I was so excited to read Lacie Waldon's book From the Jump. Once I read the synopsis, I knew it would be a book I would enjoy. I am a big fan of books about friendship and friends to lovers! A big thank you to the author and publisher for providing an e-ARC via Netgalley!

This book had a lot of fun elements.
1. I enjoyed how relationships were natural and not super strong/heavy right off the bat.
2. I really enjoyed the group of friends in the book! It made me want to be there and hang out with them.
3. Enjoyed living vicariously through the characters.

Overall, it was a light-hearted fun book! It was a fun/easy book to read! A great book to get you out of your reading funk!

I didn’t intend for my first read of the year to be a July release yet here we are.

I couldn’t resist diving into a light read and since I really enjoyed last year’s The Layover, I was excited to pick this one up. Thank you to @netgalley for the advanced review copy.

This is a lighthearted read focusing on a group of very close friends and their relationships - romantic and otherwise. You find yourself invested in each friend but this is Deiss and Liv’s story. Liv is a yes girl with a plan and she has crafted an entire persona around it. When she decides to make a change, thing definitely don’t go as planned but maybe ended up being just what she needed. Deiss is the swoon worthy book Boyfriend of my dreams. This is a great read and if you are a fan of any I’d the following - mark this on your TBR for a perfect beach read!

-Vacation setting
-Found Family
-Friends to Lovers
-Forced Proximity
-Slow burn romance

🏖️From the Jump🏖️
Author: Lacie Waldon
Publishing: 7/18/2022
Publisher: Penguin Group Putnam
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐

Special thanks to Netgalley for the opportunity to review this book. All opinions are my own.

➡️From Amazon: "Liv Bakersfield is used to living her life in “shoulds.” Be fit. Be financially responsible. Be your best self. An overworked graphic designer, she’s stretched so thin that she’s about to miss yet another vacation with her beloved group of college friends. But when Liv finally decides to start saying no, it feels good…good enough to leap straight into quitting her job and hopping on a plane to join them in South Africa.
Amid the exotic landscape and unforgettable sights, Liv expects sun and safari animals and an easy time with her best friends. But such close proximity makes everything more complicated, especially with the emotionally unavailable Lucas Deiss. Their friendship is the only thing in her life that's still solid, and she vows to do anything she can to keep the group together. But once they get back to L.A., Liv discovers that her leap of faith has become a freefall, sending her crashing into Deiss's arms. With the trust of the people she loves most on the line, Liv must decide between doing what she should … and risking everything for what she shouldn’t want."
➡️Review: If you are looking for a cute story about a straight laced girl who wants to change and hits a lot of kind-of obstacles, this book is for you.
It was just an OK read for me personally. The book was a bit long, with what felt like a lot of unlikely things that just happened. It was almost too easy. I don't want to give away any spoilers, but it just didn't have the grit I was hoping for. It seemed to just jump from one incident to the next with little flow. There wasn't enough resistance and the ending was relatively predictable.
I did, however, like that Liv had the courage to step outside of her comfortable bubble and change. That is something I hope to accomish myself in the coming year.

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From the Jump has a lot of my favorite elements. Friends becoming family, friends to lovers, a fun vacation and more.

Liv is used to saying yes to everything and trying to curate the perfect life. She finally hits a breaking point and starts saying no. She learns a lot and grows closer with her friends and a true love in the process. Lucas Diess has his own issues and is usually a mystery. Liv grows close with him and realizes there is more than meets the eye.

I enjoyed this one but wanted more of the travel. That was only a piece of the story and I definitely thought it was going to be more. I also wanted more closure or growth with Liv and her moms relationship as there were some issues brought up that then never got resolved. Overall a fun, quick read where you were rooting for the characters to find their happily ever after.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

From The Jump was my first read from Lacie Waldon and it was a wonderful place to start. The novel tells the story of Liv, and her close-knit group of friends from college. Over the years, the group has gone on many international trips, but Liv has always bowed out of these excursions, instead burying herself in work. After an upsetting incident at the office, Liv decides to start living her life for herself, and joins her friends in South Africa on a whim.

I loved this book for many reasons:
1. Liv's desire to be successful at work and putting work before experiencing life is something that many women, especially millennials, can relate to.
2. The romance wasn't in a bubble. While many rom-coms that begin with a trip have the characters falling in love in a bubble of fun adventures, From The Jump had the characters fall in love slowly, after getting back to real life and going through some serious life events together. It made their love feel more realistic.
3. The group of friends portrayed was lovable and complex, and truly exemplified 'found family.' After reading, you wish you can hang out with them and be a part of it.

My biggest complaint is wanting more. I wish we had gotten dual perspectives, as there were so many scenes where I wish we knew what Deiss was thinking, and I wish we had gotten more of the group's time in college, and seeing the complexities of their relationship form.

