Nobody But Us

Jan 02, 2013 Christina (A Reader of Fictions) rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: arc, yabc-reviews

To be entirely fair, I was not sure if this book would be my thing. The teens on the run aspect didn't really appeal to me, but Nobody But Us was blurbed by two of my favorite authors (Courtney Summers and Kody Keplinger), as well as being compared to If I Stay by Gayle Forman, which I loved. I thought perhaps instead of being melodramatic, Nobody But Us might have the contemplative, deep, emotionally fraught style of If I Stay. Well, I've been wrong before. I really need to stop buying into thi...more To be entirely fair, I was not sure if this book would be my thing. The teens on the run aspect didn't really appeal to me, but Nobody But Us was blurbed by two of my favorite authors (Courtney Summers and Kody Keplinger), as well as being compared to If I Stay by Gayle Forman, which I loved. I thought perhaps instead of being melodramatic, Nobody But Us might have the contemplative, deep, emotionally fraught style of If I Stay. Well, I've been wrong before. I really need to stop buying into this marketing that sells you one book by comparing it to another.

Starting with the good, Halbrook writes well, creating two different voices for Zoe and Will. They think differently and have wholly different vocabulary. Multiple points of view in first person are tricky, so I applaud her for doing that this well. The writing's a bit simpler than I personally tend to prefer, and includes the occasional odd word choice, like "vessel" to refer to a car, though that seems like something that my be caught before publication.

I would like to propose changing the tagline to "They're young. They're stupid. They're on the run." That pretty much sums up this book for me. Will, eighteen and finally free of the system where he's bounced from home to home and school to school, decides to take his girlfriend Zoe with him away from their shit-hole hometown and her abusive father. Fifteen-year-old Zoe needs a change, no doubt about that. Her father is a drunken monster, and should be in jail, but that does not mean that running away with Will is an awesome plan. In fact, it's pretty much the opposite of an awesome plan.

Still, teens don't necessarily have much wisdom about the way of the world and everything can seem very immediate. They're young and this seems like the best road open to them, so that's what they do. Fine. I will accept that. However, what I have trouble handling is how incredibly stupid they are about everything once they're on the road. How can neither of them ever have seen a crime drama, which would have kept them from doing a lot of the idiotic things they do?

Zoe's choices can be put down to a youthful naivete, I suppose, and a weakness of character that causes her to cling to the first person to offer to take care of her. Will, however, has a better idea of the law, having come up against it before. He knows enough to get her a fake ID that lists her age as eighteen, though they never actually use this once, and to expect that the cops will be looking for them. Yet, somehow, he expects that they will simply be able to disappear in Las Vegas with just her fake ID, where she can enroll in school and they can live together. Really? You KNOW they'll be looking for you, Will, but it doesn't occur to you that you would need a fake identity too? Or that an IDENTITY is more than a doctored license? How are you going to enroll her in school or do anything without records? What about your social security numbers? Birth certificates? Disappearing is not so easy in the modern age, especially when people know your car.

"Christina, stop being so judgmental of them for not knowing all of this stuff; I mean, they're just teens!" Maybe so, imaginary devil's advocate. Some teens might not know those things, so let's give them a pass on that, okay? Shouldn't they at least be bright enough not to draw attention to themselves as they make their escape? Will, especially, since Zoe seems to have no clue what's going on? Yet, every time they stop, they do something incredibly, mind-blowingly stupid. Being a teenager does not necessitate a complete lack of survival skills or self-awareness.

Here are some examples of how Zoe and Will continually do precisely the worst possible thing in every situation:
(view spoiler)

Will and Zoe's relationship also made me seriously uncomfortable. Yet again, we have a girl in love with a guy she's afraid of a good deal of the time, and we're meant to see them as tragic, romantic figures. No, I don't think so. Zoe, physically abused by her father, is terrified every time Will gets into a fight on her behalf. The formula repeated over and over in this book: someone threatens or hits on Zoe, he punches the person, Zoe cries and shrinks away from him, he promises he'll never hurt her and that he'll keep his rage checked, repeat.

Worse, I have no doubt that, given time, he would end up hitting Zoe. Their interactions had warning bells chiming in my head all the way through. He thinks constantly about how much he wants to make her happy, but snaps at her any time she annoys him. He swears at her, even though he knows how much that upsets her. After some guys hit on her, he accuses her of flirting with them, blaming her, though she was only a victim of their rude behavior. When he does things like this, she accuses herself for his unhappiness, for their bad situation, even though she's clearly not at fault for any of it. Their relationship is incredibly unhealthy and I don't feel like Halbrook made her stance on that as a bad thing clear at all.

What I wanted and expected was an emotionally hard-hitting novel about the horrors of abuse, but instead I found a melodramatic mess that romanticizes what I see as an abusive relationship. The whole thing read like a Lifetime original movie. I imagine many people will enjoy this, given how popular books with similar themes have been recently, but I did not.(less)

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Mar 05, 2013 Trish Doller rated it 4 of 5 stars

I was almost afraid to read this because I'd read some reviews that made me worried. But here's the thing...the kids in this book are dumb. They are. But that's sometimes what being a teenager is like. Then throw in love and fear and lust and anger and and sheer desperation, and you have a bonfire of stupid that rages out of control. And this book captures that really, really well.

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Jul 28, 2011 Kaitlin rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: yahighway

Gorgeous, amazing, heartwrenching in the best way.

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Dec 18, 2012 Ashleigh Paige rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: arc, back-in-the-oven-with-you-dear-book, right-reaction-wrong-reason, the-shameful-shelf-of-get-rid-of-it, troll-book, uh-oh-someone-has-the-idiot-ball, what-kind-of-mess-is-this, harpercollins, harperteen

See more of my reviews sooner on The YA Kitten! My copy was an ARC given to me by a fantastic friend.

