Loved being in Paris again, but I could not tolerate the actions of the main character. Mom was super toxic too. I just didn't care enough to continue this one and DNFed.

I just could not click with the characters.
The storyline overall was interest to read, but there was never a time I could find myself immerse, caring about them. It's a shame, because this story touches topics that deeply interest me, but the execution just wasn't doing it for me.

This book is horribly ableist and offensive to autistic people and I’m disappointed it was even published at all

Thank you Sky Pony Press for sending a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I hate DNFing books but this one, I had to stop reading for the sake of my sanity. The logical fallacies in this book made me cringe and mad to the point that I could almost feel my blood boiling. I really am sorry but I am going to have to rate it 1 star.

Oh where do I begin with Maybe in Paris?

Ok, so my love of Paris and being a self confessed Francophile made me select this book. The thought of travelling to Paris and seeing the sights and falling in love with the city sounds like absolute heaven to me so understandably I liked the idea of this novel. And whilst I cannot say that Rebecca Christiansen writes in a bad way (because she doesn’t) I cannot say I enjoyed this book.

Pourquoi? I hear you scream.

Well it had such unlikable characters. Let’s start with Keira and Levi’s mum. Within the first few chapters she has basically called her daughter a slut. Makes out that she is some wanton harlot. Now if that was the case then why hasn’t the mother taken some parental responsibility and tried to speak to her daughter before basically writing her off and feeling that it was ok to speak to Keira like she was muck on her shoe.

Then we have Keira who, yes, is a little bit flighty which can be forgiven but she is also incredibly selfish and naive and really takes no responsibility in her actions. She thinks she is right all of the time and acts on instinct which nine times out of ten is wrong.

Then we have the younger brother, Levi. Levi quite clearly has mental issues alongside a potential diagnosis of autism. It feels that, at times, Christiansen uses his autism to justify some of his actions which are just plain arsey which is unfair to those who have autism.

Overall, I feel that the story would have been better if Christiansen had made her characters much more likeable.

Maybe in Paris by Rebecca Christiansen is available now.

For more information regarding Rebecca Christiansen (@rchristiansenYA) please visit www.rebeccachristiansen.com.

For more information regarding Skyhorse Publishing (@skyhorsepub) please visit www.skyhorsepublishing.com.

Umm... so. I was really excited to read this book, but it did not meet my expectations. I would love to visit Paris someday, and well, that's Keira's life wish, so I thought we would have a lot in common, but I was 100% wrong.

Keira is a self-absorbed, boy-crazy girl. She's pretty stupid too. She knows a little bit of French, and she keeps showing it off in front of everyone. And she wears a Marie Antoinette-inspired dress to prom. Haha, no wonder Jacques dumps her.

I don't think I'm qualified to talk about the autistic rep, because I personally do not know any people on the autism spectrum. So, I won't be making comments on the author's representation of autism. If you would like to check out some #OwnVoices reviews of this book, I recommend reading Cait's review.

I only like two things in the entire book, which are 1. THE FOOD and 2. the characters who did their best to help find Levi. Keira and Levi go to the same patisserie (with lots and lots of amazing French desserts and treats) for breakfast every day, and its owners are such lovely people. When Levi goes missing, they help to type up and print out posters. I also really like Josh, who is such a great father figure.

But Keira's mom? No, just no. She calls her daughter a SLUT, and she secretly stays in Paris because apparently, she doesn't trust Keira? COME ON! If that is so, why did you even let her go in the first place?

Overall rating

★★

Two stars. One for the delicious food and the other for my favorite characters. I am so utterly disappointed in this book. Bye.

I wasn't a fan. I tried getting into it but it just took forever. Usually the first 2 chapters grab me.

I did not at all enjoy this book, unfortunately. I felt the protagonist was way too self centered, even for a teenager she was over the top, and I could find no sympathy for her character from any angle because of it.

Now I really, really want to go to France. I mean...that has always been a dream destination for me, but now I'm twitching because of how bad I want to go.

