Book Review: Between the Notes by Sharon Huss Roat

When Ivy Emerson’s family loses their house—complete with her beloved piano—the fear of what’s to come seizes her like a bad case of stage fright. Only this isn’t one of her single, terrifying performances. It’s her life.

And it isn’t pretty.

Ivy is forced to move with her family out of their affluent neighborhood to Lakeside, also known as “the wrong side of the tracks.” Hiding the truth from her friends—and the cute new guy in school, who may have secrets of his own—seems like a good idea at first. But when a bad boy next door threatens to ruin everything, Ivy’s carefully crafted lies begin to unravel . . . and there is no way to stop them.

As things get to the breaking point, Ivy turns to her music, some unlikely new friends, and the trusting heart of her disabled little brother. She may be surprised that not everyone is who she thought they were . . . including herself.

Debut author Sharon Huss Roat crafts a charming and timely story of what happens when life as you know it flips completely upside down.

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What can I say about this book? Is it weird to say that I have read this book before? It just seemed like so many of the YA contemporary books that I have read before. I don't mean with the story line, but with the characters. In this book we follow Ivy, as she transitions from living with a lot of money, to a life without all of the money. 

Let me rip the ban-aid off right now, I hated Ivy. She was so whiny! Listen, I know that her situation was rough, I would be a little whiny myself, but I would not do the things that she did. She made so many bad decisions! The big one, being friends with people she hated. Who does that?! Also, I don't want to hear you complain about how much she hated them, when she chose to hang out with them. I also didn't like the way she treated her friends. Basically, I didn't like anything about Ivy.

I did like most of the side characters though! I felt that they were all very unique, and different that they each had different ways of handling things. It was really nice to read about very different side characters. I find that I tend to usually like the side characters better than the main characters. 

I was overall not impressed with the story line. I feel like I have read it before. Problems or important plot lines would pop up, and I would recognize them from other books. I'm not sure if that is common, but I found it boring and upsetting due to the fact that I went into this book with pretty high expections.

Overall, I liked this book. I thought that it had an annoying main character, but with really good side characters; read this book, but go into it with lower exceptions.

3/5 Points

                            I liked it, but I didn't love it.