This needs to be said immediately: this is not If I Stay meets Bonnie and Clyde. This is Beautiful Disaster meets Bonnie and Clyde. After reading BD shortly before Nobody But Us and being horrified of all the parallels between them, I feel obligated to make sure people know in case they don't want to read about an unhealthy relationship. The idea of romance is there, but Will's red-flag behavior...more See more of my reviews sooner on The YA Kitten! My copy was an ARC given to me by a fantastic friend.

This needs to be said immediately: this is not If I Stay meets Bonnie and Clyde. This is Beautiful Disaster meets Bonnie and Clyde. After reading BD shortly before Nobody But Us and being horrified of all the parallels between them, I feel obligated to make sure people know in case they don't want to read about an unhealthy relationship. The idea of romance is there, but Will's red-flag behavior sucks all the romance right out of it.

Dual narration can be hard to pull off, but Halbrook does it well enough that mixing up Will and Zoe is next to impossible. Zoe is well-spoken and naive; Will is more jaded and used "ain't", "gotta", and double negatives often. Even then, they both have a sense of naivete about the world that really brings home how young and damaged they are. The novel itself is is riddled with problems, but their voices are so spot-on and readable that turning the pages despite issues with the content is very easy.

Now, where people might call the novel is romantic is easy enough to figure out. The idea of leaving behind a troubled past and everything else to start a new life elsewhere with your loved one does sound rather romantic. There's more than one book that ends with the main couple leaving it all behind and it turns out to be very romantic. Why this doesn't work in Nobody But Us is clear: Will and Zoe are in an unhealthy relationship that gets glorified every time someone calls this novel romantic.

Will beats up three people in the name of his girlfriend, and two of those beatings happened out of jealousy. Zoe outright tells him he's scaring her and he scares her so badly at one point that she literally gets sick. Vomit everywhere! After one of the fights, he asks Zoe if she was flirting with the guy who grabbed her butt out of nowhere and asks why she let the guy do so. When he apologizes, it's not for blaming her for the sexual harassment; it's for making her genuinely fear he was going to hit her.

Two imperfect people together is one thing. Unhealthy relationships are a whole other issue, and this is what Nobody But Us glorifies.

This might seem irrelevant, but I've seen many, many crime documentaries and many, many explanations for how these people eventually get caught. Will and Zoe's plans have so many holes in them that it's a miracle they weren't caught sooner. A fake ID isn't enough to get Zoe enrolled in high school, after all. Freaking out when cops come into a diner for a lunch break? Going to a place where one of them has a known history? Zoe calling her best friend from Will's phone? All of these are beyond suspicious and other criminals have pulled these stunts so many times that police look out for that kind of behavior. Really, how do they get away with it for as long as they do?

The ending is all sorts of uncomfortable thanks to how Zoe continues to view Will (aka, he's perfect for her) and just furthers the romanticization of an unhealthy relationship. Halbrook's got definite talent and that's why I plan to stick around for her second novel (most likely unrelated to this one), but it almost seems like she wrote the one story requires far more awareness and skill than she has.(less)

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Sep 18, 2012 Katy Upperman rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: ya-fiction, favorites

This book yanked me out of my reading funk in a major way. I loved it SO MUCH. I smiled, I swooned, I cringed, I *almost* cried. I just wanted to hug Zoe and Will so much, and the final pages... CAN'T STOP THINKING ABOUT THEM. This debut is heart-wrenching in the very best way. Highly recommend!

Edited to add a more comprehensive review:

If any book deserves early buzz, it’s this one. Kristin Halbrook’s beautiful, heartbreaking, fearless tale of two damaged teens on the run is the best contempora...more This book yanked me out of my reading funk in a major way. I loved it SO MUCH. I smiled, I swooned, I cringed, I *almost* cried. I just wanted to hug Zoe and Will so much, and the final pages... CAN'T STOP THINKING ABOUT THEM. This debut is heart-wrenching in the very best way. Highly recommend!

Edited to add a more comprehensive review:

If any book deserves early buzz, it’s this one. Kristin Halbrook’s beautiful, heartbreaking, fearless tale of two damaged teens on the run is the best contemporary I’ve read in a long time. And I read a lot of contemporary…

I’ll admit, when I saw mention of Bonnie and Clyde on the ARC cover, I was skeptical. This is YA and Bonnie and Clyde were legitimate . How much trouble can Will and Zoe possibly get into? Uh, a lot, it turns out. Nobody But Us is intense, and Kristin Halbrook holds nothing back. Will’s backstory is one of the saddest I’ve read, and poor Zoe doesn’t know love until she meets this boy who wants nothing more in the world than to rescue her. They literally are on the run–from her father, from their pasts, and from the law–and they make some pretty terrible choices along the way. The crazy thing is this: I was rooting for them. Even in the midst of a multiple-state spree, I wanted Will and Zoe to persevere. Kristin Halbrook, through flawless character development and stark, elegant prose, made me believe that Zoe and Will deserved a happily ever after.

Nobody But Us is a roller coaster of emotions. Zoe and Will are both adorable, and both so very broken. But together they are whole, taking on the world that’s wronged them. Their devotion, while young and sometimes misguided, is palpable. They love each other deeply, sweetly, tragically, and the ferocity of their relationship had me at times laughing, cringing, and nearly in tears. I was both charmed and appalled by the sacrifices they were willing to make for each other, and even when they did horrible, deplorable things in the name of love, I got it, because their motivations were so strong, and their bond so unbreakable.

I’ll say one more thing about Nobody But Us: The ending… shocked me. It was courageous and heart-wrenching and unlike most YA endings. Yet, it was perfect for the tone of the novel. I’m STILL thinking about it.(less)

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Dec 11, 2012 Shanyn (Chick Loves Lit) rated it 2 of 5 stars

I hadn't heard anything about NOBODY BUT US and didn't read the summary before I started, so I had no expectations. Sadly, this contemporary and I just did not mesh.

