This was such an invigorating and interesting story! Following Meredith through her struggles as an 18 year old was so realistic, seeing the very realistic portrayal of high school and the struggles teens face on the daily.
The passion in this story was so evident and although not completely enjoying the first half of the book, the second half blew me away with a romance I loved, carefully handled issues and debates around religion that were considerate but realistic for someone in Meredith's position.

I do feel that I struggled with the first half of this book as I was so excited to read it and yet it felt very much like a book 15 year old me would have eaten up but felt too young for me to be reading at 22. However, it redeemed itself with a shift in the writing style and tackling issues that would be seen in a YA. Overall I would definitely recommend this book and I hope people give it the chance it deserves!

I really enjoyed this book! Overall I would definitely recommend it to people. It definitely would depend on the person and their possible content warnings. Katie Wismer is definitely an author that I am going to keep my eye on in the future!

When Katie announced she was publishing this book I was really excited to try and get an Arc copy. I'm not a big reader of contemporary but I was really excited to try this book out to one support on of my favourite booktubers and two to see how she tackles the certain topics that are involved in this story.

Trigger warnings: sexual assault, bullying, animal abuse, problems involving religion.

I read this book in one sitting. It was a very fast and quick paced read which I truly enjoyed. Mare is a very naive, shy and quiet young adult who is realizing towards the end of her high school year she hasn't had the "normal" high school experience. I really related to Mare because I was the exact same as her while in school. I never went to my school dance and I was very shy, socially awkward and had no friends. I really felt the struggles that Mare went through.

Although Mare makes some questionable decisions and huge mistakes trying to deal with the anti Virginity pact coming out which pissed me off it made sense to me because of her naivity.

Although the synopsis tells us that the anti Virginity pact gets out and everyone finds out this doesn't happen until very far into the book.

I really enjoyed the topics discussed in this story and it really makes you think about things such as religion, atheism, sexual assault and animal abuse. This book does tackle some very serious themes but never makes it too hard to read.

I do feel like this book could have been made a little darker and grittier but I really did love this story and super glad that I read it!

*Received ARC in exchange for an honest review*
Rating: No rating unless I really have to, then its 3 stars.
bookboyfriendsdoitbetter.com

*Disclaimer* I am a huge fan of Katie's youtube channel and watch her religiously. She's actually the reason I made a NetGalley account, and this was my first ever NetGalley ARC.

With that said, I'm a little sad I couldn't get into this book. I thought this book was going to be a little bit more mature, because of the subject matter but it actually reads somewhat young. The main character's inner monologue reads like a 15 or 16-year-old when she is actually a senior in high school.

I really tried to give this book a chance but I finally had to DNF it at around 30%. I didn't connect to the characters and I found myself bored most of the time and it actually made me not want to read if it meant having to read this book.

The Anti-Virginity Pact is one of those books where the cover and summary mislead the reader’s expectations. I predicted a dark and provocating coming of age story. Instead, as this The Anti-Virginity Pact book review shows, it’s a cute contemporary with a lot of drama.

The first half is entertaining, and interesting plot threads were picking up. However, they all pick up at once. There are so many different traumatic events happening back to back that the story feels unrealistic. I couldn’t believe that Mare, the main character, was able to deal with everything going on. And please check the trigger warnings, because A LOT of the stuff is heavy.

One of the most significant plot threads is Mare’s profoundly religious family, while she’s an atheist. If the story focused more on exploring her parent’s beliefs and slowly building the fallout, it would feel more natural.

Instead, when their relationship reaches awful levels, you’re already numb because of everything that happened earlier. Harper, Mare’s sister, is also an interesting character. The story would gain much more from exploring the dynamic between this dysfunctional family.

The ending is okay, but not satisfactory. The characters are forgettable because all they were was their reactions to drama. The only relationship worth mentioning is Mare and the cute shelter dog because dogs deserve the world.

I had high hopes for this book because the story sounded interesting. I think Wilmer has true talent and has the potential of being a great writer, but it was clear that this novel never faced a professional editor. I found the characters to be childish and aggravating, and the various aspects of the plot felt messy and untethered. Some of the choices made by the characters also did not feel plausible. I hope self-publishing this book moves Wismer forward with her career, and I will definitely check out future books, this just didn’t quite work for me.

