Punk 57” still reigns supreme

...Well...this is an understatement I know but that was intense.
Not sure how to rate this book so I'll just chalk my rating up to “undecided”.
This book had me mildly intrigued from the start. After reading the summary, I just couldn't stop wondering how Penelope Douglas would get Tate to forgive Jared, AKA the initial bad-tempered, unpredictable jackass. I was expecting the author to make the main character incredibly easy to manipulate. But boy was I wrong.
Although Tate did seem particularly weak in the beginning, I guess that's what the character development was supposed to, well, develop. Even before Tate had escaped to France, we got a preview of how she would be after she got back and eventually faced her fears again.
Anyways, I'm going to be honest and say I'm not sure whether I'd recommend this to anyone. However, I could tell whoever's reading this that this book hooked me from the start, I finished it in one day, and the ending...the ending was

wow in a lovely, surprising, positive, amazing, wonderful, beautiful way.