Full Review: http://chickloveslit.com/2013/01/revi...

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Dec 19, 2012 Shirley rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2013-releases, arcs, for-review, read-in-2012

Nobody But Us, from start to finish, was unfortunately a huge disappointment. Based on the blurbs and praises, I expected a debut that could rival the brilliance of Gayle Forman’s ‘If I Stay’, but what I received was possibly one of the most disappointing and tedious YA contemporaries I’ve had the misfortune to read.

The characters, while each possessing their own backstory and inner sufferings still lacked depth for me to relate to or admire. Zoe, a 15 year old who is constantly physically abuse...more Nobody But Us, from start to finish, was unfortunately a huge disappointment. Based on the blurbs and praises, I expected a debut that could rival the brilliance of Gayle Forman’s ‘If I Stay’, but what I received was possibly one of the most disappointing and tedious YA contemporaries I’ve had the misfortune to read.

The characters, while each possessing their own backstory and inner sufferings still lacked depth for me to relate to or admire. Zoe, a 15 year old who is constantly physically abused by her drunk father is so, so weak. Having witnessed her mother be the victim of her father’s daily physically violence, then die at the hands of her father, and now become the sole receive of her father’s violence, I suppose it isn’t strange that she’s always felt submissive and powerless. However, I did expect some inner strength of her; some dignity or resistance to exist within her. I didn’t expect her to simply submit to her father’s abuse and just…let it go all the time. It’s like she’s accepted that being punched, shoved, tortured will always be her life and she doesn’t plan to do anything about it. She just wasn’t a strong enough heroine for my to admire, and even worse, one that didn’t show character growth. (Although I’ll admit that towards the end, she did come to her senses, but by then I didn’t care about her anymore.)

Then there’s 18 year old Will, abandoned at a young age and has jumped from one foster family to another throughout his life. I suppose he should be congratulated for wanting to do the right thing; wanting to protect the girl he loves. But at the end of the day, his actions felt immature and lacked common sense. It was difficult for me to really like Will, because half the time, I was expecting him to hit Zoe or something. I was constantly on edge, and no matter how many times he promised Zoe he would never hurt her, I just couldn’t shake the feeling that he’ll explode and unleash all his bottled up anger on her. He’s violent and I’m sorry to say, a little unstable. Plus, I'm not sure if it's just me, but their relationship screamed 'UNHEALTHY' based on their actions, thoughts and declarations of love every 2 seconds (which was driving me insane! I couldn't tolerate it one second longer!)

There’s also an it’s-me-not-you type of problem – the slang/dialect. I’m usually fine with slang/dialect in novels, but in this case I couldn’t, for the life of me, imagine Will speaking like that. It sort of…ruined the overall story for me.

As for the ending, well…had this been a poignant, touching read, I would have bawled my eyes out towards the end. But in this case? I felt nothing. I simply ceased to care about anything else that happened in the story. I was like ‘right, so that’s it.’ *shrugs*

I suppose the only redeeming quality about this book is that it was short (only 200+ pages on my copy from Edelweiss). I planned to abandon it after 10% but then decided to finish it. A fast reader can probably finish the entire book within an hour. Overall, I believe Nobody But Us had potential – lots of potential in fact. It just failed to deliver. Oh, and I forgot to mention, I couldn't tolerate another second of Zoe’s tendency to blush at every.single.freaking.thing.Will.says.or.does. Give me a break!
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Jan 21, 2013 Audra rated it 4 of 5 stars

Heart wrenching indeed. Not the ending I expected, but an ending I love. This story is sure to stick with me.

Nobody But Us is the first contemporary book I've read that I've hands down, quite simply, fallen in love with. Will and Zoe are such complex, carefully crafted characters that can't help but be fallen in love with. This is a tragic story. Both characters have their own crappy mess to deal with in their home situations, leading them to flee away together on an epic roadtrip to Las Vegas,...more

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May 27, 2013 Once Upon rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: for-review

This book reminded me of Romeo and Juliet because they wanted to be together but their families didn't want them to be together. But this book was about a girl named Zoe that lived with her father and was getting tired of being treated like a doormat all the time. Her father was always drunk and always took things out on her and she finally got to her last straw and finally had it. Well her boyfriend Will decides that Zoe and him are going to run away from their problems. Will has always had his...more

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Mar 29, 2013 Esther Shaindel rated it 4 of 5 stars

Nobody But Us creates a world within itself, a world that only Zoe and Will inhabit - nobody but them. The two of them seem to be cocooned in their own fantasy to the point that they seem almost surprised when they come into contact with outside people. And I guess that's what makes them so doomed - every interaction with other people (well, almost every interaction) is based on the way they just don't know how to relate to people, and their reactions get them into more and more trouble.

The way...more

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Mar 12, 2013 Shai rated it 4 of 5 stars

This book.. Whew.
Honestly, I read this book basically because of it's cover. There's something about it.. and it's gorgeous. I was drawn to it. I didn't even read the synopsis or reviews. (Is that weird? Am I?)
Will and Zoe.. They're so stupid. In some parts of the book, I want to go there in the book with them and yell, "You guys are so stupid! So young and stupid! Uggh! I hate you!". And at the same time I was silently crying. I can't help it. They're stupid, alright, but I get them. In some p...more

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Mar 08, 2013 Dark Faerie Tales rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: reviewed-by-michelle

Review courtesy of Dark Faerie Tales.

Quick & Dirty: A heartbreaking story about a couple who find love despite their broken pasts.

Opening Sentence: He comes down the road in his Camaro sliding left to right on the freshly oiled gravel and skidding to a stop in front of my house.

