❝You know," he started, looking away. "I shouldn't be here. Really. And it's driving me insane. But Brynn..."
I averted my gaze from his hand and towards him before he continued.
"I can't stay away.❞
Brynn Cadence had never expected to be laughing with him as he threw her flirtatious jokes over the roar of the wind in her hair. She had never expected that her eyes would search for him in the crowds of the halls or lunch. She had definitely never, ever expected that her heart would pound so loudly when he was around. Yet, she lost all common sense when Kyler Fellan was involved.
Ann Rae started posting her stories online when she was thirteen years old. Since then, her film degree has given her a broader view of narrative that helps her create and immerse herself in stories of any form. Half Taiwanese, Ann spends a lot of time both in the United States and Asia, and often draws inspiration from her personal experiences. Her debut novel, The Locker Exchange, has amassed over twenty-six million reads and forty-six thousand followers on Wattpad. Ann currently resides in Taiwan.
*Warning: I tried to keep my ranting relatively vague, but this review does get spoilery, so proceed with caution.*
I lost count of the number of times my eyes almost rolled out of my head while reading this book. Given that it was published by Wattpad Books, I knew going in to keep my expectations for the writing low (no surprises there). However, the premise seemed cool, so I was hoping I'd at least enjoy the story.
Unfortunately, that was not the case. Why wasn't it the case? Because one of my biggest pet peeves is "realistic fiction" that isn't actually realistic, and this book had implausible written all over it.
Case in point: *Girl overhears someone screaming for help, finds a dead body, sees someone fleeing the scene, and the police just brush her off and declare the death "accidental" with no real investigation. Later on, when a girl gets kidnapped, the police tell the victim and her friends (who confronted and ran off the kidnappers) they don't have a good enough description of the suspects to actually investigate the kidnapping so the kids just need to "be careful" and "stay in after dark." Say what now? No police force would ever get away with something like that, crooked cops on staff or not. Does this town not have a forensics team? A coroner? Detectives that actually, you know, investigate crimes instead of determining at the scene that a death is accidental or that there isn't enough evidence to even try to find whodunit because the description of the suspects was vague and the tires were "too common" to get a make and model of the car? How do these people have jobs? *Girl's parents go out of town for business for a month and leave her in her house alone except for when her college-aged brother comes home on the weekends. And they left the same day she found said dead body despite the fact that she was, you know, traumatized from finding a dead body. What the hell kind of parents would do that and is it even legal to leave your minor daughter home alone for that long? I would have told my boss either my husband or I were staying behind no ifs ands or buts. *Guy and girl decide to "investigate" said murder because the police aren't doing anything about it but their idea of investigating is to listen to school gossip and exchange locker notes. They make questionable connections between events (that, of course, oh so conveniently end up being related), but, why are they jumping to conclusions? *Their number one suspect is their number one suspect because the girl's older brother has a "bad feeling" about him. *Boy decides to join a gang for the sake of the "investigation" like he's some sort of undercover cop (which he's not), threatens someone with a gun as part of his initiation into the gang, and somehow never faces any sort of criminal charges for it. *Girl gets a gym locker that is open to the freaking boys locker room and no one does anything about it. Because no boy would ever try and use it to spy on naked girls. *Girl volunteers in the school office during 5th period and is somehow compelled to stay and file papers until 8 p.m. and no one cares? *There's literally only one suspect...and he ends up being the bad guy. Where's the mystery? *The one scene of underage drinking in the book was a perfect set-up for date rape. I honestly don't know why authors feel the need to have their female characters do things that are so stupid and irresponsible.
Bottom line: If you're gonna write a book and get it published, please go to the extra effort to make sure your story is plausible. I honestly have no idea how this got the traction it did on Wattpad, much less a publishing deal. I understand the author started writing stories at a young age, but success on Wattpad does not mean a book is automatically publishable. This book should have undergone a major overhaul.
Content notes: one scene of underage drinking and occasional harsh profanity.
This book was just not it and I wish I didn’t finish it (I just have a really hard time with dnf-ing books for some reason). I have a hard time giving low stars for books because I honestly feel bad doing it, but this was no doubt a one star book for me.
A girl comes across a dead body and tells police she saw someone flee from the scene and just gets a “you’re in shock” response and is brushed off, with police saying the kid fell and it was accidental without any investigation.
The girl then goes home and her parents are like “hey, I know you’re traumatized from seeing your peer dead, but we’re leaving for a month for work.” And just leave her home alone (with her college-age brother coming home on weekends)
The girl has a gym locker that is open into a locker in the boy’s locker room and everyone just tells her not to change with the locker open and no one asks the school to fix it? The boy who has the other side of the locker all of a sudden is head over heels for the girl because she was embarrassed and shocked when she realized their lockers were connected. Because apparently that’s how love works?
