Had a lot of potential, but it really fell short for me. I wish the characters, relationships, etc. were more developed.

I liked the reader/voice

I received the audiobook of this and only got through the first hour, I feel like I wasn’t in the mood and this didn’t hook me to get more in the mood. I feel think it’s unfair to rate this because I didn’t get through enough to give it a fair rating, but it’s forcing me to.

I had high hopes for this book -
I could have grown up with these girls yet they seemed to be almost caricatures - really distorted and unbelievable. Kinda yucked out about all the "sex" scenes. Would have loved to have seen more legit character development and maybe a REAL relationship/friendship (Gwen). This one was a struggle for me sadly. Terrific narrator though! Thanks to Netgalley & Isabel Banta for an advanced copy of Honey.

Short synopsis: The story of Amber Young (a fictional pop stars) rise to fame.

My thoughts: I was so enraptured with this story, I could not stop listening and reading it. I do feel like the end was missing something. It was somewhat abrupt and I would have liked a little more.

Amber was not a very likable character, but in a way I kind of liked that she was flawed. Just a reminder that celebrities are people and they make mistakes. My biggest issue is that Amber was a young adult (barely 17) making such huge adult decisions while in the spotlight and as a prominent role model figure for young girls. Maybe I’m just getting old… But the book did keep mentioning that moms hated her.

I did a mix of audio and physical reading and definitely recommend the audio version, except I do wish the lyrics were sung vs read.

Read if you love:
- Coming of age stories
- The music industry
- 90s pop music
- Fictional books written as biographies
- VMAs and MTV

For me, this book and its plot needed a story with great, developed characters, but unfortunately they were all lackluster. I was intrigued at the beginning but then it just felt that nothing really happened. The narrator did a fine job telling the story.

For those who grew up with the 90s boy bands and the solo female acts will immediately feel a sense of nostalgia in picking up Honey. Readers are given an inside, fictional, view of a pop star, the media, the fame, and the public. Honey bares all.

As a 42 year-old woman, I LOVED this book that depicts Amber Young, a pop superstar from the group Cloud9 in the late 90s to early 2000s. She was a great character and a little morally grey at times - I love how the reader got a glimpse into the limelight and how things aren't all glitz and glamour.

Brittany Pressley did a fabulous job with narration - the pace was perfect and her pitch was consistent throughout.

Honey by Isabel Banta - I wanted to love this book but this book was painfully slow. Nothing happening, random banter. I took breaks and came back to this book multiple times and I just could not do it. It was a DNF for me and I rarely DNF books.

Honey is the glittery tale of the 90-00’s pop scene. I loved this book as this was a time of music that made me feel good and still gives me good feelings. In 1997, Amber Young received a life-changing call: the opportunity to join girl group Cloud9 in Los Angeles. She quickly weaves a web that includes fellow rising stars Gwen Morris, a driven singer-dancer, and Wes Kingston, a member of the biggest boy band in the world, ETA. As Amber embarks on a solo career and her fame intensifies, that web begins to tangle and crumble. Surrounded by people who claim to love her but really want to exploit her, she is driven by a desire for recognition, success, love, (and shocker!) sex, for agency, and connection. Amber comes of age at a time when the kaleidoscope of public opinion can distort everything, and one mistake can shatter a career.
I loved this book. But I have a bias: I lived for this period of music. It got me out of some depressed time and saved my life. I loved to go behind the scenes with Amber and watch as her life is tailored for a certain image. You see the fight to have a true relationship built on love. Amber fights for her autonomy in a world that is just like her because of her sex appeal. It hits me hard because I know my favorite artists went through this. Isabel Banta isn’t making these things up. She’s taking the truth and dressing it with fiction. I listened to the audiobook which was great. The narrator was as perfect as Amber and hit all the appropriate emotions. Millennials this is a book for you unless you just hate the pop scene.

I really want to to love this book, but it just missed the mark for me. I did not finish this book because the story just wasn't going anywhere in my opinion.

Thank you Net Galley and the publisher for the arc!!

I wasn't a fan of this audiobook narrator with the vocal fry. I read that young people associate vocal fry in women with intelligence, but I associate it with annoyance.

Amber has always wanted to sing. And she is good at it. She was on Star Search, losing to a guy named Wes that would keep showing up in her life for years to come. She ends up joining a girl group and her career begins to take off. During this time she starts to explore her sexuality and learn what it means to be in the spotlight all the time.

I really enjoyed this book…it took place during the late 90s and early 2000s and Amber was about the same age I was during that time. It was a nice walk back in time for me!