The Review:

Nobody But Us by Kristin Halbrook stands out from a lot of contemporary fiction for young adults. Sometimes a book will talk about a realistic scenario and I wouldn’t be able to connect to it. Or that the m...more

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Feb 06, 2013 Yana rated it 1 of 5 stars

This is the first time I'm writing a book review here in Goodreads and it's because this book was so frustrating I just had to write about it.

The book started out pretty well, Kristin Halbrook really pulled off the dual narratives. I liked the tragic backstories of both characters. I admired that they had the guts to finally take their future in their own hands. I didn't find them cowardly for running away. To me, it was a very brave thing to do-- taking a step into the unknown future in store f...more

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Jan 31, 2013 Diana rated it 4 of 5 stars

So, this book is essentially that song by Tracy Chapman, "Fast Car," meets Bonnie and Clyde. Will has grown up in foster homes; 15-year-old Zoe lives with an abusive father. They are in love - though what this means for them is debatable - and when Will turns 18 and gets "kicked off the state," they decide to run away together.

First: The writing was very very good. I admit that at first I was worried about having to read Will's sections, which are littered with "ain't"s and "gonna"s, but I think...more So, this book is essentially that song by Tracy Chapman, "Fast Car," meets Bonnie and Clyde. Will has grown up in foster homes; 15-year-old Zoe lives with an abusive father. They are in love - though what this means for them is debatable - and when Will turns 18 and gets "kicked off the state," they decide to run away together.

First: The writing was very very good. I admit that at first I was worried about having to read Will's sections, which are littered with "ain't"s and "gonna"s, but I think Holbrook made it work. Which isn't easy.

The thing I feel most torn about is Will and Zoe's relationship. It's absolutely not a healthy one, which I am sure most people - teens or not - will realize. They feed off one another's pathology. Will, frustrated and simmering with anger over the pain he has endured, tends to lash out at Zoe, whose abusive past makes her feel like she deserves anything anyone throws at her. But in the end - mild spoiler alert - Zoe doesn't seem to stop romanticizing Will, which is a fundamental flaw in this story, I think. I understand why. Will and Zoe are the first people to ever understand each other, and I think tragedy and understanding and lust is a heady thing for anyone, let alone a 15yo girl. But all of that ~tragic love~ buries the real sucker punch, which is this:

The real, terrible tragedy of this story is that people "see what they want to see," and ignore what they don't want to see. That the adults in their lives have never been able to stand up for Will and Zoe, that here are two teenagers running because they have quite literally NO ONE else, and what a tragedy, what an atrocity that no one helped them when they could have, when Zoe and Will needed it. And what's more -- that after their lives have been wrecked by their own crimes, no one will stop, look, and ask - why? That only after the fact will friends and teachers speak up and say, I was there. I saw the signs.

I liked this book a lot. It is profound and moving. But keep in mind -- it is not a romance. And in my opinion, to call it one (I'm looking at you, HarperTeen!) diminishes its power.

A footnote - don't discount this book because of comparisons to Beautiful Disaster. Nobody But Us is absolutely more thoughtful, and - I would venture to say - doesnt glorify abusive relationships any more than an intelligent reader can say Nabokov's Lolita glorifies pedophilia. If anything, I think this book responds to those who would romanticize abuse. There's a striking moment where Zoe compares Will to her father as a young man, courting her mother and offering to protect her, which is telling. So, there's much more here than, Ooh! Muscles! Tattoos! Have your way with me! (less)

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Dec 20, 2012 Hannah (The Irish Banana Review) rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: favorite-ya, ya-contemporary

It’s always hard starting a book that you know will smash your heart, and that’s exactly what happened when I started reading Nobody But Us by Kristin Halbrook. It’s one of those books that you just know can’t end well, but it’s written in such a clear, poetic way, that you can’t stop reading for anything.

Will and Zoe are broken people. There’s just no other word for it. Will has been failed by nearly every adult in his life. He’s been bounced from home to home, a product of just how all-too-fre...more It’s always hard starting a book that you know will smash your heart, and that’s exactly what happened when I started reading Nobody But Us by Kristin Halbrook. It’s one of those books that you just know can’t end well, but it’s written in such a clear, poetic way, that you can’t stop reading for anything.

Will and Zoe are broken people. There’s just no other word for it. Will has been failed by nearly every adult in his life. He’s been bounced from home to home, a product of just how all-too-frequently our society fails older kids in the foster system. He is volatile and unpredictable, but he has this love of Zoe that is overwhelming. The sheer sensitivity of Will astounded me, especially when it came to Zoe.

Zoe, who has been beaten down and abused for most of her life by her only living parent. I desperately wanted Zoe away from her dad—possibly as badly as Will did. The man was a monster, and I cheered when they ran away together … Until I realized Zoe is 15 and Will is 18 and their being together is a crime. But that is just the first in a long series of decisions and obstacles that threatened to undo them.

This book really raises the question: Can you love someone too much? Will and Zoe clung to each other and understood one another in a way few people ever do, but it was to the point of destruction. There were so many points in the journey where things could have gone a little different and ended beautifully, but bad luck and desperation-fueled choices put them on a collision course with reality.

I finished reading Nobody But Us yesterday on the bus coming home from NYC with friends. I still had another 2 hours to kill before we got home, but I couldn’t bring myself to start a new book. This book haunted me much more than I ever imagined. No, I did not get the ending I so desperately wanted, but I think that’s the point. This book made me think and feel long after I stopped reading. I selfishly wanted to hurl this book (well, metaphorically speaking as it was on my Nook and I didn’t feel like going through the financial hassle of replacing that) and pout that I didn’t get my fairy tale ending.

But this isn’t that book.

If you want a happily ever after, then sadly you probably will not enjoy this. However, I think you do yourself a huge disservice by not reading Nobody But Us. Holbrook created this masterpiece of a novel that left me wondering and troubled long after it was over. And really, can you ask for anything more spectacular in a novel?
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Aug 17, 2012 Emily Crowe rated it 3 of 5 stars

The first half of this book was hard to get through, but the second half found its stride and improved considerably--hence the 3 stars overall. Beware: ahead there be spoilers.

