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How I Fall & How I Fly: The Complete Two Book Series
Finally read Amazon's bestselling teen author, Anne Eliot’s romantic, high school crush romance back-to-back. The series is made up of two, full length novels, now combined here into one boxed set.
Book 1, How I Fall:
*WHAT IF YOU HAD AN IMPOSSIBLE CRUSH?*
Impossible because she’s Ellen Foster. The beautiful, smart and possibly fragile photography-girl. You’re Cam Campbell. The guy who plays football 24/7 with lame parents and no life. But what if during junior year, you finally get her phone number—and it all works perfectly—until you realize you might hurt her.
Book 2, How I Fly
*WHAT IF IT'S TIME TO MOVE ON?*
When you're seventeen and you lose your first love, everyone thinks you should simply move on and get over it. But what if the cute boy who wants to date you is nice but doesn't give you the butterflies the first guy did? And what if that first guy comes back into your life and you discover all is not as it seems?
"A wonderful young adult story with diverse characters and a fun setting in Canada. The characters will make you laugh and cry. The friendships are are as awesome as the romance. The kisses are sweet but swoon-worthy. This is my kind of YA." ~Tanya TnB-Blog.
Book 1, How I Fall:
*WHAT IF YOU HAD AN IMPOSSIBLE CRUSH?*
Impossible because she’s Ellen Foster. The beautiful, smart and possibly fragile photography-girl. You’re Cam Campbell. The guy who plays football 24/7 with lame parents and no life. But what if during junior year, you finally get her phone number—and it all works perfectly—until you realize you might hurt her.
Book 2, How I Fly
*WHAT IF IT'S TIME TO MOVE ON?*
When you're seventeen and you lose your first love, everyone thinks you should simply move on and get over it. But what if the cute boy who wants to date you is nice but doesn't give you the butterflies the first guy did? And what if that first guy comes back into your life and you discover all is not as it seems?
"A wonderful young adult story with diverse characters and a fun setting in Canada. The characters will make you laugh and cry. The friendships are are as awesome as the romance. The kisses are sweet but swoon-worthy. This is my kind of YA." ~Tanya TnB-Blog.
- GenresAmazon
667 pages, Kindle Edition
First published June 19, 2015
8 people are currently reading
72 people want to read
About the author
Anne Eliot
14 books981 followersAnne Eliot lives in the high mountains of Colorado and loves to shovel snow.
While growing up, Anne hid her own anxieties by hiding and reading book after book. She developed an addiction libraries, to first love, first kisses and her favorite: the happy-ever-after story. This is what she writes today. Now she's a mom of two, and happily married to her own first love.
Anne Eliot’s first YA book, Almost, became a top 100 best selling Kindle book, and was a Readers Choice, Top 12 of 2012 book for Amazon.com at #11, and her other books, Unmaking Hunter Kennedy, How I Fall/How I Fly, and now the Runaway Rockstar Series have all been teen, top 100 bestselling books. She loves to hear from readers. Please look for her on Facebook or tweet her @yaromance.
Representation: Anne Eliot’s foreign translations are represented by Jane Dystel of Dystel, Goderich & Bourret Literary management, NYC.
While growing up, Anne hid her own anxieties by hiding and reading book after book. She developed an addiction libraries, to first love, first kisses and her favorite: the happy-ever-after story. This is what she writes today. Now she's a mom of two, and happily married to her own first love.
Anne Eliot’s first YA book, Almost, became a top 100 best selling Kindle book, and was a Readers Choice, Top 12 of 2012 book for Amazon.com at #11, and her other books, Unmaking Hunter Kennedy, How I Fall/How I Fly, and now the Runaway Rockstar Series have all been teen, top 100 bestselling books. She loves to hear from readers. Please look for her on Facebook or tweet her @yaromance.
Representation: Anne Eliot’s foreign translations are represented by Jane Dystel of Dystel, Goderich & Bourret Literary management, NYC.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
February 16, 2016
HOW I FALL:
ON REREAD: Probably would round down to 4 instead of up to 5. The things I noted in the review below bothered me a bit more this time around. But I’m going to leave it on here b/c I could be just in a mood.
4.5 stars — this book had me mega grinning from practically the first page. Honestly, there was so much to love about the characters, and it was just one of those sweet ya romances….well, that is until they ran into conflict and my heart was ripped out when I discovered this was actually a 2 book series!!! Seriously, how did I not know that??
REALLY had a hard time deciding whether to round up or down on this one. The parts that I LOVED had this book at a 5++++. But there were a few little things that bugged me, and one of those was the naivety of Cam. I really disliked how blinded he was to his parents….well, sometimes I felt like he totally saw them for the snobs and jerks they were, but then he’d be like “don’t worry, when I explain it will all be good.” I just don’t get where that came from? It was the same with his friends. Was he really that oblivious to how Ellen was treated? But then I think, maybe it’s b/c he was only 16 and truly just thought that good would prevail and all that. So yeah, not sure how I ended up feeling on that in the end. I mean, I LOVE LOVE LOVE Cam. Seriously, LOVE that boy. And he and Ellen together were so sweet and just OMG <3’s everywhere awesomeness. So maybe that’s why I was disappointed in him?
