The story starts off with Maya and her "so hot" boyfriend Alex going to a party and "mistakenly" drink alcohol which they think is just Jell-O in cups (yeah, right) and then eat candy unknown to them as Ecstasy.  Before we know it these idiots are high and off having sex in a park, of course it was only minutes before that Maya was almost raped at that party, but nothing says "take me to the woods and make sweet love to me baby" after an unwanted sexual assault. Oh, but things get much better, because feeling all weird and stoned out makes sex awkward and to top it off its Maya's first time and the pain burns like acid, so Alex (our hero to the rescue) uses some lotion to get things going...(um, girl says its burning like acid...for real lets rub some lotion on it....good plan...) and then Maya has a reaction to the lotion drugs and winds up in a coma with a swollen vagina brain, only to wake up days later pregnant. Shocked and confused, Maya's first choice is abortion, however after a frightening ordeal at the clinic she chooses to keep the baby and while she throws up, deals with pregnancy issues and is an emotional wreck, Alex wants to play with her boobies 24/7. 

If this book had a smell, you could bottle it and call it essence of butt-crack.

This book was full of scare-tactics and the writing just didn't click, and Im not really talking about grammar people, Im not the grammar police, but this book didn't even have proper sentence structure. The unbelievable dialog filled with immaturity had absolutely no relevance to teenagers, the lingo from page one screamed lecture from an adult, some of the phrases spoken by the characters I would expect my Grandma to use let alone a teenager. Maya's voice sounded like an old woman and the voice of Alex, he sounded like a bratty 14ish teenage boy through the eyes of an angry female.

If I can pull anything positive out of this book, I would say I agree with the author about this message: Teens- drugs are bad no matter what!! Getting pregnant at 16 is not cool and there are more choices out there than just abortion, however this book went about it in all the ways that make me want to eat my hands off.

Bottom Line- I want my hour and 15 minutes back!

Rating

For readers 17 and up, contains sexuality (odd scenes) mild language, drug use, teen pregnancy and abortion issues.

1/5- YA-Contemporary

Going Under by Georgia Cates
March 10, 2012 (Indie Author)
Purchased

Welcome to Going Under a story about a cheerleader popular type who meets a bad boy........and then life for them both change.

We have all read this a hundred times before, but the allure of this particular type of story makes us all come back to it. Because we want the bad boys....we want tragic and romance and angst in these books...we want to see the unconventional couple become the love story we swoon for......but in real life, we want the bad boy really to be the good guy who has a job, has a brain and keeps his private parts available to us only. Because while bad boys are hot, a flaming case of herpes isn't and nothing says loser faster than a guy who wont keep his junk on lock down. The best surprise while reading this was learning to really like the main character bad boy Jessie and getting to know his inner good guy and realizing that he wasn't a man-whore, he just had a case of "crappy life card" handed to him.

This was a pretty good story however the bummer for me was I failed to connect. Jessie had plenty of opportunities to change his "circumstances" and Claire had plenty of time to stop acting like a ditz, the emotional actions just left me a tad bit emotionless. It was a quick read that showed tiny spark, but with the bottomless cycle of these types of New Adult, Going Under failed to stand out for me. Now if these angst  gangsta bad boys who really are good boys underneath floats your boat, well then Going Under may be your next "loved-it" read.

2.5/5- New Adult- Contemporary Romance