Anyways...

The story follows Keira is an American girl who is addicted to anything French. She loves the language, the food, the culture, the history, the art, and Marie Antoinette. She is a girl of my own heart in a lot of ways. She reminded me a lot of High School Carole. Well, Keira has had a plan to go to France with the hot French foreign exchange student once she can get him to love her. She has some hope when she invites him to the prom and he says yes. Well...no spoiler alert since it is on page one, it does not go well at all.

After the debacle called "prom", Keira is brokenhearted, but things get worse. During the night, for some reason, her brother decides to kill himself. They save him and send him to the hospital for help. After some tests and whatnot, the doctors diagnose him with a form of Autism, bipolar disorder, and depression. Poor kid! How did no one realize there was something seriously wrong with him this whole time?? Bad parenting I would say.

Things happen and the doctors say it might be good for the brother and Keira to go on a France trip. What could go wrong with a selfish teenager and a teenager with Autism being alone in Paris? Again...bad parenting.

At first, things go okay. Levi does well with very few issues. Sure he says some inappropriate things when they have to wait in line or for some of the weird food Keira makes him eat while he just wants McieDs, but the first few days go fine. Then they go to Versailles and that is where things start to go wrong.

Levi says some hurtful things about Keira's love of the palace of and of her favorite queen. However, I did enjoy their conversation about historical figures they would save if they could time travel. Keira lists a huge list of some tragic figures like Marie Antoinette. Levi says he would save Hitler. Keira and I were all WTF dude? But then he explains that he wouldn't save his life when he tries to kill himself. He says that he would save Hitler from himself. He would go back far enough before he took power. Maybe help him get into Art school or not get into the army. He would save him by finding him a nice life as an artist or some such career. I was really awed by this. And it made me sad because I really felt it spoke a lot about Levi calling out for help in a way. It was a lovely scene for sure.

After that scene, things did get sour. Sure, Keira met a hot Scottish boy who is there in Paris with his band. They hit it off of course. You can't blame a girl, but then she started neglecting her brother. I won't spoil anything, but honestly Keira! You idiot you. You have a brother who needs to be watched...>_> Again, the parents AND the doctors should've said no. It should've been a family trip or something not just the two of them.

I liked the characters even though I felt the mom was a foolish woman who wins worse Mother of the Year. Josh, the stepdad, was the better parent but even he was an idiot. Yes, everyone did something dumb and bad...however...Levi and Keira are teenagers...they shouldn't be expected to know right from wrong in ALL scenarios. Levi needed help YEARS before any of this happened. Sighs.

This was a really good book. I could hardly put this down. Sure the parents were idiots, but what do you expect from a YA? I enjoyed the journey everyone had to go on. The ending was good and I liked it. It fit. I hope they all learned and grew from the experience. They seemed to!

Yes, this was very YA, but I feel like the author did a good job not making it TOO YA or TOO adult. It was a nice mix. I honestly felt like I was reading Keira's diary. It worked well.

My only complaint, besides for the terrible parenting styles, was the format. There were parts were Keira would read a text or read a note and there would be no indications whatsoever. The text was italicized or quoted or anything. It just blended in with the rest of the paragraph. I had no idea when the note or text was over. Very frustrating.

In the end, this was a good read for sure. I was hooked from page one! A couple issues, but easy to look over because I enjoyed the journey of the characters. I especially enjoyed following Keira while she explores Paris. It made me hungry and want to travel there right now! I'll give this 4 stars.

I received this from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review



Keira’s younger brother Levi has tried to take his own life and which this leads to a new diagnoses of Autism or even the word schizophrenia was used as a possible diagnoses. Keira’s dream was to spend the summer in Paris with a boy but when that doesn’t work out and with the money she had worked hard to get still in her presence she decides that perhaps a trip would benefit Levi also. So despite her mothers constant disapproval she and Levi go off to Paris together where we get to experience Pair but it’s really an emotional roller coaster.

