Review | Lola And The Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins

Lola And The Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins
Series: Anna And The French Kiss #2
Published By: Usborne Publishing
Published On: June 1st 2014 (Originally 2011)
Genre: Contemporary
Pages: 373
Format: Paperback
Source: Bought
Rating: ★★★★

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Budding designer Lola Nolan doesn't believe in fashion... she believes in costume. The more expressive the outfit – the more sparkly, more wild – the better. And life is pretty close to perfect for Lola, especially with her hot rocker boyfriend. 
That is, until the Bell twins, Calliope and Cricket return to the neighbourhood and unearth a past of hurt that Lola thought was long buried. So when talented inventor Cricket steps out from his twin sister's shadow and back into Lola's life, she must finally face up to a lifetime of feelings for the boy next door. Could the boy from Lola's past be the love of her future?


Lola And The Boy Next Door, the second instalment in the Anna And The French Kiss trilogy by Stephanie Perkins, follows Lola, a bit of a misfit who dresses in costume and dreams of attending her winter formal dressed as Marie Antoinette. She has a pretty great life - two great dads, a loyal best friend and a rocker boyfriends – until past crush Cricket and his family move back in next door.

I didn’t love Lola as much as I loved Anna. I liked it but I just didn’t feel the same rush of emotions when reading this as I did with Anna. As much as I hate to admit it, because I love Stephanie Perkins, Lola was good but not quite great.

It took me a while to get into it. I don’t know why but I found it quite difficult to get into Lola. In fact it took me until about 150 pages in, when Cricket was introduced, for me to start wanting to keep reading.

I found it difficult to relate to Lola. This could be why I struggled to get into the book. I found Lola to be much less relatable to Anna. She is such an unusual character, which was great to read about but it did make it hard to connect to her.

This book has the same “cheating” aspect as Anna had. I am not the type of person who is against cheating in books but I think there is a place for it and I just didn’t feel as though this was the place, just as in Anna. In fact, the similarities between Lola and Anna in this aspect annoyed me a little. However, I do appreciate that it shows the contrast between Max and Cricket, I just don’t completely agree with it.

What I did love about this book was Cricket. I absolutely adored Cricket as a character, and as a love interest for Lola. He seems like the perfect boyfriend and I completely fell for him as a book boyfriend. I loved how much he clearly cares for Lola and the fact that their relationship had been building since childhood was very sweet.

I also loved the Anna & St Clair scenes. I knew before reading this book that they were a part of it but I only expected them to appear a few times, not to play such an important role. It was great to see their interactions as a couple and I loved that they became such good friends with Lola and Cricket. 

The ending was perfect. I loved it so much. Everything about it was amazing and I was so jealous of Lola. I genuinely wanted to be her in that moment.

Overall, I really liked this book but it didn't quite live up to the first in the series. Stephanie Perkins writing is amazing so I would highly recommend her books to anyone but especially those who love love. It is a great 'feel good', heart-melting read.