Regardless of that little niggle, I LOVED the characters. I am chagrined to say that when I read the synopsis, I somehow got it into my head that Laura was either younger, or had perhaps a developmental handicap. Honestly, I HAVE NO IDEA where I got that from. Going back and rereading it doesn’t enlighten me, so feel free to laugh your butts off. Seriously. Laura was hilarious. She was such a nice addition to the cast, along with Patrick. So it wasn’t just a romance developing, but an expansion of both Ellen *and* Cam’s friend group. Loved the dynamics between the 4 of them.
Some of the bits in the climax bordered on unbelievable, but it didn’t bother me as much as it has in previous books by Ms. Eliot.
And on a weird side note, as a Western Canadian, and HUGE CFL (Canadian Football League) fan, I found the football notes irksome on occasion….but that’s a TOTAL personal thing. Honestly, I’m from Saskatchewan, and it’s like a religion over there. So to see the CFL sort of relegated to lameness or second best rose my hackles. ;) But since Timmie’s was appropriately worshipped in the book, I will forgive the American author. Besides, maybe it’s different over in Ontario, especially closer to the border like the town was.
And now that I got rid of that silly aside, I will just say that it is BY FAR my favourite Anne Eliot book. Seriously, most of it had me grinning and laughing and just happy so much my cheeks hurt. Now I will have to impatiently wait alongside the rest of the fans for the conclusion. *leg starts tapping uncontrollably* HURRY!!!
HOW I FLY:
3 stars -- I'm unsure how I feel after finishing the story. After rereading the first book, I could already tell I was in a different mood than the first time I read it, and so I'm sure that affected my enjoyment of finally finishing the series...but in the end, I guess I was a bit disappointed. I think I just had lower tolerance for the drama found in these books, and they just felt really unrealistic so much of the time that it took away from my enjoyment.
I knew from the ending of the first book that things were not going to go all smoothly for our star-crossed lovers. But I guess I didn't expect them to spend so much of this book apart. And since I love me a romance, I was disappointed in the lack of that in this book.
Honestly, I think most of my disappointed feelings can be summed up in Harrison Shaw. (And here's where the review could get a bit spoilery, so please skip the rest if you haven't read the book). I was leery of Mr. Shaw right from the first moment of meeting, and actually pretty much called his role in this book from close to the beginning. So watching it all unfold wasn't that fun for me. I mean, I really liked Ellen and Cam, so to watch them (mostly Ellen) succumb to yet another super villain just wasn't what I was looking for. I guess I would have preferred more real life adversity instead if that makes any sense. But I suppose that wouldn't have made for quite as much of a book. It just felt very overdramatic and unrealistic to me and so I didn't enjoy any of the climax at all.
And quite honestly, I KNOW that Ellen was trying to get over Cam, but I just couldn't understand how she could be so naive about Harrison. And knowing how important her photography was to her, I guess I was just surprised that she was so easily sucked into Harrison's machinations. I try to remind myself that she is just a teenager, only *just barely* a senior in high school, and so I should give her a little slack. But I just wanted her to figure it out on her own or something I guess.
In the end the part I found most interesting in this book was finding out what had happened to Cam in the 6 months between the first book and this one. But that was really only a small part of the story. And in general I enjoyed Cam's POV more in this book than Ellen's POV.
So yeah. Disappointed with this conclusion. Would have also liked a bit more on the epilogue and resolution with Ellen and Cam, and especially with Laura and Patrick. Laura's crazy antics actually annoyed me a bit more this time around too, so maybe I really am just in a mood. :( I hate it when I'm in a mood, I prefer to just blindly like things. ;)
ON REREAD: Probably would round down to 4 instead of up to 5. The things I noted in the review below bothered me a bit more this time around. But I’m going to leave it on here b/c I could be just in a mood.
4.5 stars — this book had me mega grinning from practically the first page. Honestly, there was so much to love about the characters, and it was just one of those sweet ya romances….well, that is until they ran into conflict and my heart was ripped out when I discovered this was actually a 2 book series!!! Seriously, how did I not know that??
REALLY had a hard time deciding whether to round up or down on this one. The parts that I LOVED had this book at a 5++++. But there were a few little things that bugged me, and one of those was the naivety of Cam. I really disliked how blinded he was to his parents….well, sometimes I felt like he totally saw them for the snobs and jerks they were, but then he’d be like “don’t worry, when I explain it will all be good.” I just don’t get where that came from? It was the same with his friends. Was he really that oblivious to how Ellen was treated? But then I think, maybe it’s b/c he was only 16 and truly just thought that good would prevail and all that. So yeah, not sure how I ended up feeling on that in the end. I mean, I LOVE LOVE LOVE Cam. Seriously, LOVE that boy. And he and Ellen together were so sweet and just OMG <3’s everywhere awesomeness. So maybe that’s why I was disappointed in him?
