My Sweetest Escape (My Favorite Mistake Book 2) by Chelsea M. Cameron

source: free review copy via Amazon Vine
title: My Sweetest Escape
author: Chelsea M. Cameron
pages: 363
genre: New Adult Contemporary Romance
published: 2014
first line: I can’t believe your parents are forcing you to leave.

Blurb:
The past will always find you

Jos Archer was the girl with the perfect life—until the night it all came crashing down around her. Now, nine months later, she still hasn’t begun to pick up the pieces. Even transferring to a new college and living under the watchful eye of her older sister, Renee, isn’t enough to help her feel normal again.

And then she meets Dusty Sharp. For reasons Jos can’t begin to fathom, the newly reformed campus bad boy seems determined to draw her out of her shell. And if she’s not careful, his knowing green eyes and wicked smile will make her feel things she’s no longer sure she deserves.

But even as Dusty coaxes Jos to open up about the past, he’s hiding secrets of his own. Secrets about the night her old life fell apart. When the truth is finally revealed, will it bring them closer together—or tear them apart for good?

My thoughts:
My Sweetest Escape is second in the My Favorite Mistake series but can be read as a stand alone.

I recently read and reviewed another new adult contemporary called As Long As You Love Me and I could not help but the notice the similarities not only in regards to one of the main characters leaving one college to start over at another one, but also in the covers. Must be a new adult romance trend.
In this story, Joscelyn Archer suffers a traumatic event which had her spiraling downhill, drinking and using drugs and doing poorly in school. Her older sister Renee has Jos transfer to a college near her and live at her house, Yellowfield House, which she shares with close friends. Renee plans on looking after Jos and making sure she stays on the right path.

Renee is super watchful of Jos, almost mother-like and sometimes she’s really too much. She was just one the characters in this book who was overly dramatic.

As Jos goes to classes, she makes a best friend, a girl named Hannah whose face is severely scarred from burns. Hannah was a favorite character, her outlook was sassy and she didn’t hide her face and shy away from people because she was scarred. I think Hannah needs her own book in this series. It was interesting how a supporting character really stole the show here.

Jos also meets a guy named Dusty Sharp. Dusty is funny, charismatic, dark and handsome with light eyes. He also beat boxes. Now this is when I came to realize that I am way to old for this book, but I digress.
Dusty beat boxes. He is very good at it and even assists during a wedding proposal scene by adding beat box effects in the background. Don’t ask, I will get back to Dusty in a moment.

Against her will Jos begins to fall for him of course, but the two resist the attraction.

Jos and Dusty each have a secret they are keeping. When these secrets were revealed, they seemed over rated and the melodrama was too much, especially with Jos’s behavior. It became almost soap opera-like.

Aside from the melodrama, I liked that Jos was into music and starts a music review blog. Her blogging and listening to music are nicely woven into the storyline.

My blog was …private. It was mine and no one knew about it. This was probably what Peter Parker and Bruce Wayne felt. Only, you know, their secret identities were more awesome than my secret blogging identity.
p.158, My Sweetest Escape (My Favorite Mistake Book 2) by Chelsea M. Cameron

I have a bone to pick now.
I did not like the way the author wrote Dusty’s character by giving him some really stereotypical traits. It is obvious by the cover that he is African-American or ethnic, as it is by her descriptions of him. I noticed the stereotyping right away.
So, what does Dusty do? As I mentioned, he beat boxes. He also wears baggy, slouchy pants that are falling down and Jo even asks at one point how he keeps them up. He also wears baggy hooded sweatshirts. There is no mention of the other characters dressing this way in this book, which takes place in Maine. This irritated me to no end.

So, aside from the stereotyping of the one single dark-skinned male character, author Chelsea M. Cameron did a nice job at intertwining a group of characters and making them seem like real friends. If only she would have written Dusty differently and not have stereotyped.

This one was not full of sex scenes, which was nice. Jos and Hannah are saving themselves for marriage and I liked seeing that in new adult romance, or anywhere really. I cannot remember the last time I read a character doing so.

While I had qualms with Dusty’s character, the rest of the story was alright. Sweet, fluffy romance, but some characters did annoy me.

Disclaimer: This review is my honest opinion. I did not receive any kind of compensation for reading and reviewing this book. I am under no obligation to write a positive review. I received my free review copy of My Sweetest Escape (My Favorite Mistake Book 2) by Chelsea M. Cameron via Amazon Vine.