Ride With Me by Lucy Keating
Published by Clarion Books on June 28, 2022
ISBN: 0358468310
Pages: 320
Genres: Realistic Fiction, Romance
Format: Chapter Book Fiction
Goodreads

Charlie Owens drives for a local rideshare app in her small Western Mass town. Early on, there is a (suspension-of-disbelief-requiring) meet cute/conflict between Charlie and Andre, a popular boy, that leads to his car being in the shop and her driving him around town. A spark between them naturally develops as they spend time together.

Positives: the awkward teen romance angle felt spot on. Keating’s writing was smooth and easy to read, with realistic dialogue.

Ho-hum: Secondary characters were uniformly nice people, some with quirky personalities, and none were remotely abrasive or challenging (everyone gets along, all the time). One friend was described briefly as Black, and a handful others had last names which indicated a diversity that the story otherwise lacked. Sense of setting was superficially adequate, if greatly romanticized; it reads like a story written by a person who lives in a city about how they imagine rural teenagers live (and did not nail the experience).

There were none of the hot button topics that often come up in YA, other than several scenes with underage social drinking. Overall, this novel offers a pleasant and undemanding reading experience for teens looking for a low-key chaste romance set in rural New England, but is not by any means a must-have for libraries.

Reviewed by Jenny Martinez Nocito, Maine State Library