Review: Riptide

Author: Lindsey Scheibe
Release Date:  May 8, 2013

Publisher: Flux

Pages: 288

Source: NetGalley
[add on Goodreads]

Special thanks to Flux and NetGalley for an advance copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

Summary: For Grace Parker, surfing is all about the ride and the moment. Everything else disappears. She can forget that her best friend, Ford Watson, has a crush on her that she can’t reciprocate. She can forget how badly she wants to get a surf scholarship to UC San Diego. She can forget the pressure of her parents’ impossibly high expectations.

When Ford enters Grace into a surf competition—the only way she can impress the UCSD surfing scouts—she has one summer to train and prepare. Will she gain everything she’s ever wanted or lose the only things that ever mattered?

Why I Loved It:  I liked this book a lot more than I was expecting to.  I was expecting a light contemporary read, with a lot of surfing, and a summer romance.  That is not at all what I got, the exception being a lot of surfing.  There was a lot of that.

The book is set with alternating POV's, Grace and her best friend Ford's.  Ford is a great guy, in all seriousness, and it seems he was pretty attractive.  I know for most people, that is always a plus.  Both of them come from completely different backgrounds.  Grace comes from the family that revolves around her hot-shot lawyer of a father who has some anger issues.  Ford comes from a family with Hispanic culture, loving parents, and an incredibly well-educated and brilliant mother and mechanic father.  Grace is so welcome into Ford's family.  She is like the daughter they never had.  Ford into Grace's?  Not so much.  Grace doesn't really let anyone into her home, much less a "come to meet the folks" kind of get together.

What do Ford and Grace do well together?  Surf.  Grace's father taught gave her the how-to when she was young, and from then on surfing is what she loved.  It was her getaway from all things LIFE.  And Ford is a great coach, adding to the education her father gave her.  They work well together, and Ford has her back in the male-dominated sport of surfing.

So that all may sound like the fluff that makes a nice contemporary.  There is so much more to the story though.  Grace's home life?  Not all it's cracked up to be.  Ford has some demons in his life that push him to be a great lawyer, which leads him to an internship with Grace's father's law firm.  That internship may just change his life.  And his relationship with Grace.

Grace's urge to surf surpasses all the things the people around her want for her life.  Surfing is her thing, what drives her, and where she escapes to.  And the way the book is written, I could smell salty ocean air and feel sand between my toes.  The book has some incredible scene setting.

There is so much more to Grace and Ford's story that the summary lets on.  The book is so much more than fluff, but it has some hilarious and fun moments in between.  The surfing backdrop is perfect for the story, and I really loved learning some of the lingo.  Who knows?  Maybe one day I will get to take some lessons, if I can get away from my land-locked environment.

Who Should Read It:  My contemporary peeps, this book is for you.  Add it to the pile!