Ok, I’m going to firstly begin with what I liked about this novel and that was the Paris setting, the descriptions when it came to each landmark or museum was great, it added to the reading experience and really made you place yourself into the Paris setting.

Now onto the points I didn’t like which is quite a lot, I found this book to be problematic simply because it was told from someone who wasn’t suffering themselves, yes I understand that any mental health diagnoses can be a strain on a family because they want the best for said relative but with this, I felt like it was told in the wrong way. Keira continuously felt sorry for herself when Levi would say hurtful things to her and I just felt it was all self centred.

Then in enters a boy whom she only meets and decides to spend the entire day with forgetting the time, could this happen in real life? Yes she’s a teenage girl but she’s also an adult whom knows her brother was along in a place he didn’t feel comfortable being in and had already informed her of that.

Then there was the mother, don’t get me started on my disliking for this character, slut shaming from the beginning then she continued to make her daughter feel like she didn’t matter throughout most of the novel.

The only characters that were likeable where the people who made the delicious croissants , Josh the stepdad and Levi himself

A good read that brought back many memories of roaming Paris streets and neighborhoods. For a first novel, decently written and very readable. I thought the details of traveling and mental illness were too simplistic and not well developed and sometimes not believable. The main character's viewpoints changed too quickly to be realistic, but I think the author has potential as a writer.

Everyone, there were so many things I hated about this book.

First, I want to preface this review by saying that I do not have a lot of experience with people on the Autism Spectrum. Therefore, I will not be commenting on the author’s representation of Autism. I will also not be commenting on the representation of mental illness because everyone’s experience and interpretation of mental illness is different depending on many things.

My main issue with this story was the characters. In a story that deals with heavy situations such as this one, you should have a main character that understands, tries their best, and learns from their mistakes. However, I didn’t see any of that from Keira. Not only was she very ableist, but she didn’t care a stich about her brother (even though the author tried to spin it that way in the end), and she was extremely immature and hypocritical.

Let me give you some quotes for her ableism…

“You picture Hollywood mental hospitals, patients drooling in straightjackets”.

“I can’t believe my brother could be that far gone”. Um…no. Your brother’s diagnoses give you no right to say that about him. That’s so terrible to say.

“Don’t psychiatric drugs turn you into a zombie?” Oh heck no. I’m sorry but also not okay. Some people use prescriptions for medication to HELP them have a handle on their illness…

Next was her penchant for being hypocritical, immature and pretentious. She acted like she was all that. She was the closest thing to be French without…you know…actually being French. And she knew exactly how to take care of her brother and help with his needs…Except she didn’t.

She could have seriously done a lot of damage to her brother, more than him leaving and getting lost. He could have gotten sick without his meds being monitored, he could have gotten hurt…A lot of things could have happened because she couldn’t watch over her brother properly. Because she had to go after every boy in Paris she took even a small fancy to. And she saw that when he left, but I don’t think she learned her lesson at all. That whole ending part seemed very staged to me. I didn’t feel bad for her at all. In fact, I was happy every time a boy broke her heart… Even though she learned nothing from it.

Which brings me to the next point. She was so immature and pretentious. She would go after almost every boy she saw, and judge him based on his appearance and what he could do for her. And in each of these instances, when they shunned her, she had something bad to say. Then she would feel so sorry for leaving her brother for some guy in a foreign country who she didn't even know. And she acted like she was going on adventures. What is she? Like 14? She is supposed to be 18 in this book. She didn’t even realize how dangerous that was. Going off with people she didn’t even know. Then, in the beginning, she had to comment on the French skills of the other tourists and make fun of them. Yet, when her own French was made fun of by a Frenchman, she got all offended. Can I scream hypocrite loud enough?

She was also so selfish. It was all about what Kiera wanted to do and who Kiera wanted to see. I can’t think of an instance when Levi got to do what he wanted. When she didn’t get her way, she was all sad or she pitched a fit like a 5 year old, bending Levi to her will.