Regardless of that little niggle, I LOVED the characters. I am chagrined to say that when I read the synopsis, I somehow got it into my head that Laura was either younger, or had perhaps a developmental handicap. Honestly, I HAVE NO IDEA where I got that from. Going back and rereading it doesn’t enlighten me, so feel free to laugh your butts off. Seriously. Laura was hilarious. She was such a nice addition to the cast, along with Patrick. So it wasn’t just a romance developing, but an expansion of both Ellen *and* Cam’s friend group. Loved the dynamics between the 4 of them.
Some of the bits in the climax bordered on unbelievable, but it didn’t bother me as much as it has in previous books by Ms. Eliot.
And on a weird side note, as a Western Canadian, and HUGE CFL (Canadian Football League) fan, I found the football notes irksome on occasion….but that’s a TOTAL personal thing. Honestly, I’m from Saskatchewan, and it’s like a religion over there. So to see the CFL sort of relegated to lameness or second best rose my hackles. ;) But since Timmie’s was appropriately worshipped in the book, I will forgive the American author. Besides, maybe it’s different over in Ontario, especially closer to the border like the town was.
And now that I got rid of that silly aside, I will just say that it is BY FAR my favourite Anne Eliot book. Seriously, most of it had me grinning and laughing and just happy so much my cheeks hurt. Now I will have to impatiently wait alongside the rest of the fans for the conclusion. *leg starts tapping uncontrollably* HURRY!!!
HOW I FLY:
3 stars -- I'm unsure how I feel after finishing the story. After rereading the first book, I could already tell I was in a different mood than the first time I read it, and so I'm sure that affected my enjoyment of finally finishing the series...but in the end, I guess I was a bit disappointed. I think I just had lower tolerance for the drama found in these books, and they just felt really unrealistic so much of the time that it took away from my enjoyment.
I knew from the ending of the first book that things were not going to go all smoothly for our star-crossed lovers. But I guess I didn't expect them to spend so much of this book apart. And since I love me a romance, I was disappointed in the lack of that in this book.
Honestly, I think most of my disappointed feelings can be summed up in Harrison Shaw. (And here's where the review could get a bit spoilery, so please skip the rest if you haven't read the book). I was leery of Mr. Shaw right from the first moment of meeting, and actually pretty much called his role in this book from close to the beginning. So watching it all unfold wasn't that fun for me. I mean, I really liked Ellen and Cam, so to watch them (mostly Ellen) succumb to yet another super villain just wasn't what I was looking for. I guess I would have preferred more real life adversity instead if that makes any sense. But I suppose that wouldn't have made for quite as much of a book. It just felt very overdramatic and unrealistic to me and so I didn't enjoy any of the climax at all.
And quite honestly, I KNOW that Ellen was trying to get over Cam, but I just couldn't understand how she could be so naive about Harrison. And knowing how important her photography was to her, I guess I was just surprised that she was so easily sucked into Harrison's machinations. I try to remind myself that she is just a teenager, only *just barely* a senior in high school, and so I should give her a little slack. But I just wanted her to figure it out on her own or something I guess.
In the end the part I found most interesting in this book was finding out what had happened to Cam in the 6 months between the first book and this one. But that was really only a small part of the story. And in general I enjoyed Cam's POV more in this book than Ellen's POV.
So yeah. Disappointed with this conclusion. Would have also liked a bit more on the epilogue and resolution with Ellen and Cam, and especially with Laura and Patrick. Laura's crazy antics actually annoyed me a bit more this time around too, so maybe I really am just in a mood. :( I hate it when I'm in a mood, I prefer to just blindly like things. ;)
April 5, 2020
Wow....... another great YA duet by Anne Eliot!
Ellen has cerebral palsy, she’s been in love with Cam since middle school. Cam is the senior school quarterback - he would never like her back.... but he does! She just doesn’t know!
The Duet tells of the story of how Ellen and Cam finally manage to speak with the help of Laura London the Irish exchange student!
Such a lovely book, I was cursing at the end of How I fall with the ending..... I am so glad that I had the second book to continue reading!
Friends, photography, scholarships, love, hatred, jealously, break ups, friendships and love. I can only hope that Patrick and Laura get their own story too 💜
Ellen has cerebral palsy, she’s been in love with Cam since middle school. Cam is the senior school quarterback - he would never like her back.... but he does! She just doesn’t know!
The Duet tells of the story of how Ellen and Cam finally manage to speak with the help of Laura London the Irish exchange student!
Such a lovely book, I was cursing at the end of How I fall with the ending..... I am so glad that I had the second book to continue reading!
Friends, photography, scholarships, love, hatred, jealously, break ups, friendships and love. I can only hope that Patrick and Laura get their own story too 💜
October 16, 2015
Excellent series. Good to see people with disabilities strong willed. Loved Ellen, Cam, Laura, and Patrick. Would actually like to have a part three which tells of Patrick's adventures as well as what happens with Ellen and Cam. Highly recommend these books.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews