Say You Swear (Boys of Avix, 1)

Say You Swear By Meagan Brandy Closing this book at the end, I got closure I wasn’t sure I was going to get more than halfway through this book. It gave me all the feels and Noah Riley could very well be my number 1 book HUSBAND, forget the boyfriend label. I should mention, I am writing this review after my second read of this book. I picked it up for a re-read after some major changes occurred in my life and I needed the feelings this book gave me – sorrow, anguish, swoon worthy butterflies, awe, and all of the synonyms that go along with these listed. It is not a slow burn but it’s not a fast burn, either. Is there such things as a “medium burn?” If so, this is it, but again, WORTH IT. The plot is primarily from the point of view of the FMC, Arianna, but also includes POV from MMC, Noah. Arianna has a twin, Mason, whose best friend is named Chase. Arianna has been in love with Chase since the minute she met him as kids, when his family moved to town. However, from the first interaction between them, Mason stepped in and shut it down, quick-like. From that point on, Chase was too afraid to choose Arianna over Mason, as he felt like he was going against his best friend. Fast forward to the summer before college and while the gang is enjoying the summer at their new beach house (gifted to them by all of their parents) and Arianna meets Noah, the new captain of the football team at Avix, where all of them will attend college together at the start of the year. Noah is handsome, has beautiful blue eyes, and does not push himself on Arianna, although it is very clear he is attracted to her. She is attracted to Noah, too, but she can’t get pass the childhood crush on Chase. The story develops with a new quick friendship between two characters and a want-what-you-can’t-have mentality from another. Fast forward, again, towards the end of the semester and tragedy strikes. I mean, it is devastating! What happens with Ari and Noah? What happens with Ari and Chase?? You MUST read to find out how this story ends – it is so worth it! Meagan Brandy’s writing style in this book was right up my alley, I followed along well AND (the first time I read it) I definitely did not guess the plot. I don’t enjoy books where I can predict what is going to happen, who the “bad guy” will be, etc. Meagan hit me with the plot twist around the 75-80% mark in the book and my insides fell to pieces. My overwhelming need to know how it was going to pan out kept me going with determination to finish the book. I am glad I did. It did NOT immediately result in a HEA, either. After the devastation of the major plot twist in this book, there is lots of turmoil and anguish amongst all of the characters and Brandy kept you pressing forward towards the ending. Some of my favorite quotes from the book: “We’re half a bowl down when he looks over. “What?” I ask over a mouthful of French bread. “For the record, that about killed me, and it was a one-time thing that will never replay itself.” His lips pull into a one-sided grin. “So next time you ask, be sure because I won’t deny you again.” ‘Say you swear.’” “At first, Noah doesn’t move, his head following my brother and the boys, but then slowly returning to me. It takes him a moment, but his attention finally falls to the hoodie I’m wearing, and his eyes snap up to mine. He gets it, that I didn’t come for them. I came for him. His backpack falls to the ground where he stands, and he erases the last two steps between us. Before he reaches me, I spin, showing him the back, where his number is boldly printed, but he knows that. After all, he’s the one who gave me the hoodie. I throw my arms out, peeking at him over my shoulder. “Does this count as me wearing it to a game?” His lips curve up, and he gives a slow shake of his head. “Not a chance.” I spin again, now facing him fully, and step closer. “Does it count for something?” Noah reaches out, gripping the front of the hoodie, and tugs me to him. He whirls me around until we’re half hidden by the open door, his hand gliding into my hair. “You already know the answer to that,” he says, and then he’s kissing me.” ““You will?” he rasps. “Of course I will.” His palms shake as he grips my cheeks, his eyes piercing mine. “Say you swear?” Placing my palm over his tattoo, I recite its meaning. “Fear not the fall, but the life that comes from having never leaped at all.” I smile through my tears. “I’ll always leap if the jump leads me to you, Noah Riley. Always.” “And forever.” “I swear.”" Overall, this book definitely sits on my “will be re-read” shelf in Kindle. It is hard to pull yourself away from such an all encompassing love! I loved this book so much, I followed up with reading the other two with overlapping characters from Say You Swear, which are: Fumbled Hearts and Defenseless Hearts. All three are 5 stars, in my opinion. Read them all when you are looking for a perfectly written story with great characters, where you’ll feel happy, devastated, on pins and needles during the torment of the fall out, back to where Meagan Brandy puts your heart back together, piece by piece.