If ever there were a book that demonstrates how the part of the teenage brain that oversees risk tasking and evaluating consequences isn't fully developed until the mid-twenties, this is it. We all know that teenagers do stupid things. We know this by observation, and we know this because we all did stupid things as teens...more The first half of this book was hard to get through, but the second half found its stride and improved considerably--hence the 3 stars overall. Beware: ahead there be spoilers.

If ever there were a book that demonstrates how the part of the teenage brain that oversees risk tasking and evaluating consequences isn't fully developed until the mid-twenties, this is it. We all know that teenagers do stupid things. We know this by observation, and we know this because we all did stupid things as teens that we would not dream of doing in our adult lives.

It's absurd that Zoe and Will run away together after they've only known each other two months. Zoe is a quiet survivor who endures her father's verbal and physical abuse on a daily basis, while Will harbors a troubled past and a violent rap that has landed him in various foster homes, never staying in one for very long. Once he turns eighteen, he convinces Zoe to run away with him. She's smart and fearful from living with her dad, yet oddly innocent; he's hardened but with a real soft spot for Zoe. All he wants to do is protect her; all she wants to do is feel safe with somebody for once in her life. So they take off from North Dakota in a beat-up Camaro and a thousand dollars of stolen money and head to Vegas to make a new life for themselves.

Yeah, I know what you're thinking: how can *that* possibly go wrong?

Before they cross their first state line, Will has beaten up her father. He swears up and down that he would never hurt Zoe, but what he doesn't realize is there is more than one way to hurt a person.

Before they cross their second state line, Zoe has been caught shoplifting tampons because she's too embarrassed to ask Will for the money to pay for them and Will breaks a bottle of wine over the gas station proprietor's head. They dash out the door, leaving him for dead.

Yeah. How can any plan that these two kids concoct possibly go wrong?

So basically their story doesn't end well. I had imagined a Thelma & Louise scenario, but instead it involved a standoff with the police and the FBI

I had a lot of trouble buying into the premise of the first half of the book: that Zoe, the quintessential good girl who keeps her head down, would run off with Will in the first place. That Zoe's friends, neighbors, and teachers would all turn a blind eye to her father's abuse. She had visible bruises, apparently. The reader can't possibly believe that North Dakotans value children less than other people, and we can't write it off as being secret, or that it happened in a time when things like this weren't talked about (there's no date given, but they have cell phones with cameras, so it's 21st century).

But once I hit the 150 page mark, and once the first bad decisions were made, it was easy to fall into the second half and believe where the consequences of those initial bad decisions would take them. The second half felt intense without being melodramatic, and the closer the ending gets, the more inexorable it feels. God, I wouldn't be a teenager again, in love and with no way out, for anything.

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Feb 10, 2013 Jasmine Rose rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2013-books-read, contemp-challenge, dac-13, standalone-13

I really wish I hadn't seen any reviews for Nobody But Us before reading because I feel like they were all just sitting in the back of my mind poking at the story while I was reading. Still, I did end up enjoying it.

I did not, in fact, really like either Will or Zoe, but I could appreciate their characters. They were supposed to make bad choices and be caught up in each other. I was so torn while reading because on the one hand, I know what new love feels like and that Zoe and Will's was multipl...more

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Mar 10, 2013 Erica rated it 3 of 5 stars

I fell in love hard with the cover of this book and talked about it on twitter so much that the editor gave me a galley. I thought I would love it--and I definitely liked it. There were a lot of things to appreciate about it. It moves quickly, for one, and it follows two teens who have really, really shitty lives (I love fun contemporary YA but I do like to read about kids who have serious issues--and not in an "issues" way.) They make terrible choices, but the author definitely backs up why the...more

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Jan 28, 2013 Larissa rated it 2 of 5 stars

2.5 Stars

Nobody But Us was one of those books that I had no idea how I felt about it after I finished it. Towards the beginning I was thinking about giving it a fairly high rating, but as I kept reading, my rating kept going down. It’s sad because there were many elements in the story that I liked and even applauded. But in the end, the way it was written made me feel I couldn’t give it a very high rating.

I really appreciated the gritty, blunt way that Kristin Halbrook shows us the characters’ b...more 2.5 Stars

Nobody But Us was one of those books that I had no idea how I felt about it after I finished it. Towards the beginning I was thinking about giving it a fairly high rating, but as I kept reading, my rating kept going down. It’s sad because there were many elements in the story that I liked and even applauded. But in the end, the way it was written made me feel I couldn’t give it a very high rating.

I really appreciated the gritty, blunt way that Kristin Halbrook shows us the characters’ backstories. We learn about the horrors they have faced growing up and gives us context for things like Will’s violence. While of course this doesn’t justify his actions, it inspires a pity towards him that would not have been there otherwise. She created two very complex characters, and because of the alternating narratives, we get to see the inner workings of their minds.

For what I did not like about this book, let me first say that I don’t know who wrote the synopsis, but there was almost nothing in common with this book and If I Stay. The only similarity I see is that there is a girl who has a lot of trauma and is trying to come to terms with it. The circumstances are completely different though, so really in that respect it could be compared to a million different books. If you are looking at this book just because of that comparison – I know that was one reason why I was excited to read it – let me tell you now, Nobody But Us is nothing like If I Stay. The Bonnie and Clyde part is pretty accurate though.

If the author had meant this book to be more of a tough portrait of two troubled people who are fighting against a world that never gave them a fair chance, I think I would have enjoyed it much more. As it was it felt like a romanticized unhealthy relationship, which was my biggest problem with the book. I know it is unlikely the characters had enough insight themselves to realize how dysfunctional, unhealthy, and even illegal their relationship was, but if emphasizing that had been an important part of the book, the point would have gotten across.