I may not be the "target audience" (I'm almost 27 and this is a young adult book), but I still really enjoyed this! It felt authentic and real and like there was a lot of love poured into it, yet it wasn't hokey or insincere. I couldn't put it down, actually!

Something that really struck me about this book was the fact that it didn't take the turns that I thought it did, especially towards the ending - but don't worry, I won't spoil it! All I'll say is that it left me thinking deeply about a lot of things and I couldn't help but talk about everything that happened in the novel with my husband, something I don't do with just any novel. I loved how different this book turned out to be and I'm so excited to have been able to read it! I highly recommend the novel and the author.

*I want to thank Net-Galley for giving me ARC copy for Review*

The Anit-Virginity Pact by Katie Wismer is one of those novels that will sit with me. If it through the subject mater that is discuss, or even simply the characters that it portrays. Everything about this novel was beautifully constructed, well almost everything. There is at one point near the end that I thought was a little outlandish. I'm giving no spoilers here but linked down bellow will be both my non-spoiler review, and spoiler review that went up on my YouTube channel. In the spoiler review I do mention what I thought was outlandish. But for the sake of anyone who hasn't read it yet, no spoilers here.

Back to the novel, first I want to start with Mare our protagonist. A character that I fell in love with from the first line of the novel, "For the record, I don't normally have a predisposition for making bad decisions." She intrigued me, and soon became a character I would jump in front of a bullet for. Her journey from a person who never spook up to someone with a defining voice is powerful. The story that is told around her was nerve-racking to watch unfold and several moments I had no idea where it was going. In others, I wished I had not known as the destination was far worse. That is to say this book is dark, it deal with very heavy topics. It is safe to say that every topic is handle with such ease.

That brings me to the second thing I want to discuss, the trigger warnings. They are listed in the front of the book and pay attention to them. I would say the big ones to look out for are; religion, sexual assault, anxiety, bullying, and most importantly trauma. If any of these subjects make you uncomfortable I highly recommend passing.

With that being said Wismer does some remarkable things handle subjects such as religion and trauma. Mare struggle with religion, with grounds the novel, is something amazing to watch unfold. Down to the final moments. But I say most importantly, the way Wismer handles trauma is something most writers hope to achieve. There are several quotes I have never related to more in my life. The way Mare deals with the trauma that is place upon her is something that changed me. Made me look at myself and helped me.

Lastly, lets talk about the beautiful writing. There are moments were some writing techniques are subtle and mesmerizing. Then they're others where is right there on the page and I want to briefly mention them. I do want to warn, a slight spoiler ahead.

-Spoiler-
Lets talk about Mare's first kiss with Sam for a second. The way it is written was one of the best kissing scenes I think I have ever written. As a writer these scenes are tough to write. The vulnerability and the way she captured it all so beautifully.
-Spoiler-

Now we can talk about how Wismer sets up the scene. Each scene set up is perfect and well described that we can picture it unfold before our eyes. It was like watching a movie. At some points it was how she described a group of kids sitting and others a busy party. Each time I saw everything and never once was I told.

The Anti-Virginity Pact will be a book I hold dear for a long time. A book that will surely reread again and again. Of course, I will follow this author and continue to read whatever she puts out.

For the most part, I enjoyed reading this. The writing felt a little juvenile and some plot points were convenient/cliche, but I had a fun reading experience and think it was perfectly fine for a debut novel. I think there’s more to it than meets the eye and I will definitely will be keeping an eye out for what Katie puts out in the future!

I received an ARC from Netgalley. All opinions are my own.
2.5 stars
I wanted to love this book I really enjoyed the authors poetry collection so was interested to see how this book would be. I felt like some of the plot points did not need to be in there and the story would be the same. I would read more from her in the future but this book just missed the mark for me.

I'm struggling to decide how I felt about this book....the summary gave me a different impression than what I read. That being said, I think the book deals with a lot of great topics.

Meredith is the preacher's daughter. She's extermely shy and introverted. Her best friend Johanna is the opposite. Johanna decides that they should vow to lose their virginity before graduation. What's the harm? Ha ha ha ha....you'll have to read about that for yourself.

There are some pretty heavy topics in this book. Meredith has been struggling to maintain the facade of being a dutiful daughter and maintaining her religious beliefs. She's also trying to handle the backlash for the pact being found and the extreme bullying that ensues. Another is the typical awkwardness of dating as a teenager. Also, very briefly there is the issue of animal abuse.