“𝑰’𝒍𝒍 𝒂𝒍𝒘𝒂𝒚𝒔 𝒍𝒆𝒂𝒑 𝒊𝒇 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒋𝒖𝒎𝒑 𝒍𝒆𝒂𝒅𝒔 𝒎𝒆 𝒕𝒐 𝒚𝒐𝒖. 𝑨𝒍𝒘𝒂𝒚𝒔.” “𝑨𝒏𝒅 𝒇𝒐𝒓𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓.” “𝑰 𝒔𝒘𝒆𝒂𝒓.” Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Spice: 🔥.5 Tropes: College romance, sports romance (hockey), love triangle (kind of), he falls first, boy obsessed, mirror action, angsty ⚠️Check triggers⚠️ This review is going to be different than my usual format because I'm not going to provide a blurb before my review. I usually summarize the book (without spoilers), but this one is just too hard to do without giving things away. I HIGHLY recommend going in without any information because it makes it so much better. The actual blurb for the book doesn't give much away, so if you're curious, I'd recommend reading that. This book took me on a ride the entire time and I couldn't put it down. I'll be honest that the beginning was hard for me to get into, but once we met Noah in chapter 4, I knew I needed to keep reading. The angst killed me, made me sob, and had me smiling all at the same time. There's so many things that happened in this book that I can't even though on because it would spoil it, but I will say it was a journey that left me forever changed. I loved the connection Arianna had with her brother, Mason, so much. I wish he wasn't as protective of her, but I did feel like he lightened up with one of the men (name redacted to stay spoiler free) because he knew she was safe with him (hero). I thought her friendship with Cam was so pure and a perfect example of friends being soulmates. Arianna goes through it in this book. She learns a lot about herself, and what she truly wants for herself and from a partner. My heart broke for her, and her man, with their tragedy. I'm glad they were able to come back together and grieve with each other. A main trope in this book is a love triangle, but it's honestly so much more than that. It has a love triangle of sorts, but not really, in my opinion. The heroine does feel conflicted at times, but it's pretty clear for most of the book that the triangle is heavier on one side than the other to everyone but the heroine. I know love triangles aren't for everyone, but I swear this isn't like other books with this trope and there's a clear winner between the two men. I will say this isn't a perfect book. If it wasn't so hard to put down, and the hero wasn't absolute perfection, I would've rated this lower. The reason why is the writing is a bit chaotic. There's a lot of exclamation points and text lingo (lots of '?!') that made the characters come off immature and juvenile. I also found it a little long, and some of the internal thoughts were repetitive or unnecessary. For me, this could've been edited a bit more and had some parts reworked a bit. I still think it's a beautiful story and would recommend it to anyone. It's definitely going to be a top 2023 read. 🚨🚨STOP IF YOU DON'T WANT POTENTIAL SPOILERS🚨🚨 Let's talk about the star of this book for me: Noah Riley. My sweet angel baby, Noah 🥰 Noah is so pure with a true heart of gold. I loved the way he adored his mom and the love he had for her. Noah is the definition of "he falls first" and "boy obsessed". He met Arianna by accident and was taken with her right away. He was caring, sweet, adoring, and absolute perfection. I loved how he paid attention to what was important to Arianna and made her life easier. Acts of service is definitely his love language and it showed in the way he took care of her. He deserves all the love in the world and has the patience of a saint. I would give anything to have him call me 'Juliet' or 'baby' 🥺 My heart broke for him after the tragedy and the events that unfolded. There's so much trauma that he'll have to work through and I just wanted to hold him. I'll say what we're all thinking. Chase. Is. Trash. I don't care what anyone says, he is trash and will always be trash. He had his opportunities and he messed them up. I don't think he truly wanted Arianna like he thought he did because nothing would've stopped him from going after her. It was trash what he did before the tragedy and it was trash what he did in the aftermath. I find him to be so manipulative when you think about what he did after the tragedy and I truly have no sympathy for him.

On a recommendation I uncharacteristically chose to read this one, despite all the personal strikes it had against it. Myself never choosing the sportsy books, the ridiculous length of the book was a bad strike, and it being an older book of sorts (having enough new releases on my tbr to keep me entertained!) and a series book. I generally bypass them when they are more than a duet, I prefer a standalone. But this book, I'm glad I accepted it as a read. The characters were likable, the MMC especially outshone the others in the book. The author did well in stereotyping the whole college scenario. It was well written, made for some tearing up. The family, friends, and teenage angst all made for a good combo in this one. All from an author I'd never heard of! She did well at keeping my attention!

