Much like many others, my interest in this book was piqued with the pun in the byline: “A Novel of Prose and Cons.” And that was a great lead-up to reading it! By the Book was a fun, adorable story with amazing female friendships and a great family dynamic.

Mary comes from a family of academics, with two professors as parents and talented siblings. She attended an experimental school where grad students were the teachers and the students pretty much had free reign over their own curriculum. When her school shuts down, she has to attend public school for the first time.

Her only friends from her old school refuse to hang out with her, so she’s forced to navigate sophomore year alone until she meets a group of girls: Arden, Lydia, and Terry. They take Mary under their wing after she gives them dating advice, purely based on all the 19th century novels she reads. She warns them away from Alex, whom she knows to be a heartbreaker from her sisters’ Shakespeare troupe.

I really enjoyed their friendship! At no point did it feel like they’re condescending or taking pity on her. Instead, they were all really genuine and so supportive. It was nice reading this especially with characters who are going through new experiences.

I’ll admit, I had my reservations because the protagonist is 15 (later 16). I usually read the upper register of YA because that’s just generally what I enjoy more. I also find that the younger side usually comes with a lot of secondhand embarrassment, but that wasn’t the case for this book, and I’m glad! Reading about how Mary and her friends navigate high school felt real. They also didn’t feel “aged up” either; it read like they’re sophomores, a mix of desperately trying to fit in and somewhat knowing what you want.

I also wasn’t sure about the writing at first because usually writing that emulates classics tend to come off as pretentious to be, but again, that wasn’t the case for this book. The prose really added to the atmosphere of the book and helps you feel like you’re in Mary’s head.

My only real issue was that Alex is a senior and Mary is a sophomore. I just don’t like age gaps, particularly in YA. However, this wasn’t necessarily a deal breaker for me in this book because their connection felt genuine. Also, Alex is the “rogue” to put into tropes (and Mary often does), but it’s never like…a sexual thing if that makes sense? More like he just flirts with every girl so that helped me feel more comfortable with the two years of difference between them. I still wish there wasn’t so much of an age gap, but I did think they were cute and I liked their banter.

There was a lot of humor in the same vein of a comedy play, particularly with Mary’s large family. Circumstances keep building up and it all leads to this crash that I found hilarious.

Overall, this was a really cute story! By the Book tied in classics and applied those tropes and story plots to a more modern audience. I definitely recommend this book for fans of Tara Eglington’s How to Keep a Boy from Kissing You or Emma Mills’s First & Then.

Obsessed with literature rather than social media, Mary lives in a different time than her peers. Mary is a great character who is highly intelligent, yet incredibly naive when it comes to the “real” world and the complexities of love. She struggles to fit in and understand others, but then she finds that her reliance on the classics and antiquated views on relationships from nineteenth-century literature can be used to deem a man worthy...or so she believes. Her new group of friends, help her to come out of her shell while she helps them find boys who are swoon-worthy. Everything seems to be going great for Mary...until the ultimate scoundrel starts to make her view life a little less by the book.

Reasons why I enjoyed By the Book: the characters are well-developed, Mary’s family is fantastic, I loved the literature references (makes me want to go read some classics), it was a quick read, and it provided a great lesson that fitting in is hard, and rather than changing yourself, find those who love you for all your quirkiness.

This is definitely a lower YA novel and high middle school read; this is one I would recommend to my students. It was a bit of a slow starter for me and it was a pretty predictable plot, but a novel I don’t regret reading! I would definitely recommend this to any YA readers who love a rom-com with a helping of literary allusions and great characters.

There is something about reading a book about books that does my heart good. I mean maybe it’s the fact that I already live and breath books. All I know is that the author did a good job of combining many classics (most I haven’t read yet but am now intrigued) into this book.

Mary lives and breathes books. She basically makes life choices based on how certain characters/authors would. That is dedication. Her life changes dramatically when she is forced to go to public high school.

I did feel a connection towards Mary because she has a large family. I grew up with 5 siblings and life was crazy! I also connected with her because books (obviously) and because I to switched to public school (from homeschooling) during my high school years and it was hard!

It’s interesting to see how friendships, old and new, play out. She is starting in a new place and trying the best she can. It isn’t always easy but I love that she has friends who are always there for her even when she doubts how close they have truly become.

The relationship in this book, you could say, is enemies to lovers. There are some great moments between them and I enjoyed reading about them.

As a book with teens in high school you can bet there is drama. It wasn’t over the top and I thought it was realistic and done nicely.