I really loved the intention behind all of the thought provoking, conversation starting topics, I just feel as though they were rushed in the ending to the book. The pace at the beginning was great at establishing who Meredith is and what her life is like, but the last 20% of the book is all of issues that I feel were crammed in and rushed through.

A special thank you to NetGally and Katie Wismer for providing me with an ARC.

This book was so freaking fantastic! I started reading this during a reading slump so it took me a while to get through it (no fault of the book just my own issues) But I absolutely loved it! The writing was very simple and easily digestible! I loved the characters and I was able to relate to pretty much all of them in one way or another! The overall character arch and growth was done very well and I appreciate the fact that most of the issues the character was facing was put in the book for a reason and a learning lesson and not just to add useless drama! The friendship relationship in this book was done so beautifully and was one of the best things about this story! The last 35% of the book was so gripping and addictive that I just couldn't put it down until I KNEW how everything turned out! The hard hitting topic and approached and dealt with so well and this book really made me feel seen in so many way! The topics of Religion, Sexual Assault, Bullying are all really hard topics to write about and to do it well! I have experienced a lot of the thing this character has gone through, and I thought that it was represented very very well!

The only "bad" thing that I can even pinpoint it that toward the end it felt like there were just so many thing going wrong in the characters life that I didn't get to see them all flushed out and felt by the character! I just wanted a bit more time spent on each issues for the characters to learn all they could from the mistakes they made. But that is such am minor thing and didn't affect my overall enjoyment of this book!
I am so proud of Katie and all of the hard work that she has put into this book and I so extremely happy to have loved it as much as I did!

Erm what the hell was this book 🙆
The title and the blurb both sounded so good but the story had nothing. Nope.
So it all starts with our goody-goody MC Meredith aka Mare and her best friend Johanna signing a pact to lose their virginity by the end of the senior year. Cool. Interesting. What harm could it do, eh?
Turns out - a lot 🙂😂
Filled to the brim with drama, this was a hot mess, not kidding. First, the characters were so underdeveloped. Our MC had serious anxiety, it turned out, but later this was completely left unaddressed. Well well. She was so bland and a typical 'im a good girl I can't take revenge or do anything bad' girl, if you know what I'm talking about. And there's nothing wrong with it but Mare was just - just.
Then was Harper who was nice and badass rebel sorts but her problems were completely anaccounted for later, giving us just one instance that would question her sexuality.
And her over religious parents. Damn son. Won't even go into this.
In case of characters, I think I only liked Squirt the dog and a bit of Sam. Johanna was a hit or miss.
Now, coming to the story, it was a mess. I know I've said it but I'm saying it again - it was a MESS. The author couldn't just deal elaborately with one important theme, no. The author had to deal with multiple unrelated (almost) themes that we're simply abrupt and just there in the story to add to the number of pages.
There was a lot of unnecessary drama and I cringed so bad. It was typical and cliche and a very overdone plotline, bring in some tense mean girl drama along with some dog drama and voila! There you go.
I guess I would've loved it a little more if the book solely focused on talks of sexuality and rape and abuse and the religious aspect. But it was so rushed, all of these important topics, one and another thing came out of nowhere and ended up nowhere. It was just a big mess I felt.

Thanks to Netgalley for the e-copy. All views expressed are fully mine.

We follow Meredith the preacher's daughter who is going through a hard time, she struggling with her belief and about how to tell people then, she’s got pretty bad anxiety which I have to say is depicted well but I think that is a personal opinion cause not everyone with anxiety experience in the same way.

‘Not that I should be surprised – my anxiety has always been an unwanted but expected houseguest. I can usually anticipate it long before it starts to manifest, but no matter how hard I try to prepare or reason with my body, it still reacts as if the millions of times before haven’t taught it this is not a life or death situation. That it is, in fact, only making things even more difficult than necessary.’

She made a pact with her best friend Jo that they’d both lose their virginity before the end of senior year. Then Meredith gets worried when Jo decides she wants Mr. Graham, her teacher to be her first. I did like how it showed Meredith voicing her concerns about the idea, I just wish she never caved on what she thought was wrong, Because nothing good comes out of these situations. There was more talk of religion and believing or not believing that I thought was a really good undertone to have. It didn’t take up the full narrative but it went a long way in helping build the background of the character showing us why Meredith is the way she is when the book starts, and there were some good points where made.

