Off-Campus and Briar U Series | Review
THE OFF-CAMPUS SERIES
I started my September with the Off-campus series. This series contains 4 books which are The Deal, The Mistake, The Score, and The Goal, which revolve around Ice Hockey and Romance.
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐⭐
TROPES - Fake Dating, Bad Boy/Good girl
TRIGGER WARNINGS - Mentions of Rape and Physical abuse
ABOUT - Hannah Wells makes a deal with the superstar hockey player Garret Graham to tutor him to keep playing while he helps her get the attention of the guy she has a crush on. Garret and Hannah help each other with this, but what happens when they start trusting each other with their secrets?
MY VIEWS - Hannah and Garret are my second favourite couple in the entire off-campus series. Fake Dating, in general, is one of the tropes I love, but the way Kennedy portrayed it in The Deal simply blew my mind. Hannah and Garret go from bantering to helping each other with their problems to supporting each other no matter what, and I found that so beautiful.
The Mistake
RATINGS - ⭐⭐
TROPES - Second Chances
TRIGGER WARNINGS - Alcoholism
ABOUT - John Logan has every girl falling for him except the one that he wants. To take his mind of that girl, he spirals into bad habits leading him to meet Grace Ivers. Mistakes push Grace away, and a year later, she is back, intending to ignore his existence, while Logan returns intending to prove her he's worth a second chance.
MY VIEWS - Logan and Grace are a cute couple, but this book doesn't make it to my favourites. In my preferences, I always barely like any second chances romance and hence the 2 stars. The way Logan treats girls and college life in the first half of the book also holds a significant proportion of why I did not like this book as much. Although Grace is one of the sweetest characters, I have ever seen.
The Score 
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
TROPES - Enemies to Lovers, Hidden Romance
TRIGGER WARNINGS - Death
ABOUT - Allie Hayes is in the wrong place, nursing a broken heart from her long term relationship and not knowing what to do after college. Dean Di Laurentis is carefree and always gets what he wants, but one night with Allie rocks his world upside down. Allie just wants to be friends, but Dean has other plans. Life-changing events put both of them through problems, but Dean never had a problem scoring in even a losing game.
MY VIEWS - Dean and Allie are my favourite couple in the entire off-campus series, and I am so in love with them. I even have a page from the book hung up on my wall is how much I love it. Dean is a playboy, but the way he is for Allie is swoon-worthy. They both help each other at their worst as friends, and there is this specific moment when Dean sees Allie in a broken state, and he forgets about everything else, and it melts my heart into a puddle.
The Goal
RATINGS - ⭐
TROPES - Surprise Pregnancy
ABOUT - Sabrina James has her entire future planned. What she didn't plan was a surprise pregnancy with John Tucker. Tucker is adamant about being by Sabrina's side and help her through this and convince the stubborn girl that some goals can only be made with an assist.
MY VIEWS - This book is my least favourite book in the entire off-campus series, and it's because of a couple of reasons. Firstly, Surprise Pregnancy would be ranked in the last tier of tropes if I had one. I just simply plainly do not like the pregnancy trope used as forced proximity. Another thing that was the entire problem in this book was Sabrina herself. Sabrina wanted to achieve her dreams and keep the baby, and when Tucker offers this to her, she lets her stubbornness get in the way? And she's supposed to be smart. I totally agree with Dean's thoughts on Sabrina being judgemental and cold-hearted.
THE BRIAR-U SERIES
The Briar-U series is the sequel series for the Off-Campus series continuing with the story of the Ice-Hockey Players. It's also a 4 book series with The Chase, The Risk, The Play and The Dare.
The Chase
RATINGS - ⭐⭐
TROPES - Brother's Best Friend
ABOUT - Summer Di Laurentis is attracted to her Brother Dean Di Laurentis' best friend, Colin Fitzgerald. When she has to share a house with him, sparks fly, and drama ensues. She thinks Colin doesn't want her, but she's off-limits to him.
