Review: Numb by Laura Clark (Westbrook #2)

Note: This ebook was provided by the author in exchange for an honest review.

Laila Patterson is finally seventeen but the fairy tale-like love story she was living just a few weeks prior to her birthday didn't end the way she hoped it would. All she has left from it is a letter she's read repeatedly, trying to comprehend what its writer truly wanted to convey, and a diary with her thoughts about the heartbreak she continues to live with over the summer. She's grateful for her best friend, Avery Brookes, and Avery's boyfriend, who has become one of Laila's closest confidantes, Trevor Maddox. But that relationship is wreaking as much confusion as Laila's own with Sam Woodson. Trevor is both a possibility and a risk, and then Gavin Trotter enters the picture, stealing her attention. She's feeling too many things for too many boys, but is that better than feeling the nothingness that has numbed her heart indefinitely?

Numb is the second book in author Laura Clark's Westbrook young adult (YA) romance series and picks up a month or so after the events of the first book, Distraction. There are a couple of flashbacks that provide a better picture of what Laila Patterson has been going through after her relationship with Sam Woodson ended. The letter he left her finally comes to light and reading it broke my heart, which is saying a lot considering I tend to be a bit cynical when it comes to the motivations of self-sacrificing fictional characters in romance novels. Learning why he chose to walk away makes it much easier for readers to empathize with Sam, although it's clear that words written on a sheet of paper won't suffice when it comes to Laila picking up the broken pieces of her young heart. First loves a great but first heartbreaks suck a lot.

If Sam's presence was constant in book one, he isn't around as much in book two, although the remnants continue to linger throughout. It's Trevor Maddox who takes on a bigger role here, but he's forced to share Laila's attention yet again when Gavin Trotter snags Laila's affections just when she needs someone to make her heart beat double-time in excitement. I wasn't too much of a Gavin fan, and it wasn't because he wasn't a nice person. My resistance to his charms was basically due to not really knowing what it was he was after. The guy was very laid-back and casual in his pursuit of Laila, but it was no less focused. And then, just when you thought he was down and out, Sam makes his presence felt once again. To have three guys as interested in her as Trevor, Sam, and Gavin were, I'd have gone absolutely batty having to choose.

Laila may be seventeen already, but her lack of maturity when it comes to being in any sort of relationship with a guy is front and center here. She's impulsive and acts on her negative feelings just as much as he would her positive ones, which of course, tends to lead to even more problems for her. The ending is one that makes it easy for any reader to walk away with a smile on their face, but let me advise you to read the third book in the series because not all is what it may seem. We've only skimmed the surface of the love square that is Laila-Sam-Trevor-Gavin and there are still resolutions that are forthcoming for some of them in book three. The Westbrook series is an addictive one, regardless of your age, and with writing this good, I'm hoping you guys'll join me in my latest reading addiction. I'm giving Numb five out of five stars. ♥

Date Read: 23 November 2015

Learn more about Laura Clark.

Purchase Numb on Amazon.