Thank you to NetGalley and Putnam Books for providing me with this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

One of my new favorite authors! Loved this book and definitely recommend!

Watch my live interview with Lacie: https://amazon.com/live/broadcast/d7b2b2ba-93bd-47de-808e-d9d0d4b183a2?ref=social&tag=erinmbransco-20&linkCode=ilv

This book originally caught my eye due to the pretty cover. Once I read the synopsis, I knew it would be a book I would enjoy. I am a sucker for the friends to lovers trope and a character-driven storyline - this book fit the bill for both!

Olivia strived throughout her adult life to make sure she was put together, followed the rules, and appeared perfect to the outside world - a reaction to her unstable childhood. She thrived with structure. I absolutely loved seeing her “thaw out” throughout the story and really find what she loves in life more than structure and perfection. I also enjoyed watching the feelings build and come forward between her and Deiss - how they observed each other over the years and knew each other better than the other three in their little friend circle knew them.

I thought it was sweet how the 5 friends stuck together through college and into their adulthood. I got a little annoyed how some of them got left out on occasion - but then realized that this was actually pretty realistic and it ended up making Olivia realize what she was missing by being so strict in her lifestyle.

Overall, a very well-written book that I would definitely recommend! Can’t wait to read more by this author!

This is my first book from this author, and I know it will not be my last! I found all of the characters in this story to be very likeable and relatable. This book is so well written, you are able to travel into the book and live vicariously through all of the characters. If you are a friends-to-lovers trope person, you will love this book!

Lacie Waldon has become my go to travel author! I read The Layover on an airplane earlier this year and this was the perfect follow up. I loved the vibrant setting and the globetrotting adventure of this book. It was fun, smart, and sexy at the same time. This is a book about friendship, love, and finding yourself in the midst of it all. Thank you to Putnam Books & Netgalley for providing an advanced copy of this book!

2.5/5 stars rounded up. In "From the Jump," we meet Liv Bakersfield - a girl who doesn't say no out of fear of reliving her past. Liv meets her friend group in college and they stick together for 11 years via monthly hangouts and the occasional fancy vacation. One day, after years of saying yes to projects at work that she hates and no to vacations with friends, she turns it all around and says no for the first time. This vacation leads to a whole new Liv and shifts in her relationships with friends that only get dicier (lol) when she gets home.

**SPOILERS AHEAD**

While I mostly enjoyed this book, there were too many small things that bugged me to make it a super pleasurable read. Reading this brought up so many questions that were either unanswered or didn't give a satisfactory answer (in my opinion). How was Liv's stuff able to be stolen so easily? Wasn't Elena supposed to be housesitting? Why do her "friends" call her the Ice Queen, and why are they friends with her if she's so cold? How does her personality change seemingly overnight? Why are they friends with Simone, even before the whole Deiss secret thing? How is Deiss able to forgive Liv and Simone for telling someone his biggest secret, resulting in it getting out to the world? Did Liv ever get her money back?

Maybe I just went into it with expectations that were too high, but I was slightly disappointed with the whole thing. I liked so aspects of it enough to continue and not DNF. I also felt so disconnected from the plot and the characters that I was literally about the read the conclusion to the whole book and chose to sleep instead.

Some good things about the book: Deiss, CAT Stephens, forced proximity, girl finally becoming who she wants to be rather than who she was supposed to be. This is a good book if you like friends-to-lovers - obviously I'm a sucker for that - and can deal with loose ends not being tied up and reading about unrealistic friendships.

A huge thank you to the author and publisher for providing an e-ARC via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review!

This book definitely gave me ‘Friends’ vibes, centering around a group of close friends who stay together through thick and thin over the past decade. Liv, a girl who lives by the book and religiously sticks to her rigid plans, decides to say ‘cya’ to that lifestyle and ventures out of her comfort zone by daring herself to do things she’s never done before.

This book was so insanely cute, and the slow-burn between Liv and Deiss was swoon-worthy. I loved the dynamics between the friends, and I absolutely adored Elena. Also, Deiss making an effort while flirting? Yes please.

Will definitely be purchasing this book when it comes out on July 5, 2022!

Thanks for letting me read this, it really took me some time its not one of those books that can keep your interest for very long I liked it but I didn't love it, I think it definitely needed something more to it

I will definitely be keeping up with all of Lacie Waldon's future releases. This book made me laugh, smile like a fool and SWOON. I have yet to stop thinking about Lucas Deiss and wondering if I could order my very own Deiss online. I recommend this book to any fan of contemporary romance novels. This one will definitely hit the spot.

I haven't read The Layover yet but am definitely moving it up my list after finishing From the Jump! This book was so much cuter than I anticipated. A quick, easy read with enough drama sprinkled in to keep the reader interested, and a really fun cast of characters - I couldn't put it down! I didn't love Liv at first, but she grew on me as the story went on and I found myself rooting for her. There was one side character I could not stand, but otherwise I really loved the dynamics, banter, and history of the friend group. There were a couple of slightly unbelievable plot twists, but I liked the rest of the book so much that I didn't even mind. I highly recommend this one, and can't wait to see what the author comes out with next! Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC!

This was cute! It was a light, mostly happy read with a few nice angsty twists and turns sprinkled in, and I read it all in one sitting!

If you’re looking for an easy, fun, and warm read with just the right amount of drama, this one is for you.

Liv has spent her entire life trying to become exactly who she needs to be. She wears the right styles. She reads the magazines and the books and the blogs. She has the career, the friends, and the perfect apartment.

But she’s not happy.

So when Liv makes a snap decision to finally join her friends on their adventure to South Africa (the first time she’s ever accompanied them, though she’s always been invited), quitting her job in the process.

And it feels great. So great, in fact, that Liv plans to keep shaking things up when they return home to LA.

But this new version of Liv has a whole new life to handle - not only cleaning up the wreckage of her spontaneous decision to leave but also the fact that she has definitely developed feelings for her best friend, and it looks like he might feel the same way.

A MUST READ!!!

From the Jump features Liv and her friend group from college that consists of herself, Deiss, Phoebe, Mac, and Simone. Liv lives her life doing what she thinks she should be doing; she always dresses presentable and wears makeup, works out and eats an extremely healthy diet. She never really lets herself go and just live freely, everything she does is according to what books and blogs say she should be doing up until she takes a leap to quit her job and join her friends on a trip to South Africa. She quickly realizes that she has been missing out and finally starts to figure out who she is and what she wants. She finds in these wants is one of her best friends: Deiss, but she makes a pact with phoebe that she won’t date him for the sake of the friend group. The friend group has already survived a breakup and doesn’t need another one complicating things. Things get messy when she finds herself living with Deiss after losing all of her assess and her apartment and she finds herself wondering if there is a possibility of having something more with him.

I LOVED this book so much!! I didn’t know what to expect coming into this book; I didn’t know that much about the storyline or the author, but I could not put this book down! I read it in one sitting!! This book is a friends to lovers book which is one of my favorite tropes. There was also incredible banter between Liv and Deiss and it also had a little bit of a slow burn. I loved how drawn I was to the characters and their worlds. I loved all of the side characters as well and hope there might be a book from Phoebe’s perspective! It is definitely a must read and I can’t wait to read more from this author!

The Layover was adorable, but this just made me swoon.
I honestly thought these two would end up as friends. This sweet love story just melted my heart.

OMG! I loved the layover so obviously I was excited for this one and it truly blew me away! Perfect beach/ vacation/ summer read! Highly recommend. One of my most anticipated releases of 2022!

MC Liv does everything right in her life. She has everyone’s dream home, works the longest hours to succeed in her job and tries to live a balanced lifestyle. This chronic yes woman finally decides to say “no”, and when she does, her life spirals out of control. Now she doesn’t have her whole life mapped out and realises how much she hates her job. Escaping the harsh realities of her life, she finally goes on her friendship group’s annual holiday away, with this year the trip taking them to Africa! Just when things are taking a turn for the worst, and her life is complicated beyond her control, she starts to fall for her longtime and entirely off-limits best friend. How can things in Liv’s life get any more complicated?!

This book was such a pure delight, and I honestly enjoyed this book from cover to cover. I honestly found all of the characters to be likeable and relatable. The banter they shared and the honest friendship for each other were so pure. This book is about individual growth, friendships and finding romance in the least expected places.

Lacie Waldon used to be a flight attendant, if you didn’t already know! I absolutely love her ability to bring this sense of wanderlust and the excitement we all know about when travelling. There is honestly such great energy surrounding all of her books and their ability to make you feel like you are travelling right alongside the characters on their next adventures.

This book has all of the tropes:
❤️ Found Family
❤️ Forced Proximity
❤️ Friends-to-lovers
❤️ Slow-burn romance
❤️ One bed

This slow-burn romance was so well written that the intertwined comedic relief and banter throughout the novel had me laughing out loud. This swoon-worthy, light-hearted and sweet read is honestly the perfect beach read that will give you the sense of escapism I’m sure we are all wanting at this time. This book is perfect for fans of “People We Meet on Vacation” by @emilyhenry and will give you all the feels 🥺❤️

I enjoyed this novel by Lacie Waldon. I found Liv a bit frustrating at the start but as the story developed, so fondness for her grew. I wasn’t in love with the idea that her friend group was so set against any of them dating, and found Phoebe hypocritical and Simone terrible. In the end though, I was able to get over it and overall enjoyed the romance.