The girl’s friend gets kidnapped and she of course arrives on scene and scares off the perps. Police are called and just…don’t care? They say there’s not a good enough description of the perps, so it’s too bad, and just be careful out there.
The girl and her boyfriend decide they’re going to solve the mystery and get themselves into dangerous situations because honestly they’re pretty dumb and it could have all been avoided easily. They also pretend to break up after fake dating so no one will get suspicious that they’re both asking questions but then continue to meet up in public spaces. The guy joins a gang because the ONLY suspect (who they don’t really have any initial reason to suspect but also so happens to be the bad guy) decides to tell him what is going on only if he “joins him.” But then the suspect essentially says he doesn’t like the guy, so why’d he want to tell/involve him in the gang anyway?
All in all there was no mystery (since the suspect was the bad guy and there was nothing to ever suggest it wouldn’t be him), the locker part was barely a part of the story, the guy falling for the girl so quick (like, hardcore in love) is something I didn’t buy since they didn’t even know each other before that, some things that were included were unnecessary and weird, law enforcement not doing anything didn’t make sense for what happened, and it was just not realistic for a book that was (I believe) intended to be realistic fiction. I did not enjoy it and I would not recommend.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
I think this one was a little too young for me. Plot points seemed a little unrealistic for high school students at certain points throughout the book and it was a little much at times
The Locker Exchange follows Brynn and Kyler the death of a student from their school, and while they try to solve the mystery surrounding her death. Everyone believes that the girls death was an accident, a misstep on the stairs that resulted in her falling to her death. However, Brynn and Kyler are convinced that that's not the whole story. This book is a sweet high school romance with a mystery subplot, but I'd consider their romance the main plot line. As they begin to uncover more and more secrets surrounding this girl's death, Kyler and Brynn find themselves stuck in the middle of a very dangerous scheme.
I enjoyed the plot of this book and I liked how Brynn and Kyler met through their shared locker. I've never read a book with that sort of meeting between the characters, so I really enjoyed it. In my opinion, it felt like the book was more romance than mystery which I happen to prefer. I loved how Kyler and Brynn were solving a mystery together, and that trope has become a new favorite of mine! In addition to this book being fairly short, the mystery/romance helped keep this book really well paced.
I'd say that the characters were basic but in a good way. Kyler wasn't your stereotypical popular football player since his only personality trait wasn't just football. As you get to know his character better, it's shown that he's really sweet and caring. I also like how Brynn wasn't a typical "nerdy" girl that's "bullied". She's just a typical high school girl that cares about her friends and others.
Similar to the characters, the writing was simple but it helped the book flow really well. The description of the scenery and events was really good and I was able to easily understand all of the plot points. I haven't read many high school romances since I primarily stick to fantasy books, but I've been wanting to read more of them recently. This book was a really good start, and I'd recommend it to anyone, especially if you're looking to get out of a reading slump <3
Too many interactions with a 100 friends. I already lost track of you was you, etc. The heroine cared too much about everything involving her friends and they had to know everything. Immature behavior.
Mom and Dad are never home. Brother is in college, but has secrets. Heroine meets hero by sharing a locker kind of. Heroine has had a crush on the hero’s BFF since middle school, but know founds herself drawn to the hero. There are secrets all around. I really thought I knew what the hero was hiding, but I was wrong.
The beginning was nice, but then I found myself skimming. You have to buy it off Wattpad. I regret wasting my credits.
usually this would take me less than a day to finish but since it didn’t hook me from the start it took quite some time. lol. i read the original version on wattpad and i remember really liking it but this refurbished version was meh. the monologue was okay at best as well as the romance. the mystery was supposed to be the whole point of the book but instead i felt as if it was barely there? there wasn’t really anything that stood out to me; but then again it’s a wattpad story.
Absolutely loved this book!! Read this book on Wattpad and got hooked really fast. At first, it was going to be cliche but that changed really fast reading more into the book. At a later date, I'd definitely reread!!
the locker exchange begins with Brynn discovering one of her fellow classmates dead on the bleachers leading to her needing to discover what happened to her classmate. shortly after this, Brynn is assigned her gym locker and finds out that her locker has no back and it is actually connected to the locker from the boys’ locker room. her locker buddy is Kyler, the flirtatious and popular football player. they start getting closer together and they both decide to investigate the death of their classmate to see if they can catch the killer.