Overall, this was a good book and if you are a fan of books about books then I would definitely check this one out!

This book was a delight. The classic references were so clever and well done. It was a fun, engaging romantic read.

This book just melted my heart and it was literally the cutest, fair warning. It follows Mary, a young fifteen-year-old who has spent his life reading classical romantic novels, but is not very good at social interactions. Until she meets a group of girls who ask for her advice in the relationship field, given that she knows so much because of the book she's read.
Also, she comes to know the "school scoundrel", as she calls him, Alex, and the two develop a sort of friendship that goes beyond everything Mary could ever think. But is it really just friendship?

Like I said previously, this book was the cutest. I fell in love right away with Mary, our main character, and I could really relate to her, because at her age I surely was like her, and my life was submerged by books (it still is). I was rooting for her for the entire novel and I was so proud of her when she started making friends and maybe fall in love.
All of the references to classic books were heartwarming, and I could recognize most of them so this definetely add something to the novel.
At the beginning the way Mary spoke was a little bit offputting for me, because I couldn't really believe that a fifteen-year-old would talk like that, but later I grew accostumed to it and I felt like it was a nice addiction to the story overall. The writing style was really captivating and very good in my opinion.

Another thing I really enjoyed was the inclusion of a big family. I lovede the dynamic between all of the siblings. Everyone had their own story and they brough a lot to the novel. Jasper was the cutest little brother ever. This book made me regret being an only child.

The romance was NOT the main part of this book, but it was certainly swoon-worthy. Alex was more than the typical popuar boy in high school, and even though I got the plot twist quite early on in the novel, it was satisfying to see Mary come to terms with her feelings and the revelations life had in store for her.

I also really loved all of the representation in this book. I won't go into details because spoilers, but it was really good.

This is a 4.5 and not a 5/5 stars because I felt like the end was a bit rushed, I would have liked to see more of a resolution, but the very last page was the cutest ever, so I'm totally on board.
I'm highly recommending this book.

Thank you to NetGalley and HMH Books for Young Readers for this e-arc in exchange for an honest review!

First off, the cover was adorable and the title was amazing. That convinced me to request the book, and then the description…it seemed like it would be the perfect book for me. I am pleased to announce: if you haven’t read this book you are going to love it when it comes out. There is so much to love packed into this book. I mean, it was so good I was having trouble forming coherent thoughts. This is a romantic comedy. This is a good falling in love book. Honestly, I could sing this books praises all day long.


The Writing
First, Sellet has an amazing voice. I started reading this book and went “oh my god, oh my god” because the writing was out of this world fantastic. I cannot even put into words how much I loved the writing. It was so good I think I was drooling. (I’m kidding…but seriously, the writing is top notch and it is beautiful). The quality was there and I flew through this book in between another one I was reading. I just didn’t want to stop reading it, but I also didn’t want to finish it because it was so good.

The Pacing
The pacing worked very well for me. There were no weird or jarring moments, and therefore, I have almost nothing to say regarding pacing. It worked. The characters and the plot melded together creating perfect pace and atmosphere for me.

The Plot
Let’s talk about the plot…the plot that is the characters. Because there is a plot, but most of it is focused on character driven arcs and character relationships. Done well, it can be one of my favorite things to read, and this was done really well. We have Mary, our title character, who loves books and is new to her school. There she makes some friends, and if you’ve read the summary, you know what the book is about, but in any case, Mary’s arc is very much the plot of the book, and her growth as a character.
I also love resolutions of the issues in this book, unlike some books who don’t address problems, this one does, and does it very well.

The Characters
I don’t know if it is at all possible to talk about any of the characters without giving too much away, but I do want to say this: I loved them all. I loved very specific parts of this book so much so I want to go back and reread it immediately.
Mary is a fun character. I think she is relatable, quirky, has faults but is also supremely adorable. I love her. She may be one of my favorite characters.
Then you have her friends, and one thing I really loved about this book was how friendship was featured. How well it was developed and how honest it felt. It was one of my favorite parts in the whole book. Mary and Arden and Lydia and Terry were all fabulous characters and I would love to see them and their own books in the future.
I also loved the romance in this book. I felt the setup for it was great. I mean, I knew what was going to happen, and I knew some plot points I had guessed at, but it didn’t make the book any less fun, in fact, I loved that this book did and didn’t take itself seriously. There was so much to love about these characters and the relationships that they formed with each other.
Mary’s family was great too, I loved how it was function dysfunctional family. It was great, and I am sitting here trying to figure out how to phrase it an unable to.