Ahhhh! I read this entire story in one sitting, that’s how excited I was to start this fabulous new novel by the incredible Meagan Brandy. I seriously couldn’t put it down! The dynamic between main characters, Arianna and Noah, leaves you wanting more after (and during) every chapter. 😩💕 This angsty, passionate, and incredibly emotionally charged romance, was truly breathtaking. The obstacles the two characters faced along the way just made their happy ending all the sweeter, not to mention the fact that they came out all the more strengthened and bonded because of them. Meagan is and always will be a must read author for me, and this book is a perfect example of why that is. She depicted a perfect balance of strengths and weaknesses in these characters, giving them real life emotions, pains, heartaches and struggles. A truly fantastic job of making these characters come alive on the page. Plus, the chemistry between these two was present from the first moment these two main characters met! Such a brilliant combination! This entire novel was written with such deep tones and emotions embedded into every scene but all the ache that accompanies the story leads to an incredible ending that really leaves the reader wanting more. I only just finished the book and I’m already missing it! 😩🥰 Although, I’ll be honest, any book Meagan Brandy writes will automatically be absolutely phenomenal in my mind! Like I said before, I more than enjoyed every word of this book and couldn’t put this story down from the second I received it. It has absolutely lived up to the utter perfection that usually encompasses all of this author’s other work! Absolute perfection! 👌🏻❤️ Long story short, Meagan (once again) did such a fantastic job and I cannot wait for my physical copies of “Say you Swear” to arrive in the mail! Yes, I said cop-IES because I absolutely need to have both versions of this masterpiece on my beloved bookshelves. The only addition that I would make to this story is to what Meagan added at the bottom of the book description “… full of angst that is sure to pack a punch!” Ah, more like a freaking knockout/home run/touchdown… you get the idea. 😂🥰📚❤️👌🏻 This book is absolutely going down as one of my top reads of 2022! Love, love, love this book, and love, love, love this author! “Say You Swear” gets five very well deserved stars from me! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Say You Swear is my Roman Empire. I've read many sad books and seen many sad movies, but this book !!! Don't get me wrong, it's not sad. If you were to ask me my all time book boyfriend, I would tell you this one, Noah. God, this is such a heartbreakingly beautiful story. It's the kind of love anyone wants to experience someday. This book is so well written, the characters are so authentic and empathic. I had doubts about when I saw everyone stating Say You Swear as their favorite book on booktok/gram, but man ! So yeah, read it, it might become an important part of you. *side note* prepare the tissues *side side note* Oh ! To be loved like Noah loves Ari 🥹

MEU DEUS!!!! Nem sei por onde começar a falar desse livro. Estou morrendo de amores pelo Noah, ele é o melhor namorado literário que existe! Então, vamos do início. Aqui temos a nossa mocinha, a Arianna, uma jovem de 18 anos que começará a faculdade e, junto com seu irmão gêmeo e melhores amigos, vai curtir o último verão antes de começar essa nova fase. Eles são um grupo de 5 jovens que se conhecem desde a infância e são inseparáveis. Ela é apaixonada pelo Chase, melhor amigo de seu irmão, mas nunca teve coragem de fazer nada sobre isso. Até que, nessa viagem, ela tem a oportunidade de descobrir se o Chase sente o mesmo por ela. Infelizmente, a Arianna tem seu coração partido e começa a nova faculdade com todos os seus amigos. Só que ela precisa de certa distância para conseguir superar o fato de que seu sonho de um dia ter uma relação com o Chase nunca irá acontecer. E eis que surge o Noah, quarterback do time de futebol da faculdade que seu irmãos e amigos também jogam e quem ela conheceu rapidamente na praia nas férias de verão. E o Noah a vê como ninguém mais consegue. Ele enxerga sua alma, suas tristezas e anseios e surge uma amizade entre eles. O Noah é um ombro amigo fora do círculo de infância que a ajuda a superar o coração partido. E então a convivência vai se transformando em algo mais. Arianna e Noah começam a se apaixonar e é lindo de se ver. Só que ainda existe uma certa insegurança nesse novo amor, principalmente porque o antigo parece não querer desistir ao perceber o que está perdendo. E então vem uma reviravolta épica e inesperada que nos deixa de coração apertado. Chorei de soluçar com esses capítulos. Havia muito tempo que não me emocionava assim com um livro! Super recomendo! Vale muito à pena!

One thing about Amazon books , they always arrive in a good condition - I read the book and it was fantastic , Shout out to Meagan Brandy and Amazon for this great product

Say You Swear ist eine fesselnde Liebesgeschichte voller Höhen und Tiefen. Die Emotionen sind intensiv, die Charaktere glaubwürdig und die Handlung hält einen bis zum Schluss gefangen. Ein echtes Auf und Ab – aber mit einem schönen, zufriedenstellenden Ende. Absolute Leseempfehlung für Fans emotionaler Romance!