LOVE FORTUNES AND OTHER DISASTERS - KIMBERLY KARALIUS

Love is real in the town of Grimbaud. Fallon Dupree has dreamed of attending high school there for years - generations of Duprees have followed the (100% accurate) fortunes from Zita's famous Love Charms Shop to marry their high school sweethearts. So she is devastated when her fortune states she will NEVER find love.
But Fallon isn't the only student with a terrible love fortune, and a rebellion is brewing. 
Will Fallon be able to overthrow Zita's tyranny and fall in love?

So I got this book in my first book subscription box from Yureka and I wasn’t sure how I felt about it - the book seemed a bit too soppy and clique for me.  I mean, the blurb says it all...  But I was really surprised by how much I liked it in the end.

When I was looking at other reviews, the word that everyone kept using to describe the novel was 'cute' but, at first, I really had no idea where they got that from.  I took me a long time to get into the story and I wasn’t a fan of the language or the predictability of the plot.  It was only when I got to the last hundred odd pages that I felt myself really beginning to enjoy myself.  I finally understood what everyone else was talking about. 

In a town where romantic future is set in stone and people are told at a young age what their romantic future is going to, be a conspiracy stirs, threatening to bring down Zita's reign over the town. Fallon follows in the footsteps of generations of her family members, travelling to Grimbaud to receive her love fortune and live happily-ever-after with her ‘intended.’  The only issue is; fate says Fallon is never to have her love requited.  So, driven by her stubborn determination to not spend her life as a lonely spinster, Fallon joins a rebellion to take down Zita and her tyrannical scheme, to allow people to find their own way in love and face the heartbreaking consequences head on. 

Starting off rather slowly, it was hard to get into the book and I found myself unable to relate to Fallon or really any other character.  The entire concept is great and I really wanted to know how Karalius would find a way around the issue of a life without love - because what kind of book would it be if it didn’t? 

While it does redeem itself closer to the end with quite a few funny and cute moments I felt that it was left too late.  Perhaps if I was able to see more development in the characters and the plot a little earlier I would have become more invested in the story and really related to Fallon.  But, being me, I still fell for everything the book sent my way - laughing when it wanted me to, awwing in the cute moments...

Overall I am definitely not displeased, in fact, I am quite the opposite.  The story grew to be more entertaining and I am so glad that I have read it.  This is one of those books where you get through half of it without much care for it and then you suddenly can’t put it down.  The ending is seriously what turned me around on the book.  If you decide to read this book, hold out to the end and you won’t regret it.  I certainly didn’t.

Rating: 3/5


Get this book on Book Depository here or from Amazon at an awesome price here.