I feel like the experience reading this book is like watching a TV show like Pretty Little Liars or Gossip Girl. I love these shows and find them entertaining which is exactly what I found in this book. This book is not a light or easy read it covers things like: Bullying, Religion, Sexual Assault, Animal Abuse, Substance abuse, Anxiety, and trauma. It is however addicting and keeps you glued to the pages wanting to find out what happens.

‘Eyes will zero in on my read cheek and the beads of sweat in my hairline. I’ll try to speak. My blood will thunder so loudly in my ears I’ll barely even hear my own voice as it comes out thin and shaky – a dead indicator to everyone around me of just how nervous I am over something completely simple and stupid like getting called on in class. They’ll all know in a panicked, shaky mess.’


One of my favorite aspects of this book is the sisters. I found Mare and Harper’s relationship quite endearing and totally realistic, especially towards the end of the novel. I think the whole book came off as quite realistic, it has some important message and the writing was solid. It really did feel like an appropriate narrative the characters sounded and acted their age. The writing of the characters came across as genuine. I didn’t have any expectations going into this. I watch Katie Wismer’s book tube channel and was excited to get approved for an arc from NetGalley but I went in expecting nothing and came out with a book I enjoyed.

3/5 stars. Thank you to NetGalley and Ahimsa Press for the e-arc!

I liked it well enough. I didn’t hate it, I didn’t love it. I think I had the most problems with the pacing, and it feels like some things aren’t finished enough. I didn’t have a problem finishing it and never wanted to stop reading, so I went with 3 star on this.


What I liked:
-I thought the premise of this was really interesting, which is why I picked up the book in the first place.
-I think the first third or so of this book is my favorite part. In the beginning, it read like a pretty chill contemporary novel that would lead up to some hard conversations. I also liked Meredith’s character the best in that part.
-The writing reads pretty standard for YA contemporary. You want to figure out what happens next, and the writing is not super dense.
-I actually liked a lot of the plot points that were addressed (didn’t love the execution, though, more on that under the what I didn’t like section)
-A lot of reviews say that Meredith acts too young, but I like it and I think it fits the book. As someone who grew up in the midwest in the U.S., a lot of people who are raised in extremely religious families come off as young/naive/sheltered to everyone else. So I thought that it was realistic.


What I’m on the fence about:
-The description/blurb on goodreads leads you to believe that the order of events in the book happens differently than it does, especially the way the anti-virginity pact was introduced. I think if sex and the church's view on that were discussed more in the book (or slut-shaming, or something along those lines), it would have worked better. If the pact had been the catalyst for Meredith getting bullied, that would have worked better.


What I didn’t like:
-Nothing much happens for the first half of the book but too much happens in the second half. The lead up could really have been condensed. Things don’t really kick off until about half way, and then everything seems to happen at breakneck speed.

-I feel like this book tried too hard not to offend anyone, and thus skipped some of the emotional labor of leaving a religion. The characters could have done a lot of reflection on their actions and how they wanted to move forward with the people around them, but we don’t see any of that. Meredith is an atheist before the book even starts, so we’re told about her journey there in retrospect. There isn’t a lot of in depth talk of the problems Meredith has with the church in the beginning. We don’t know a lot about the church she’s in, and because of that, the things that happen later in the book seem to appear out of the blue.

-Some subplots of the book are not finished, and some are unnecessary. Which sucks, because I think a good amount of these plot points tie into religion very well. The plot deals with sex, sexual assault, and bullying in a town that is very religious, but does not tie any of these to the church strongly enough.


All in all, it was fine but it could have been edited down for pacing, and the subplots could have been more fleshed out.

Not for me, no. I was expecting something else from this book, the writing was overly simple and the characters felt really artificial, everything felt really artificial and unrealistic.

I was really intrigued by the cover and title of The Anti-Virginity Pact. I went in expecting a story about a girl wanting to lose her virginity, which I guess is kind of what the story is about, but it wasn't at all what I was expecting. The cover art had me thinking it was a thriller, and the description referred to it as a romance. It seemed to be a bit of both. And realistically for me, this was a case of judging the book by its cover - I didn't even read the description before reading the book.