Overall
If you couldn’t tell, this was a five star read for me. This book was so amazing, and I absolutely loved it. It drew me in, and kept me reading. I am so excited because I am sure going to be ordering the final copy of this book when it comes out. I liked the book that much – and when it comes out, I am begging you all to try it.

A light and quirky read. This fun story about a bookish girl using the knowledge she has gathered on love from her classics, tries to tackle love and friendship. This was such a fun read and found a lot of myself in the main character, Mary. I thoroughly enjoyed Mary's growth and her very large family. Sellet did a phenomenal job portraying each major and minor character and gave them all so much depth.

The writing did not gel well with me and I only got to 20% before I gave up. Thank you for the opportunity but sadly this book just wasn't for me.

Full review on Goodreads. I’m really looking forward to recommending this one to my students. It’s cute and clean and has some good friend and romance struggles with some diversity and lovable characters.

Oh my gosh, this book was soooo CUTE!

Mary, a sweet and completely clueless bookaholic, meets Alex, a sort of Casanova with the best repartee and a bad case of myopia. Their love story was light with the perfect amount of fluffy.

The references to classic books were on point and woven in so well that it never weighed down the story.

Besides the romance, which was perfect, what I adored was Mary’s friendships. I remember how hard it was navigating the halls of a school alone and then winged by incredible women.

I am really sad that I couldn't get into this book as much as I wanted to. It was one of my anticipated releases because of a) the cover is so stinking adorable and b) the synopsis had me hooked. I made it through the first 20% and I had a hard time getting a grasp on the characters. I'm not a big classics reader either, so someone who is a fan of Anna Karenina and Jane Austen would enjoy this more. I absolutely hate DNFing books, and I don't do it often. I will give this another try later down the road though.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an eARC of By the Book in exchange for anhonest review!

Mary loves books, classics, especially. Raised by two professors, Mary has been coddled by her parents, and in a special school program. But when the program is shut down, at 15, Mary must attend public school. With an almost Pride and Prejudice feel to it, Mary meets Alex, an actor in her elder sister's Shakespearean theater company. Off-putting and seemingy rude, Mary begins to grow close to him and eventually even enjoy his company.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book. I automatically relate to characters like Mary, because I speant a lot of my childhood with my face stuck in a book, and I've always found making friends really difficult. And honestly? I think By the Book would make an awesome Netflix series! What can I say? A modern, booky YA twists on Pride and Prejudice is always a yes for me!

This was a sweet, funny, and exceptionally smart YA romance. It's great for fans of the classics who also realize how ridiculous some of those "morals" are when applied to modern life. It's also a wonderful story about supportive friendships amongst teen girls. I laughed and swooned so much throughout reading and look forward to more from Sellet!

This was such a cute read!!! It spoke to my little bookish heart...and made me laugh- something I needed now!
I like at the end of the book it had a list of the books mentioned...

The perfect YA rom-com for Jane Austen nerd's!

As a devotee of classic novels, Mary Porter-Malcolm knows all about Mistakes That Have Been Made, especially by impressionable young women. So when a girl at her new high school nearly succumbs to the wiles of a notorious cad, Mary starts compiling the Scoundrel Survival Guide, a rundown of literary types to be avoided at all costs.

Unfortunately, Mary is better at dishing out advice than taking it—and the number one bad boy on her list is terribly debonair. As her best intentions go up in flames, Mary discovers life doesn’t follow the same rules as fiction. If she wants a happy ending IRL, she’ll have to write it herself.

Okay, so this was super cute. I loved Mary's obsession with classics/period dramas. The references and puns had me DYING. I also liked her big family, and the journey in which she learns how to navigate true friendship. It was actually kind of scary how much she reminded me of ME at that age - fifteen, unbearably naive, lonely, and completely unversed in love.

(Not much has changed, actually.)

However, her own naivety made me struggle as a reader. I wished she would have stuck up for herself more, and stuck up for the people she cared about more. Don't get me wrong - I remember what it's like to be fifteen and afraid, but even at that age, I possessed sass in spades. Although, there were few instances in which she defends herself and others, I found the moments that really mattered, she did nothing. That seemed to be an element of Mary's character that I found lacking.