The only characters I liked in the whole book were Levi (who actually had more of a head on his shoulders than his sister), their stepfather Josh, who actually had useful ideas and who was nice, and the bakeshop siblings. I hated the mom. She was manipulative and controlling, completely obsessive and she was so mean to her daughter, but sweet as pie to Levi.

This is a really touching story that has a great sister-brother relationship. I loved how the main character learned to love her brother more and going from hating how different he was with his mental disability to understanding him better and accepting his difference. Also, the descriptions of Paris were just magical :)

Maybe in Paris is an enjoyable YA books that I'm sure will appeal to anyone who reads and enjoys YA.

It is a fast paced book, keira Braidwood is a pleasant character, who at times be at annoying, but as the book goes on and the relationship between Keira and her brother, it is understandable.

The authors description of Paris is delightful and you can almost see and hear the bustle of the french city.

After reading this book, I wanted to visit and try every pastries in Paris. I hope to see more books by this author.

1 “Really?” Stars

ARC via NetGalley

Thank you, Sky Pony Press!

First of all, I don’t rate books one star on a regular basis. I really don’t. I feel horrible every single time I do it, and since I don’t like making myself sad, I try not to do this often. But I had a bad feeling about this story from chapter one, and I wish I could say I’m surprised I ended up disliking it this much, but I am not.

Let me just quickly say I don’t feel qualified to talk about the representation of Autism in this book. I read on Goodreads that the author’s brother is Autistic, and I don’t want to offend her family in any way. So I’ll stay away from this topic. I’m sure other reviewers with better understanding of the subject will talk about this aspect of the story.

I want to start by talking about the premise. This premise in itself is a bomb ready to go off. Look at the blurb: girl ignores her brother’s diagnosis and decides it’s a good idea to take him to Europe weeks after he attempts suicide + girl is more worried about flirting and falling in love than being around her brother + girl calls her brother’s autism “quirks” + girl abandons her autistic brother in a strange country to hang out with guy + girl finally realizes she screwed up. See where I’m getting here? This is a recipe for disaster.

I get that the point of the story is to show Keira’s journey from being clueless to finally understanding what’s happening around her. Growing up is part of her arc. But when you’re dealing with serious topics like these, you need to be 100% sure the main character is someone readers can get behind. Someone readers are willing to follow through every mistake. Someone readers will forgive because they see she’s trying to be better. I didn’t get that from Keira.

Keira was too selfish to be the protagonist of a story like this. She only thought about herself and, even when it seemed she was thinking about her brother, she truly wasn’t. And I could see that from the first few paragraphs.

The book starts with Keira hearing a commotion because her brother tried to kill himself. No spoiler here since the blurb talks about this part. Okay, so if you’re going to start with something like that, the scene needs to be so emotional I’ll instantly feel for the characters involved, right? Well, that didn’t happen. Keira didn’t give me anything to hold on to. She didn’t get out of her room even though she heard her mother screaming, the ambulance coming and everything else that was going on. I got nothing. Absolutely nothing from her.

Later on we come to learn Keira is suffering from anxiety, so maybe that why she didn’t even leave her room. Ok. I get that. What I don’t get is why she seemed to not care for her brother at all until she decided, HEY, you’re dealing with mental illness right now, the doctors are saying maybe you won’t be able to ever live without supervision, but we should take an unsupervised trip to Paris and, you know, ignore everything else.
And the thing was, I got the feeling that this wasn’t even about her brother and her misguided, but well-intended attempt to show him that he could live life the way he wanted. No. It was all about her. It was about her dream of going to Paris after graduation—a dream she was afraid wouldn’t be fulfilled because of her brother’s suicide attempt. I truly felt like the only reason Keira even thought about taking her brother to Paris was to make the whole trip possible. Her mother had made it clear she disapproved of Keira’s choice to travel, and doing it while her brother was hospitalized would’ve been really cruel of her. So it came across as if she was finding the perfect solution to her “problem”: taking him with her.