Meredith Beaumont is the teenage daughter of a small-town Colorado preacher. She's also recently signed a pact with her best friend Jo declaring they'll both lose their virginities by the end of senior year, which is quickly approaching. While Mare sets her sights on the childhood best friend she hasn't spoken to in years, Jo pursues their young, attractive history teacher. But things don't quite go as planned, and though a mean girl at school may cause many a problem for Mare, she may actually be her own biggest enemy.

Eh, it's rough to review a book when it has so much potential but instead just falls short. Honestly, this book was a bit of a mess. The intro chapter introduces the book in a way that leads the reader into believing this story is a going to be a thriller. I mean, yes, I went in mistakingly believing that this book was a thriller novel, but I've gone back and reread that first chapter and it still sets up expectations of a story in the thriller genre. And honestly, I think the novel would've been better served as a thriller that includes some romance.

And the characters were pretty terrible. Jo's plan to seduce her teacher was horrid, but she wasn't the worst of the characters. Ashley, the mean girl, was pretty unbelievably horrifying. It made it pretty difficult to even consider that level of bullying. It was bad. And Mare was just purely infuriating. Every decision she made was just bad news. She was an incredibly unlikeable protagonist. Sam and Jada were the only really likable characters, and there wasn't quite enough of either of them.

There was also some hints at major things that other characters were dealing with (Jo, Ashley, Silvia), but it was just passed over and ignored. I really felt some of those issues needed to be addressed, and they just... weren't.

Lastly, there was a significant second storyline that seemed pretty pointless to me. The actual storytelling was fine, and it wasn't that the second storyline was bad - it would've just been better served in a different capacity, in a different story. It just didn't make sense within this particular story.

Now that I've got all the bad out, here's what I really liked about the story: I liked that the main character was a French-American preacher's daughter in small-town Colorado. I liked her doubts about religion, her struggles with anxiety - those are the things that made her character more real.

"Teaching abstinence only doesn't stop teenagers from having sex - it just creates an entire generation of uneducated people who don't understand anything about safe sex, STIs, and how their own bodies work" - The Anti-Virginity Pact, Katie Wismer

There was so much potential with The Anti-Virginity Pact. The plot is reminiscent of a classic 80s or 90s teen drama: A group/pair of friends make a pact with each other to lose their virginities by graduation. There's some romance and drama, a mean girl, bullying, falling in love. It's all there. The main character has depth, but she's insufferable. The book was put together so messily, which took away from what the book could've been. I wish I would've liked this book more.

This book was really compelling. It hooked me right from the start and had so many memorable lines and moments. I totally felt everything while reading this. I love Meredith and Sam and would love to read more.

My only issue was the ending. Meredith just forgiving and forgetting after a week didn’t seem right. It seemed too much like trying to create a happy ending when I feel like a slightly broken ending would have suited the book and plot build up better.

3.5 stars. I enjoyed this book. Sometimes the story is a little bit too over the place, but it was overall good.

I watch Katie’s channel on YouTube and that is what made me want to read the book even though it is not what I usually gravitate towards.

Before I started this book, I didn't realize that it would have a heavy Christianity focus in the book but as someone who doesn't mind reading Christian books, it didn't hinder me in enjoying this book. Our book introduces us to our two main characters Meredith and her best friend Johanna. Meredith and Johanna are in their final year of high school and have decided that this year they will lose their V-cards and together in a drunken haze - make an Anti-Virginity pact. Normally this wouldn't have been too bad but for Meredith - she is the eldest daughter of the local Preacher and they are quite strict in their learnings as we read one of the church member youth being sent to the Conversion Christian Camps and their Dad heading to stop Sex Ed at their high school. As the book goes along, we read as Meredith starts to date Sam - another guy from her Church and Johanna has her eye on their English teacher. Throughout the novel, both girls will start to open up as they decide to take the next steps. What will happen though when the contract gets out and the whole school knows and the bullying starts? Can Meredith keep it under wraps from her parents or will she find herself shipped off in the middle of the night to the Christian Conversion camp?
The Anti-Virginity Pact was a great Edgy Christian Fiction YA read and reading this did get me thinking as we do live in a world, where often 18 is the age where females if they haven't had sex earlier - will try to before that point as I remember being 18 - the first time I had sex as I wanted to wait till I was 18 years old and I too think it was strongly due to my Christian upbringing.