Now...Alex Ritter. He was amazing! I understand the importance of writing a coming-of-age tale that doesn't involve just romance, but family, and friends, etc., However, I feel this story would have been so much more impactful, if the romance between Mary and Alex had been the focus. Instead what we got was random moments (totally memorable moments that I was fangirling over, don't get me wrong), where Alex simply popped up out of nowhere. We never really got to know him. SOME of him, grant it, but not all of him. What we did get though, had me fanning myself. I also loved how the novel shed light on what attracts us. Someone could be a total Casanova and out of our league in our book, and yet your friend could think the complete opposite. That was a nice touch to Alex's character.

Overall, I enjoyed this!

DNF @ 5%. I try to read at least 25% before I give up on a book, but I couldn't even make it through two chapters of this book. It was just trying way too hard. The main character was insufferable. I will say I'm also a lot older than the target audience for this book, so a younger, quirkier crowd may enjoy this much more.

This was a charming contemporary YA read that I think will appeal to the slightly younger portion of the teen set. Mary being 15-turning-16 in the course of the book helped make her naivety believable (along with her sheltered academia-based upbringing) rather than grating or annoying. The plot point of applying classic novel archetypes to modern day high schoolers was fun and felt fresh, although I did struggle to believe that Mary's new friends could have possibly found that approach as absorbing as they did. All in all, the romance plot was cute even if I wanted Alex to have gotten a little more page time so we could get to know him better once Mary's Vronsky goggles were off, and I liked how much of a focus was on her relationship with her new friends and with her family.

RATING: 3/5 STARS

I think this book will appeal to younger MG/YA readers. The story felt juvenile, a little too black-and-white for my taste so unfortunately this was a DNF for me. I did like the writing style, though. Additionally, the heroine was sweet and likable, and I enjoyed the references to classic novels.

**Disclaimer: I was given a free e-ARC in exchange for an honest review from NetGalley.**

Title By the Book

Author Amanda Sellet

Description from Amazon

Mary Porter-Malcolm has prepared for high school in the one way she knows how: an extensive review of classic literature to help navigate the friendships, romantic liaisons, and overall drama she has come to expect from such an “esteemed” institution. When some new friends seem in danger of falling for the same tricks employed since the days of Austen and Tolstoy, Mary swoops in to create the Scoundrel Survival Guide, using archetypes of literature’s debonair bad boys to signal red flags. But despite her best efforts, she soon finds herself unable to listen to her own good advice and falling for a supposed cad—the same one she warned her friends away from. Without a convenient rain-swept moor to flee to, Mary is forced to admit that real life doesn’t follow the same rules as fiction and that if she wants a happy ending, she’s going to have to write it herself.

Release Date May 12, 2020

Initial Thoughts

I was super excited to have been approved for this book on NetGalley. I’ve been seeing ARCs floating around on Instagram for a while now and really wanted to get my hands on a copy. I love Jane Austen and this book gave me major Jane Austen feels.

Some Things I Liked

References to classic literature. I love a well read character and Mary Porter-Malcolm was probably one of the best read sixteen year olds I’ve ever read about. I loved all of her references to Moby Dick, Emerson, Jane Austen, and more throughout the story. She makes me want to read more of the classics.
Jane Austen vibes. I absolutely adored the fact that Mary felt like a perfect mash up of Emma (of Emma) and Elizabeth (of Pride and Prejudice). Mary’s family felt like the Bennetts while her antics with matchmaking reminded me of Emma.
Sixteen Candles vibes. I also loved that this story reminded me of the classic Molly Ringwald movie. I was missing a certain character at Mary’s birthday party that would have really completed the Sixteen Candles atmosphere (but the feelings were there nonetheless).

Series Value

I loved Mary’s story and I think there is a lot of potential for spin-off stories especially among the other Porter-Malcolm children. I’d love to read more about any of Mary’s siblings or her friends.

Final Thoughts

I really enjoyed this book. Once again, this was one that I was approved for on NetGalley and immediately started reading (despite the numerous older titles that I should have read first). Totally worth it.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Recommendations for Further Reading

What I Like About You by Marisa Kanter – if you liked a main character who was obsessed with books, definitely try this April 2020 release. The romance was a bit more dramatic in What I Like About You, but it had similar feelings.
Tweet Cute by Emma Lord – if you like cute rom-coms with a sort of enemies to lovers vibe, try this book by Emma Lord.
Finding Mr. Better-Than-You by Shani Petroff – if you liked the idea of taking inspiration from the classics, you will love this book. It’s all about taking inspiration from classic rom-com movies.

I loved every second of reading this book, honestly couldn't put it down. This was just the kind of entertaining read I needed.