The Boy Most Likely To by Huntley Fitzpatrick

Publication: August 18th 2015 by Dial Books

Goodreads summary:

Surprises abound and sparks ignite in the highly anticipated, utterly romantic companion to My Life Next Door

Tim Mason was The Boy Most Likely To:

- find the liquor cabinet blindfolded

- need a liver transplant

- drive his car into a house

Alice Garrett was The Girl Most Likely To:

- well, not date her little brother’s baggage-burdened best friend, for starters.

For Tim, it wouldn’t be smart to fall for Alice. For Alice, nothing could be scarier than falling for Tim. But Tim has never been known for making the smart choice, and Alice is starting to wonder if the “smart” choice is always the right one. When these two crash into each other, they crash hard. 

Then the unexpected consequences of Tim’s wild days come back to shock him. He finds himself in a situation that isn’t all it appears to be, that he never could have predicted . . . but maybe should have.

And Alice is caught in the middle. 

Told in Tim’s and Alice’s distinctive, disarming, entirely compelling voices, this return to the world of My Life Next Door is a story about failing first, trying again, and having to decide whether to risk it all once more. 

My thoughts:

I liked My Life Next Door a little bit more but I still really enjoyed The Boy Most Likely To. It's a companion novel so it can be read as a stand alone but I'd recommend reading My Life Next Door first because you will end up spoiling yourself.

I think Tim's character development was well paced. At the start of the novel his dad tells him he has until Christmas to change his life or he's not paying his health and car insurance and he's pulling his college fund. Tim does change throughout the novel but not in the way I expected him to and I loved that. But The Boy Most Likely To isn't just Tim's story,it's Alice's too.

Alice was my favourite character. She's definitely a complex character with lots of layers. She was portrayed very realistically and I liked that. She has a big burden on her shoulders because she feels it's her job to keep the family running smoothly because her mother is pregnant and her father is in hospital. With 7 other siblings she has her hands full but she does her best. She's very closed off and often referred to herself as Tin Alice which I thought was an interesting way of showing how she sees herself as heartless, but during the story she does grow and change and learns that she doesn't need to do everything all the time.

Huntley Fitzpatrick knows how to write a realistic family dynamic. Each of the Garretts are so easy to love.They're all so different from each other. I'd love to see a book about Andy or one of the others someday. They are one of my favourite fictional families I've ever read.

I loved how we got to see what Jase and Sam were up to after the event of  My Life Next Door,because when I finished that book I wanted to read more about them.

 I didn't understand why one character,Hester, acted the way she did to some of the other characters. I don't know if she was supposed to be written like that, but I didn't like her at all, she was very cold towards the others and I think realistically a person in her situation would have acted differently.

All in all, I really enjoyed this book,it was a quick enjoyable read and I can't wait to pick up What I Thought Was True,which is the only Huntley Fitzpatrick book I haven't read yet.

My rating: 4 out of 5 stars.