Had Keira been a good sister to Levi, I would’ve believed she truly wanted him there, but she couldn’t have cared less about him. She was too busy thinking about Paris and falling in love.

Dude. Keira was obsessed with falling in love. In Paris, preferably.

What I’m about to say next will shock every single person who’s ever read one of my reviews, but here it comes: THIS BOOK DIDN’T NEED A ROMANCE SUBPLOT OR A ROMANCE-FOCUSED MAIN CHARACTER!

I know. I know. But it’s true. This book would’ve been so much better if instead of trying to fall in love with every single boy she met, Keira had been focused on her brother. I wanted to read a book about a good sibling relationship, but nope. All I got was selfish Keira taking her brother to Europe, getting pissed off because he was uncomfortable in some situations and therefore changed her plans, and then ditching him when the first boy who wasn’t rude to her asked her out.

I mean, I would’ve been really pissed off at the author had I been French. Pretty much every French boy Keira met was horrible to her. Then came a nice Scottish guy and she was ready to fall in love.

I don’t know, but how exactly am I supposed to sympathize with a character who leaves her mentally ill brother in a hotel room for hours to go flirt with some guy she just met??? I don’t understand. I’m confused. I really am. Was I supposed to like her?

I’m sorry, but she made bad choices after bad choices, and she seemed so clueless that I simply couldn’t even feel sorry for her.

Then when describing her brother’s situation to her crush she says her brother is “screwed up”. At this point, I’m like WTF?!

After that she obviously loses her brother because she left the poor guy alone in a hotel room from morning to freaking seven p.m.! The blurb said she’d lose him, so this isn’t even a spoiler. The thing is, this happens at the 80% mark, and if the main character is still making this type of choices this late in this story, I’m pretty confident I won’t change my opinion of her in the last 20% of the story.

I wasn't surprised when Keira kept irritating me after that. Sure, she eventually learned a thing or two, but I was so done with her at that point that I simply couldn't get behind the happy ending. I’m sorry.

So, while I did get what the story was trying to portray, I don’t think it had the right elements to successfully carry such a complex premise. I needed a main character I could get behind and Keira was never that for me. I went into this thinking I’d get a sibling story, but all I got was a selfish sister making her brother’s life even more difficult than it already was.

I really wanted to like this book, I loved the storyline and how the aftermath of the suicide attempt affected Levi's family. But. (And it's a big but) Kiera was just too whine-y for me, too boy-obsessed and even when she realised she was being selfish she still went ahead and did what she wanted without thinking of her actions. I feel that if Levi had a few chapters from his point of view then it might have broken things up a bit and made Kiera's voice a bit more bareable but I just kept rolling my eyes at everything she did. It may also have been helpful for the readers to have some information and details about Austim within the storyline to help understand Levi more. Personally I know a lot about Autism after writing my dissertation around it so this helped me understand Levi and his actions, but I'm not sure it would've been the same if I wasn't as knowledgable about the subject.
I'm glad I kept going and finished the book though as the ending was good, and I feel like Kiera learnt her lesson.

Unfortunately MAYBE IN PARIS was quite the problematic hot mess. Not only is the premise highly unbelievable (and untrained 18 year old takes her 16 year old mentally ill, disabled, and suicide prone brother to Paris ALONE???) it was really ableist and disparaging towards disabilities such as Autism.

I'm quite unimpressed with how horribly Levi's mental health and disabilities were portrayed. The book starts off with him trying to kill himself. But we never find out why. Presumably he's sad but the book never actually talks about it. This sparks him going to a psychiatrist hospital for 2 weeks. He's not even allowed to see his sister. He's diagnosed with Autism and possible schizophrenia and bipolar. These are HUGE diagnosis but the book doesn't explore them, doesn't talk about what they mean. It just piles up stigmas with Kiera sitting there talking about drooling people in strait-jackets and this is what her brother will become. It's not only rude, it's cruel to people who genuinely struggle with mental health issues. I also ask how Levi's parents never noticed he was struggling until he was 16? They said they knew "something was wrong" but how could you leave your 16 year old son, who barely talks and never leaves the house, and think "oh he's fine"?

