I love a good enemies to lovers/ forced proximity trope. This was a super cute YA rom-com. Loved the character growth for Kelsie and I loved Eric and Kelsie's chemistry.

Thank you NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for my ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

This was a fun enemies to lovers road trip book. They have both been ghosted, by a girlfriend and friend and work through their feelings on their road trip. Cute YA romance I’d recommend for the YA audience!

Ok this book was an unexpected hit for me! I do love a good YA romance, plus enemies to lovers, plus complicated friendships and struggles. There are definitely several little conflicts going on throughout this story and I think if they weren't handled properly it could have seemed like a lot going on, but with the timeline and pace of the friendship being built, it made a ton of sense.

Kelsie is so frustrating but like aren't we all a little stubborn and frustrating sometimes? and Eric is just a sweet angel with some hard things going on in his life and I would just like to give him a big ol' hug.

I would recommend this book to fans of THE DO OVER by Lynn Painter, and TODAY, TONIGHT, TOMORROW by Rachel Lynn Solomon.

I love a good enemies to lovers road trip love story. This one was just so fun. Thank you to S&S or the advanced copy

It has not been a good year for me and YA as a genre. Especially modern setting YA. It might be because I have less patience for teen angst now that I have teenagers of my own. Whatever the reason, I find the genre has not been working for me. That said, I really enjoyed Everyone Hates Kelsie Miller. Somehow the writer managed to make their teenage selfishness bearable. Kelsie and Eric have good chemistry, and their character and romantic development work for me. I give this book a solid 4/5 stars and will be on the lookout for this author in the future.

This book probably would get closer to a 3.5 if I could give a partial star but alas I cannot. There were parts of the story that I liked but those pretty much did not happen until I was 3/4 of the way through the story. There were just some things about Kelsie that were hard to “watch”. I did love the banter that her and Eric had as well as some moments towards the end. In the end this isn’t a book that I fell in love with but appreciate some parts of it.

A fun YA with themes that will appeal to young readers. The characters’ journeys, both physical and emotional, was engaging and realistic. Highly recommend.

Summary: Kelsie Miller and Eric Mulvaney Ortiz have been frenemies; competing in school for as long as they can remember. When Eric’s girlfriend breaks up with him on her way to college, and Kelsie’s best friend “breaks up” with her over a disagreement right before moving across the country to live with her mom, Eric proposes they take a road trip to the University of Pennsylvania to try to win both of them back.

Thought: This is such a cute YA about figuring out who you are and who you love. On the surface, it is a fun romance between two life long frenemies who take a road trip together in search of what they “think” they want. As they spend time together in close proximity, they realize what they they think they want and what they actually want might be two different things. I loved taking the road trip alongside Kelsie and Eric as they fought each other and well as their feelings. And it is always fun to head back to college for that freshman experience.

At its core though, this is a story about figuring out who you are, quirks and all, and your weaknesses and how to improve upon them. It’s about learning how to say you’re sorry and asking for help when you need it. All of these messages are important for young adults who may be going through some of the same struggles. Kelsie is such a relatable character and I hope a lot of readers will seek solace in seeing someone else going through what they might be going through.

Read if you like:
•enemies to lovers
•forced proximity
•demi-sexual rep
•road trip storylines

Thank you NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for my ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

Available now!

Everyone Hates Kelsie Miller, by Meredith Ireland, follows Kelsie, whose best friend, Briana, just moved across the country and ghosted her, leaving her unsure what she has done to warrant it. When school golden boy (and Kelsie's academic rival), Eric Mulvaney-Ortiz, asks her to come with him on a roadtrip to UPenn, where his girlfriend goes and where Briana is touring, Kelsie reluctantly agrees. Over the course of the trip, Kelsie finds herself having revelations about her role in her and Briana's friendship falling apart, and simultaneously starts to see Eric in a new light.

I really liked Kelsie as a protagonist. She's very intelligent, but not so amazing with people-skills. She's sarcastic and a little harsh, but over the course of the book genuinely matures and learns to hold herself accountable for her behavior. I was definitely rooting for her, and I enjoyed her character arc.

I liked Eric significantly less. He just had no personality; I couldn't find myself getting on board with him. His girlfriend has ghosted him, so he wants to go to UPenn to talk to her and do a grand gesture to try and convince her to not give up on their relationship. Part of my issue with this was how painfully obvious it is that he and Kelsie will end up together, so it's difficult to invest oneself in his plot at all, but it also becomes much more difficult to ship him and Kelsie because he's so hung up on another girl. I also didn't find that her and Kelsie had much chemistry beyond the academic-rivals trope (which I do love, but this book was not the best example of it).

Books about friendship problems are always difficult for me, since I've had some traumatic experiences with my best friend ignoring me, so there was a point where I thought I was going to DNF this book, but I'm glad I pushed through. I really enjoyed the depth of Kelsie and Briana's friendship, the flashbacks that we see of them, and the arc of the two characters throughout the book. It's very much a friendship-centric story; the romance takes a little bit of a backseat, which is good because the friendship plot-line was much stronger and more compelling.

The roadtrip trope is always so fun, and it didn't disappoint here; though not reaching maximum chaos for fictional roadtrips it did add some fun elements to the story.

Overall, I'm giving Everyone Hates Kelsie Miller 3/5 stars. The friendship plot-line and Kelsie's character development are done really well, but Eric is such a drawback that it really detracted from the rest of the story for me. I would still definitely recommend it if you love roadtrip stories or friendship-centric books, since it does both of those aspects really well.

“I wanted to freeze time and everyone in the same spot.
But that was impossibly selfish.”

Kelsie Miller knows two things: first, her best friend Briana has moved across the country and has definitely been ignoring her, and second, nothing will ever make her like golden boy Eric Mulvaney Ortiz. But then Eric proposes a spontaneous road trip with the intention of reuniting with Jessica, the girlfriend who ghosted him. Now, Kelsie suddenly has the opportunity to face her former best friend in person. The biggest challenge? Surviving a car ride with her academic archnemesis. When a simple road trip turns into an overnight college-campus escapade, Kelsie starts to examine why exactly ‘everyone hates Kelsie Miller.’

I absolutely loved Meredith Ireland’s debut book, The Jasmine Project, so when I heard her second book was an academic rivals-to-lovers road trip rom-com, I knew I had to get my hands on Everyone Hates Kelsie Miller. A primary issue in Kelsie’s story is her friendship with Briana. Readers learn about the depth of their friendship and how impactful platonic intimacy can be. “Friendship breakups” are a valid yet underrepresented heartbreak in YA books, and I think Kelsie’s internal dialogue and flashbacks offer a lot of relatable musings on unintentionally causing hurt in friendships. With that, I also appreciate how much development Kelsie undergoes as the book progresses. Kelsie not only realizes how she hurt Briana in their friendship, but also how her own insecurities and pride impacted her relationships with other people. People like Eric—who, by the way, checks so many of the best rom-com character tropes. Eric is the academic-rival-turned-lover, the football star who’s also on track to being valedictorian, and the one who falls first! Seeing the tension between Kelsie and Eric evolve throughout the book was so satisfying. For all you movie fans, the book also ends with a nod to an iconic rom-com (another trope I adore)!

Lastly, I want to highlight how Meredith Ireland incorporates adoption and surrogate families into the backgrounds of Kelsie and Eric. Kelsie is a Korean adoptee, and Eric was born via surrogacy. Both characters openly discuss their backgrounds, particularly through conversations about meeting biological parents, navigating family dynamics, and exploring personal identities. As a transnational and transracial adoptee, I felt so seen by Kelsie’s conversations and feelings. I loved reading about an adopted character who sees adoption as a positive part of their story– not something to “fix” or some kind of personal roadblock. We love seeing casual representation!

Everyone Hates Kelsie Miller delivers a fun and engaging rom-com while also addressing nuanced and complex themes of relationships, identity, and personal growth. The book was a great and quick read, and one I’ll definitely recommend!

Everyone Hates Kelsie Miller releases October 11, 2022.

(Pine Reads Review would like to thank NetGalley and the publisher for sending us an ARC in exchange for an honest review. Any quotes are taken from an advanced copy and may be subject to change upon final publication.)

I absolutely loved Meredith Ireland's debut, THE JASMINE PROJECT, so when I saw her sophomore novel on NetGalley, I knew I had to request it. I read it all in one sitting, and I mostly enjoyed the cute romance. However, THE JASMINE PROJECT had had me practically rolling on the ground cracking up, but I only smile-laughed a few times while reading EVERYONE HATES KELSIE MILLER. It felt a little too short, and while I liked the emotional learning journey Kelsie goes on throughout the story, a lot of things felt a little too easy and coincidental. Overall, I enjoyed it, but not as much as THE JASMINE PROJECT.

(Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review. Any quotes are taken from an advanced copy and may be subject to change upon final publication.)

I adored Ireland’s previous book, but this one really wowed me. I was shocked and pleased by the myriad of emotions I experienced. Heck, this book was precious!

It was a road trip book, and I LOVE road trip books. Being on the road with Eric and Kelsie was a lot of fun. There was tons of verbal sparring in the beginning, and the barbs exchanged between two highly intelligent and competitive people can be very entertaining. I also enjoyed all the shenanigans, on and off campus. There was definitely lots of COM in this rom-com.

Along the way, the things got cleared up between Eric and Kelsie, and Kelsie began to see Eric in a different light. That was the beginning of a long string of revelations for her. It was something that really made an impact on me, and my love for Kelsie grew as a result of her self-growth. This trip began with a laser focus on winning back her besties, but it was quite a personal journey for Kelsie.

There were just so many things that stood out for me in this novel. I loved the exploration of complicated relationships and friend breakups. I adored Kelsie’s family and will never tire of meeting wonderful YA parents. Then there was the adorable romance and even a sort of grand gesture.

What started out as a mission to reconnect with her best friend, turned into a rather meaningful personal journey for Kelsie. Being the smartest girl at a most competitive school didn’t always mean that Kelsie saw all the signs, and she had been missing some really big ones. This road trip with her nemesis was an eye-opening one that helped her recognize some of her faults, weaknesses, and missed opportunities. Fun, heartwarming, and packed with humor, I loved every minute of this book!

This is a story about how often we don’t see what is right in front of us. Kelsie Miller is one of the very top students in her magnet high school in upstate New York. Never the most popular, she spent most of high school with her best friend since kindergarten, Briana. Kelsie’s main competition for being the top student is one classmate she cannot stand: Eric Mulvaney Ortiz. Besides being a terrific student, Eric is everything that Kelsie is not — popular, with tons of friends, and the star football player of the high school team.

As the summer before their senior year comes to an end, though, Kelsie and Eric realize they have a common interest when they encounter each other at a party. Briana moved away earlier in the summer to live with her mom across the country and stopped talking to Kelsie for reasons she does not understand. Eric’s girlfriend who he met over the summer also stopped speaking with him. Jessica, his girlfriend, is a freshmen at the University of Pennsylvania and, from social media stalking, Kelsie learns that Briana is planning a visit there. So Eric asks Kelsie to take a road trip to UPenn to try to win Briana and Jessica back — or at least learn what went wrong. Kelsie reluctantly agrees to go on this trip with her hated rival and, in the course of their time together, learns much more about herself, Eric, and the future she wants than she could have ever imagined.

This book was terrific! The author did an excellent job of examining the pressures that top students feel and the different ways they experience and respond to those pressures. I really appreciated how the book portrayed how the assumptions we make about others, even those we are certain we know well, are often way off the mark. Most of all, Kelsie and Eric are both engaging, complex, and thoughtful characters — it is fun (and frequently funny) to spend time with them, and their journeys over the course of the book feel authentic and earned.

Strongly recommended!

EVERYONE HATES KELSIE MILLER follows Kelsie and her academic rival, Eric, as they take a road trip to Penn State to a) find Eric's girlfriend who has been avoiding his messages, and b) find Kelsie's best friend who moved earlier in the summer and has also been ignoring her texts. I didn't know too much about this before going in, but I was excited when we started the road trip because I love road trips in YA books. Unfortunately, though, I found myself disappointed with the book overall. The characters are juniors in high school and, just like with many of my complaints with YA these days, they seemed so immature. Going alongside that, both the spoken dialogue and the internal dialogue felt very "trying to be a cool teenager" and it just didn't flow well; I found myself cringing more than I wanted to. I also thought some of the flashbacks in this book were placed at inopportune times and didn't feel natural either. This isn't a bad book by any means, but I just don't know that its content matter (touring college, etc) matched with the actual behavior of its characters, who seemed young for their junior/senior status.

I plan on talking about this on next month’s episode of Raise Your Words for my episode titled Recent Releases! Everyone Hates Kelcie Miller is perfect for fans of A Pho Love Story and Today Tonight Tomorrow. It’s also good for fans of A Taste for Love! I love that this takes place on a college campus. Eric and Kelsie are hilarious together!

This was such a good YA read. I really enjoy books about road trips! There is something about pulling characters away from their every day lives that just really enhances the story.

I really liked The Jasmine Project by this author so I was excited to try another book by her!
This book is set around high school academic rivals setting out on a road trip to get their ex-girlfriend and ex-best friend back.
I love academic rivals to lovers so that aspect was so great. The banter between the main characters was so entertaining but they also shared some really deep and meaningful conversations which I really appreciated. Their connection was super believable. Sometimes the characters felt a little juvenile when the majority of the book took place on a college campus so it felt a little unbalanced at times.
I really enjoy this author’s writing! It’s humorous, sentimental, fun and genuine. The writing and story made for a quick and satisfying read. I went into this one wanting a fluffy YA romcom and that’s exactly what it delivered.
This book was honestly so cute and I think a lot of young adult readers who are uncertain about their path in the future when it comes it college will be able to relate to it.
Thank you so much to NetGalley, the author and the publisher for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

Everyone Hates Keslie Miller follows Keslie who is the top of her class and Eric who is the football star and the homecoming king. Keslie's best friend Bri moves across the country and Eric's girlfreind Jessica also moves across the country. So Keslie and Eric decide to go on a roadtrip to see them. Eric and Keslie never really got a long. But soon a roadtrip brings them closer together, and they learn they have more inc ommon than they thought. What they don't expect is to mabye become friends are even more.

This was such a cute YA book. I really liked the Keslie and Eric's realtionship. And how in the end of this book they eneded up where they were suppose to be. I felt like this was a very easy fast read. I will say it did feel a bit on the younger side for me, but that is the case with some YA books. But if you are looking for a cute YA book to read, I would suggest this one.

This was a quick, charming story about rivals and friendships. The writing was engaging, and the plot was truly fun! This would be a great YA pick for fall.

Thank you Netgalley and Simon and Schuster for allowing me to read and review this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

If you've ever read Today Tonight Tomorrow by Rachel Lynn Solomon or any YA book from Katie Cotugno, then you must pick up Everyone Hates Kelsie Miller.

I love when an author creates an intimidating and smart character as the main protagonist.

Kelsie and Eric are academic rivals. They both feel the need to challenge the other and get a higher score. Eric and Kelsie both lost someone they love: for Kelsie it's her ex best friend Bri who left their small town for UPenn college after a disagreement. For Eric it's an ex girlfriend who is going to the same college and "ghosted him". Eric suggests they take a day trip to UPenn and reconcile/reconnect with their exes and accept if they need to let go or move forward with either relationship. Reluctantly Kelsie agrees which leads to crashing college parties, revelations about themselves, and a twist to Eric and Kelsie's own friendship.

I read Everyone Hates Kelsie Miller in a day. Meredith Ireland has such an easy, quick, and engaging writing style that keeps you guessing. I did enjoy this rivals to friends to possibly more relationship between Eric and Kelsie. I think it was written very well.

Kelsie does have a personality that could rub a few people the wrong way. She is very honest, blunt, and knows who she is, kind of attitude. To me she felt relatable and someone I'd personally be friends with if I knew her back in high school.

I do really like her character development and how she came to understand that she was in the wrong and needed to be done to fix her friendship with Bri. As much as I like a good romance, I think I appreciated the friendship part more.

If you enjoy quick and fun YA reads, you'll enjoy Everyone Hates Kelsie Miller.

Remember to always apologize if you're in the wrong, even if it's a late apology.

4 stars