This book either intentionally or inadvertently poses some interesting questions like what happens to foster kids when they turn eighteen and are ‘kicked off the state’? Or what is the price of staying silent versus speaking out? I admired this because I think they are important topics, but they are breezed over with the plot of two haunted individuals trying to fix each other while leaving a trail of crimes behind them on their train-wreck of a road to freedom.(less)

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Jan 21, 2013 ExLibris_Kate rated it 3 of 5 stars

Will and Zoe are two very messed-up kids, each with their own baggage and tragic story. To escape her abusive father, they run away, but things quickly get out of hand. It was interesting to read the way that the tables slowly turn as the story progresses. Will is determined to take care of Zoe and shield her from all reality, but that never works and soon Zoe starts to gain some insight and becomes more of a voice of reason. In between these turning points, however, is some monumentally poor de...more

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Feb 02, 2013 Emily rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2013, 2013-teen-reading-challenge

I found myself torn by this book. On the one hand, it was a quick read, I finished it in two days because I found myself wanting to know what would happen. On the other hand, the relationship between Will and Zoe made me incredibly uncomfortable. Will has just turned 18, and Zoe is 15. FIFTEEN. And no amount of "but she's mature" can make up for the fact that she is a fifteen year old who is emotionally stunted by her own childhood trauma. Because of this, I find it incredibly difficult to sympa...more

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Jan 19, 2013 Aman rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: romance, ya-contemporary-2013

Rating: 3.5 stars

Reviewed @ Enticed by Books

THAT ending! GOD! SO. NOT. EXPECTED.

You know those TV shows nowadays where the people do stupid stuff, and you still watch it knowing that there is no lesson at the end of it, like Silent Library or Worlds Dumbest. They are pure entertainment, and no matter how dumb they are, you still enjoy them. That is exactly what this book feels to me. From the beginning, I knew what the characters were doing was wrong & illegal and it was never going to end w...more Rating: 3.5 stars

Reviewed @ Enticed by Books

THAT ending! GOD! SO. NOT. EXPECTED.

You know those TV shows nowadays where the people do stupid stuff, and you still watch it knowing that there is no lesson at the end of it, like Silent Library or Worlds Dumbest. They are pure entertainment, and no matter how dumb they are, you still enjoy them. That is exactly what this book feels to me. From the beginning, I knew what the characters were doing was wrong & illegal and it was never going to end well, but I had so much fun reading about their crazy journey.

They’re young. They’re in love. They’re on the run. is indeed the perfect tagline for this book, if you add They are a little dumb at the end. I'm not making fun of it, I liked Nobody But Us, it was a funny book initially and got really really intense at the end which was completely unexpected. Zoe and Will come from a bad background, and on Will's 18th birthday, they plan on running away together. Zoe is the only child of an abusive father, and Will is a foster kid, and now both of them want a better life for themselves. I would have done the same thing in their place, but Zoe is not legal yet, and in todays world people take law very seriously. I knew that Will would be behind bars when the police finds him, and I was dreading waiting for that part because it was going to happen. I knew it was.

Will had a hot & cold personality, sometimes I loved him so much that even I'd run off with him, and sometimes I just wanted his face to be a punching back. He has such a pure heart, but then he has to say some crap and mess it all up; in a way, he reminded me of Jude (Crash trilogy by Nicole Williams) a lot, and I ended up loving Jude, but I had so-so feelings for Will. He made bad choices and I absolutely hated the consequences he had to pay. I never in a million years expected the ending to be so horrible & sad. I didn't like it.

Still, I don't feel bad for Zoe. That girl is the epitome of pushovers, I don't like girls like her. They take everything in, all the abusive, the bad mouthing, and never complain. She was sweet & loving, but she has to learn to fight back, and I didn't believe she was stronger at the end, I felt she was more miserable. After finishing the book, I don't think the whole journey was worth the ending the couple had. They had a messy life before, and they had even a messier one afterward.

I do have to commend on one thing, which is Kristin Halbrook's writing. It was phenomenal for a debut author; she made it so easy to differentiate between Will & Zoe voices. Nobody But Us is a fun entertaining book about two crazy people in love. I enjoyed reading it, and I would recommend it to anyone looking for a fun, adventurous read.

A Copy was provided by the Publisher and Edelweiss for an honest review. (Thank You!)
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Feb 18, 2013 Sapir rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: romance, realistic-fiction, exceeded-expactations, ebooks, books-i-loved, 2013, tearjerker, what-an-ending, blog-reviewed, beautiful-covers

For this review and more, visit Diary of a Wimpy Teen Girl

This book was absolutely amazing. When I first picked it up, I wasn't expecting such a heart-breaking, emotional and beautifully told story.

Zoe and Will are both broken teens. Their lives weren't easy. Since Will's mother has abandoned him when he was a baby, he's been moving from one foster-home to another, never finding his place. He never felt loved or cared for. All he wanted to do when he turned 18 was to run far, find himself a bett...more For this review and more, visit Diary of a Wimpy Teen Girl

This book was absolutely amazing. When I first picked it up, I wasn't expecting such a heart-breaking, emotional and beautifully told story.

Zoe and Will are both broken teens. Their lives weren't easy. Since Will's mother has abandoned him when he was a baby, he's been moving from one foster-home to another, never finding his place. He never felt loved or cared for. All he wanted to do when he turned 18 was to run far, find himself a better future and never come back.
15-year-old Zoe has always lived in fear because she could never know what will irritate her abusive father and cause him to hit her. She always walked around with bruises on her face and just tried to ignore them and continue her life.
Will and Zoe decide to leave their state - North Dakota, and make all the long way to Vegas to start a new life together there. This book describes their trip, a trip that will change everything. Can they run away from their pasts?

The relationship between Will and Zoe was very unusual - it was like nothing I've ever seen before in a YA book. The two of them were very different from each other and it looked like they can't make a good match. Despite that, they became a very strong couple, and I think it was because each one has managed to fill the needs of the other.
Zoe was sensitive and couldn't stand up for herself. All she needed was someone to love her and to protect her like the father she never had. I could see how Will became like a father to a her - he did anything a could to keep her safe and always thought about her first.
Will, from the other side, needed someone to keep him steady. He had a tendency to outburst and to go into violent fights without thinking. Zoe, who was more careful, balanced him.
Overall, their relationship was very sweet and positive. But there were some times when I felt like something is off about the way they treat each other, and especially Will. He was a little possessive and over-protective, and sometimes his influence on Zoe wasn't good. [(view spoiler)]
I loved reading about their complicated relationship and it was my favorite part of the book.

This book was very well written - it was fluent and easy-to-read. The story was told from two POVs - Zoe's and Will's. The switch between the narrators was done very well, and it made me like the book even more. It was very interesting to read how both the main characters felt and how they reacted differently to situations.

When the book started, I had no idea in which direction the plot would go. There were many problems mixed together, and I thought that the author is going to choose one of them to focus on. But somehow, the author took the story to somewhere else entirely and made the plot very creative and original.
The end was stunning! It broke my heart!! I really can't believe the author could think of such an ending to this book. I can't say much because I don't want to spoil the book for you, but be sure it turned this book into an absolute tearjerker.

This book was excellent and I highly recommend it to people who are looking for a deep, emotional read.(less)

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Jan 21, 2013 Eileen rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: arc, contemporary, ebook, edelweiss, for-review, owned, young-adult, romance

Check out more of my reviews at ***Singing and Reading in the Rain***!

Nobody But Us, simply put, is equal parts heart-breaking, real, and raw, yet none of those things at all. Kristin Halbrook has made me feel so many different things all at once and it's equally infuriating and equally touching.

Zoe and Will are in love and running from the world, running from everything. Running from their old lives and starting a new one together. Usually, when I discover that the romance has already happened,...more Check out more of my reviews at ***Singing and Reading in the Rain***!

Nobody But Us, simply put, is equal parts heart-breaking, real, and raw, yet none of those things at all. Kristin Halbrook has made me feel so many different things all at once and it's equally infuriating and equally touching.

Zoe and Will are in love and running from the world, running from everything. Running from their old lives and starting a new one together. Usually, when I discover that the romance has already happened, and they're already in love, I find the romance hard to believe because you don't know anything about how they fell in love. That was the exact case here. I couldn't connect to their relationship at all. At all. As I continued to read, I picked up wisps of how much they loved each other, but as a whole, I was at a loss.

Another issue I had with Nobody But Us was the fact that the plot absolutely dragged for the entire first half and the better part of the second half. Nothing really started to happen until I was two-thirds of the way through the book, and by then I was starting to wonder how many other ways the first half of the story could've gone. Maybe a few flashbacks would've helped with the relationship and the pacing of the plot. Maybe a little more danger at first. Maybe a little more secondary character development. But, by the time I hit the two-thirds mark, that all just flew right out of my head.

The interesting thing with Nobody But Us is Will. I found him to be the most fascinating in the entire story. He's not very well educated, which shows in the way he talks, but this journey we watch him go on with Zoe is kind of like the time where he finally grows up and earns closure for everything he's ever done. He's chaotic and his mind is a jumbled mess, but as I read more with his narration, the more I had to fall in love with him. Will, in my opinion, was the leading protagonist and Zoe was there to push him on the right path. He's so sweet, yet so broken, and all he really wants to do is protect the one real thing he's ever known. If I summed up Nobody But Us in one sentence, I would say: A daring story of a teenage boy in love who finds his place in the world, and discovers just how large the cost of sacrifice in the name of love is.

Poignant yet unrealistic, heartbreaking yet lagging, Nobody But Us brings you on the journey of two reckless teenagers in love, and you can feel the same angst, the same chaos, the same emotions as they do at the same time hating them. It's positively breathtaking.(less)

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Mar 11, 2013 Winna rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: young-adult

I once wanted to write about a similar premise, but I wasn't ready yet so the idea just simply vanished.

I got this book because I wanted to feel again that feeling when I wanted to write my first book with this premise, and because the cover is so gorgeous.

A few major setbacks:

- The characters. Flawed, too flawed even. I agree with some reviews on Goodreads, we're being told, not shown. I don't like either character very much, and what's being described as smart does not resonate as an act of in...more

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Dec 20, 2012 Isamlq rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: arc-galley

Yeah ... there’s something missing in this one.

The girl reads young and undefined so that when went from one extreme of being afraid of her shadow to another extreme of hitting her boyfriend and committing crimes way well, there’s little time for to adjust and picture her doing any of it. I found her unbelievable.

The guy too read too much It’s all about the girl for him…. and it’s this intensity that leads to him not quite thinking things through. Worse, it’s the both of them that don’t really...more

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Jan 08, 2013 Cathy rated it 2 of 5 stars

Eh. I just couldn't shake the opinion throughout most of the book that this whole story was stock, cliched. The girl has been abused her whole life; the guy has grown up in a bunch of foster homes and has some behavior issues. They take off together and end up getting into some trouble. Either they're going to find a happily-ever-after, which is unlikely, or they're going to meet a bad end, which is more likely. Story written. Bam.
The writing's pretty good, but the story ... eh. I think that the...more

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Dec 24, 2012 Christina rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: ya

Thanks to Edelweiss/Above The Treeline for providing me with an ARC of this one.

This is a popular plot across all genres: damaged boy meets damaged girl. In this story, the damage for each is pretty extreme – Will is a foster kid who has been abandoned by basically everyone and Zoe is abused by her alcoholic father. Will convinced Zoe to leave North Dakota with him and set off for Las Vegas, where they will of course have new, fairytale lives. But, they don’t. They story is told through both Wil...more

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Jan 26, 2013 Shreya (CCReviews) rated it 3 of 5 stars

*A copy was provided for review purposes*

By reading this wonderful YA contemporary novel, anyone can tell that Kristin Halbrook has potential for great writing. There was a flawless flow in the dialogue, and it just made me want to keep on reading more. At first, I was cautious about reading this book at first....because, well..it sounded sappy. Love this, love that, heartbreak, choices, sad endings and all that stuff are major turn-offs for me cause there needs to be some kind of plot and actio...more *A copy was provided for review purposes*

By reading this wonderful YA contemporary novel, anyone can tell that Kristin Halbrook has potential for great writing. There was a flawless flow in the dialogue, and it just made me want to keep on reading more. At first, I was cautious about reading this book at first....because, well..it sounded sappy. Love this, love that, heartbreak, choices, sad endings and all that stuff are major turn-offs for me cause there needs to be some kind of plot and action you know? But as I said, this book was surprisingly good. It's complex and tragically romantic with a deeper meaning hidden behind the words. There are struggles and make-ups, and sometimes it seems realistic where teens can identify with the problems, and other times it's just plain fantasy.

The characters in this book were written with intricate detail and had capturing personalities. The reader will be able to clearly feel the amount of love there is between Zoe and Will, the two main characters of the book. Both of these characters have a very troubled past. Zoe had been abused and disregarded for almost her whole life by her dad, the only parent she has who's alive. It was entirely torturous for me to read about such a cruel life which Zoe faces with her dad, and I just wanted her to leave him as soon as possible. Honestly, I don't think I've ever hated such a character as much as I hated Zoe's father, and to think this actually happens in the real world as well is painstaking. Will was a sweet character who looked out for Zoe when she was with the monster she calls a father. He himself doesn't have much of a great past as he had been orphaned when he was little and has always been disappointed by the adults in his life. He is always bounced from foster home to foster home and has never truly had a "family". Both Will and Zoe escape from their pasts when they decide to run away together. I'm not ashamed to say that I was rooting for them on the sidelines when they were running away from their fears because in their case, it was the best they could do. And with the love that they share for each other, and the amount of dependence they had on each other shows that they would be fine by themselves. But of course, nothing's perfect and even though it seems like their love could break the monsters of their pasts, it simply couldn't and there was always an obstacle which stood in their way to prevent their happiness.

So yes, the story is realistic in that it possesses troubles with teens commonly found in the world today, but the way it goes about fixing these problems isn't very realistic at all. The romance seems too perfect an conveys that love is enough to survive in this world, which it isn't. Also, I personally don't enjoy books with a lot of ups and downs and many depressing moments, so I wasn't overly ecstatic at some parts of the book and wouldn't recommend it to the light-hearted. But it was just too beautifully written and heart-breaking to put down and it's hard to put a book down when you want to know what happens next. And what happened next.....well, let's just say it wasn't your typical fairy-tale ending that you always hope for. The book balanced itself out with its pros and cons and in the end, I would say it made for a significant read with a sufficient storyline fit for a YA contemporary novel.
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Dec 11, 2012 Brittany Rehage rated it 4 of 5 stars

Nobody But Us is not Bonnie and Clyde meets If I Stay. It's not. If I were to rate it only based on those comparisons, it'd be 1.5 stars. Yes, there's a bit of a Bonnie and Clyde feel, in that it's a couple on the run, but Will and Zoe are more than that.

Zoe runs away from home with Will. She's only 15, he's 18. Their dream is to just run away from their pasts and their problems, and to start life fresh. They do have a bit of a plan, so they aren't completely clueless, but they're living on thei...more Nobody But Us is not Bonnie and Clyde meets If I Stay. It's not. If I were to rate it only based on those comparisons, it'd be 1.5 stars. Yes, there's a bit of a Bonnie and Clyde feel, in that it's a couple on the run, but Will and Zoe are more than that.

Zoe runs away from home with Will. She's only 15, he's 18. Their dream is to just run away from their pasts and their problems, and to start life fresh. They do have a bit of a plan, so they aren't completely clueless, but they're living on their dream. Then reality crashes on them and they are each forced to make big decisions about their future together.

Zoe seems a bit mature for her age at times, and then at other times it's easy to tell she's only 15. I believe she believes she is in love, even if I'm not sure what she actually feels is love. Will offers her kindness and a way out, when everyone else in the town turns their backs and ignores the truth. I think Zoe falls in love with that, with the white knight, but it can be hard to tell as you read the novel.

Will breaks my heart. He could have been so much more, but he's given up on a system that gave up on him. He believes he is the only person he can trust and rely on all the time, but he wants to be better for Zoe. He wants to be the the kind of guy he thinks she deserves, even if he goes about it the wrong way. Every decision he makes for the two of them breaks my heart just a little bit more.

I can see where people might have issues with the destructiveness of their relationship, and to be fair, it isn't a healthy relationship, not by a long shot. Will has temper issues and needs to learn how to control his violent urges. Zoe needs to be able to stand up for herself more and not rely on someone else to prove her worth. However, not once did I get the feeling this book was supposed to be a sweet romance.

It was a book about how a destructive relationship destroys. It turns the good into bad and it makes happy endings hard to come by. Maybe that's just how I viewed the novel. I just felt as though the point wasn't to write a relationship that has typical teen issues, it was to write a relationship that was self-destructive not only to the relationship as a whole, but to the two individuals.

Nobody But Us was a rough, gritty novel that pulls are your heart and makes you hope, all the while, you know things can't end well. It's not like If I Stay meets Bonnie and Clyde, but it is a good book. Definitely worth a read.(less)

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