And to cement that the parents in this book are horrible, Kiera's mother calls her a slut within the first few chapters.

We get lines like this:
"She talks about the tests they've done on him and the diagnoses they're throwing around -- "autism with signs of developing schizophrenia or bipolar disorder". Those words, they're so harsh. You picture Hollywood mental hospitals, patients drooling in strait-jackets. My little brother can't be that far gone, he just can't be."

Autism is not a mental disease and it's not an illness and this book is just straight up insulting the Autism community.

I question this "hospital" where a trained professional psychiatrist could say to his patient's face that he'll never recover or live a full life. This maybe something you talk to parents about, but not to a patient who is obviously intelligent and cognitive. I'm so disgusted. Plus a doctor like this who can totally sign off on his patient going, basically uncared for, to Paris for a holiday with people who know NOTHING about his conditions, is obviously a terrible doctor.

The anti-medication themes were very distressing. Kiera continually says that Levi's medication is making him into a drooling zombie, even though we see no actual evidence of it on page. Oh and remember when Levi wasn't on medication? He tried to kill himself. Kiera needs to just stop. She's ignorant and uneducated and doesn't change the entire book.

The romance was entirely frustrating, with Kiera's life plan revolving around just finding a boy in Paris to fall in love with. Anyone will do. Her standards were so low, a pancake would be higher.

When is Kiera going to educate herself on Autism? Or schizophrenia? When is the book going to tell us about these conditions instead of just presenting stereotypes? Levi never showed consistent symptoms for anything which lead me to believe the book had no idea what it was talking about.

I couldn't possibly suspend my disbelief any further to accept any aspect of this story. The ableism and anti-medication themes are so suffocating. There's no learning curve. Keira is learning to love her brother despite his Autism. You want to know how ridiculously insulting this is? And it gets more insulting when the climax is the "disabled boy runs amok and ruins everything". This is a book designed for neurotypical people to "Feel good" about themselves for putting up with neuro-diverse and disabled people. It's completely condescending.

This novel was an exercise in anxiety. Oh. My.

Keira's younger brother, Levi, has tried to commit suicide. He's also been newly diagnosed as having Autism. All this happens just at the end of Keira's school year, during prom and then graduation. Keira and Levi have always been close, but to put it in Keira's own words:

When something feels good, I got at it full throttle. When something feels the slightest bit bad, I completely wipe it from my mind.

And that's really Keira's personality in an essence. She loves her brother, but she's also in love with Paris. She's saved up for a big after high-school trip, and in lieu of her brother's new fragile condition, thinks that maybe seeing the world might be good for him too.

Here's where I had to suspend my disbelief. His doctor is okay with this idea. Their parents are okay with this idea, just as long as the kids wait two weeks first, for Levi to acclimate back to home and normal life circumstances. Levi has medicine, so he should be okay as long as Keira watches after him.

Cue my anxiety. Levi's diagnosis is so severe that his doctor predicts he might never leave his parents' home. Keira is a totally nice (and well meaning) person, but she's easily distracted. She also has lots of expectations for this Paris trip, which might not be feasible with a very sick brother in tow.

There are so many things I like about this novel. I totally get where Keira was coming from, even though I sometimes wanted to throttle her. Her relationship with her family seemed very real. Keira and Levi certainly bickered the way I and my brother do. I also liked the relationship the siblings formed with a neighborhood baker and her brother.

But ultimately, I worried about Levi like he was a real person. I wanted him to get real help, not just medication, but therapy. Maybe therapy for the entire family. I wasn't convinced his illness was being taken seriously by anyone, and I was afraid for him.