I'm not really sure if I really enjoyed this book, probably because of the subject matter of becoming a pop star ins the 1090's early 2000's but I did find it interesting and well written. It is a coming of age story above all and that is what I did like. Amber Young is an ambitious young teen when she is spotted by a talent agent and begins her first steps to becoming an international pop star. The competition is fierce and Amber is plagued by insecurities in her talent as a singer and dancer. But as she matures, experiences love and develops deep friendships with other performers she comes in contact with she comes in to her own. It takes years, but Amber arrives on the other end as a successful star and worthy person. If you like pop culture and pop music this might book might be of great interest to you. Recommended. 4 stars.

Many thanks to Net Galley and Macmillan Audio for a chance to read/listen to an ARC of this audio book.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Really liked it, stuck with me & would recommend
This 90's- early 2000's coming of age in the music business story captured my attention and didn't let go. It helped that it was compete nostalgia for me as I too was in a band (with my late husband) during that period and had some regional success. We were not poppy, but it all still relates. 

The back story, the feelings, the naivety, and the hopefulness all made for a great character study. I felt it was a much better read than some of the other big music stories of late. 

The narrator, Brittany Pressley, did a good job, I had no trouble understanding who was saying what, where, when, and with what expression/intension. 

Thank you to Macmillan Audio, NetGalley, and author Isabel Banta for providing me with a digital ARC copy of this audiobook in exchange for an honest review. Honey is out June 25, 2024.

This book has such a promising premise for all the 90s/00s pop-loving girlies. But 10 minutes in, nothing starts to happen and nothing continues to happen. It was just boring. Brittany Pressley is one of my favorite book narrators and even she couldn't save this snoozefest.

Thank you NetGalley and McMillan Audio for the advanced copy.

Set in the late 1990s and early 2000s, Honey reads like a novel following the likes of Brittney Spears, Jessica Simpson, Christina Aguilera and *NSYNC.

The characters are young, naïve and immature at times, navigating a unknown world in the spotlight. Being told how to act, what to wear and exactly what to do to succeeded in the music industry all while growing up and trying to figure out life.

I have read several fiction novels about bands and solo artists as well as memoirs by musicians and Honey is a solid YA debut novel. I wish there was more depth to some of the characters but I really enjoyed this coming of age story.

Edited to add: GoodReads has Honey listed as YA but NetGalley has it as New Adult. I agree it’s definitely more New Adult due to the more mature nature of the sexual themes than you would expect to read in YA.

OMG, the nostalgia! Honey has a target audience: me. I wasn't super into pop music of the late 1990's/early 2000's, but I was definitely there for it and remember it well. Amber Young, the main character of Honey, is only a couple years older than I am. I loved the mentions of TRL, the VMAs, and early cell phone use.

Amber and the other artists, her friend Gwen, Savannah, and boy band ETA, are clearly inspired by Britney, Christina, Jessica Simpson, N*Sync, and Backstreet Boys. Honey explores the pop music industry machine and the pressures faced by young pop stars in the early days of the internet. While we don't see some of the more insidious parts of the music industry, we do get a forthright look at what Amber experiences and how she feels not just as a pop star, but as a person. She wants to be heard and seen, and it takes her a number of years to truly find her voice.

I had a great time with this novel. I liked the bits of multimedia and Brittany Pressley's narration was wonderful. This one's definitely for the millennials, and I ate it up.

Thanks NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for an advance copy of this book.

Thank you NetGalley and Macmillan for access to this audiobook! I loved the main character and following her story as a 90s pop singer! I grew up in the 90s so this felt nostalgic throughout the whole book. All the characters feel like real people and I was so invested in their stories.

1⭐️

ARC kindly provided by publisher via NetGally in exchange for an honest review.

DNF @ 7%, this book was not for me. i didn’t enjoy the writing style and was not a fan at all of our FMC. :(

I saw so many people raving about this book on Instagram so when I saw that there was an ALC available through NetGalley I just had to snag it.

I grew up in the 90s so I was so excited for the nostalgia of pop stars and boy bands and while those happy vibes were present this book also sheds some light on the darker side of fame. This really felt like it could have been a memoir for any of the big 2000s pop stars. I liked the little interviews and mentions of pop magazine quizzes. I wasn’t a huge fan of the song renditions though. They felt very…for lack of better word..cringy to me.

What brought down my rating was the fact that I found Amber to be such an unlikable character. She made a lot of questionable decisions (mainly regarding Wes, I think he was even more unlikeable than Amber), and I felt like her character relied on sex more than necessary.
I did like Gwen, but I didn’t understand why she and Amber were even friends. I also wish we would have gotten more of an epilogue at the end. More in-depth of a “where are they now”