MY VIEWS - This book did not particularly have a trope that I hate, but the plot was bland, and I couldn't find anything I hadn't seen before. It was plain and hence the two stars. Adding Hunter to the whole mix just made it more messy and hard for me to like.
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
TROPES - Rivals, Enemies to Lovers, Fake Dating
TRIGGER WARNINGS - Pregnancy Loss, Survivor's guilt (off sorts)
ABOUT - Brenna Jenson is the daughter of the head coach of the Briar Hockey team, while Jake Connely is the captain of their rival team Harvard. When Jenna faces misogyny at her workplace, she decides to use Jake to get the position, but for every fake date with Jake, he wants a real one.
MY VIEWS - In the whole off-campus and Briar U series, Jake and Brenna are my favourite couple after Dean and Allie. Brenna is one of the strongest and most likeable female characters I have read about. Her backstory is mysterious and makes the readers sympathize and respect her more. The cute banter and the way Jake is makes the book a great read.
RATINGS - ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
TROPES - Friends to Lovers
TRIGGER WARNINGS - Suicide Attempt
ABOUT - Hunter Davenport has decided to go celibate after losing a game because of it. Enter Demi Davis, who is in a long-term relationship with her 8th-grade boyfriend. When she breaks up with her boyfriend, she rebounds and sets her eyes on Hunter.
MY VIEWS - With Hunter and Demi, we got to see them develop their friendship, and that friendship develops into more. Their chemistry was just brilliant, and this book also had the jealousy done right trope. Seeing Hunter trying to maintain his celibacy just makes me laugh so hard. This book definitely hangs high in my favourite reads.
The Dare
RATINGS - ⭐
TROPES - Ugly/Beautiful
ABOUT - Taylor is the ugly duckling, while Connor is the hottest new hockey player. When Taylor is given a dare to seduce Connor to prove that she's not the ugly duckling anymore, she accepts it.
MY VIEWS - Elle Kennedy delivered the biggest disappointment with this book. Connor and Taylor are both great, but I just couldn't feel the spark I felt with other Kennedy books and even with The Goal and The Chase (My Lowest ranked books in the series). The book was just a rip-off of any other playboy good girl romantic comedies. I just simply did not like this book.
The Legacy
RATINGS - ⭐⭐⭐⭐
ABOUT - The book ends all 4 off-campus couples with an elopement, pregnancy announcement, proposal and wedding.
MY VIEWS
Elle Kennedy books, especially the off-campus and Briar U series, are some of the most delicate pieces of romance I've read, but The Legacy didn't meet up to my expectations. I am still giving this book a 4 star because of the incredible journey I had with this series, and even though it wasn't adequate, I still felt love for the book.
I wanted all 4 of the couples to have a big reunion moment in the end or at least something similar to that, for which I was a bit disappointed not to see.
There are some scenes where I wanted the author to maybe elaborate and show what she did, but she didn't. Instead of Sabrina's bachelorette party, we could have gotten more on Tuck's Bachelor party because I felt like it would have been a more heartfelt moment.
The wedding scenes, proposal, and the pregnancy announcement weren't elaborated enough, and maybe she wanted to show that big moments do not matter and the little moments matter more, but she could've done it for just one or two couples and not all? By the time I got to the end, I was expecting atleast one big moment, but that didn't happen. The book was solely based on big moments, but Grace and Logan don't have their big moment. Dean and Allie's big moment was ruined, I guess? For Tucker and Sabrina, she just copied the same thing for Grace, and Logan just added some extra plot. Hannah and Garret did not even have a big moment.
Elle was repeating the same plot over and over again with each of the couples. There is this big thing that is about to happen, but oh no, it got ruined well; big moments don't matter. We can have all these big moments quietly. Atleast one of the couples could have actual Big celebrations?
For an elopement, proposal and wedding, there was no actual wedding scene in the book, so I'm going to say not to have great expectations of a big ending.
Ignoring the lack of big moments, the book did have small moments that melted my heart. It was still a fantastic read and a great ending to each couple's story.
Absolutely beautiful book. Can you please do a Fake Dating trope book Recs
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