the concept of the book is really cool and the mix of mystery and romance is something that I really enjoy, however, I do think that both of those were rushed. the romance between Kyler and Brynn begins almost immediately after they meet and escalates just as quickly and the mystery is partially solved around 1/3 into the book. there was no build up with the romance and the mystery could’ve been more spread out and had better hints leading up to it. I just thought that everything went way too fast in this book and I was constantly trying to both guess and keep up with the story.
with all that being said, I still enjoyed Brynn and Kyler’s relationship as it was very cute and light-hearted (if you forget about the death of their classmate) and when they finally figured out all of the details of the mystery. my favorite relationship in the book (and the most realistic one in my opinion) was that of Brynn’s best friends, Liam and Adalia. they were super cute throughout pretty much the entire book and had me rooting for them from the start.
this book was a super fast read and honestly entertaining. i had no idea what was going to happen next in the book and honestly had whiplash from all that happened.
It was a missed opportunity. I rated it 2 stars because I at least finished it.
I love crime stories and I love romance stories, so I was expecting something different. It is a Wattpad so I understand it's unfair to go in with high expectations, but I was expecting something mediocre at least. I was looking for books similar to "She's with Me" (a Wattpad book I really really liked) and I stumbled across this.
Sadly, the story genuinely doesn't make sense. The mystery is ridiculous, the romance is lacking chemistry and development and it simply isn't worth it. I've read stories where the police is corrupt, but I've never heard of a police dismissing a potential murder as an accident on the crime scene, dismissing the only witness and just shutting down the story. What about the girl's parents? What about forensics, police reports etc? You can't just do that. This isn't a matter of small town and police laziness/corruption, it just genuinely can't happen the way it did.
And the actual reveal is even weaker. A crime gang related to gambling where they simply kidnap people. Okay, sure.
Then we have the romance. I thought okay, the mystery is weak but the romance will make up for it. But nope, it didn't. It was instalove, with very little development. They started dating quickly, which okay can be realistic for teenagers, but what about after that? It's like their relationship remained static. They were apart for way too long, which made it even worse and all in all, it didn't work.
This book wasn't a great read to me. The plot was boring and I felt like the one minute the main characters are looking for evidence of the death of a girl which she randomly found on the football field, and then going on dates and acting normal. I feel like it's two different books combined and put into one. The police force in the book is also trash. The main character tells them she saw someone else on the football field but they brush it off and then when someone gets kidnapped they also brush off, like what? Then her parents also leave her alone after she is still traumatized from the death of the girl. They make bad connections between events that somehow end up being related but, why are they jumping to conclusions? Their number one suspect is their number one suspect because the girl's older brother has a "bad feeling" about him. And the locker, what school has a locker that shows into the other genders' locker room? All the events that happened in this book are very unlikely but they just seem to happen right? The author didn't put that much effort into this seeing as it is very sloppy and the decisions the characters make and just stupid like joining a gang for the sake of the investigation which is half based on rumors from high school students. Over this book is very badly written and I would not read it again looking at this book's phoniness and quality.
This was decent overall, it is definitely a book I would expect from wattpad so if that is what you like in a book then I think you’ll love it. It had a good start and pacing, it also had me interested in the story. But about half way through is when crazy things started happening that were just super outlandish and not realistic for high-school. So first of all, her parents are just not in the picture as they are out of town the entire book so she basically lives alone except on weekend when her brother Baylor comes in town. Then her friend is kidnapped, they rescue her, and the police do nothing. Then her and Kyler plot out what to do and record the messages but surprise, the bad guys had bugged her and were listening so she then gets kidnapped. Kyler comes to the rescuer with Baylor and the FBI so happily ever after. Middle school me would’ve loved this but I think I’m just too old for something like this now to be ranked high for me. I did like the slight romance between Kyler and Brynn and the locker note exchanges we get.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Interesting premise of a high school locker that has no back, so the somewhat quiet Brynn comes face to face with Kyler, star of the football team every time she opens it. When attraction begins to grow between them, she's wary, but Kyler offers to help her investigate what she believes was a murder she witnessed, one the local police refuse to pursue. Add in that her best friend's dad is almost broke and secretive about what's happening and you have a mix of romance and mystery. It's a bit unpolished, but still a fun read.
I love the Young Adult genre because they’re typically easy reads that are highly entertaining. The Locker Exchange is no different. The relationship between Kyler and Brynn brought me some nostalgia, my husband and I are high school sweethearts. I thought the mystery aspects worked well and weren’t too heavy handed. The scenes were well written and realistic. There was a bit of everything in terms of diversity and characters. Overall great read and I’ll be passing this book over to my 13 year old to read next.
I listened to this on audible. The story was all over the place. There were way too many characters. The only thing I really enjoyed was the romance between the 2 characters. The rest of it was just all over the place.. The mystery just didn't mesh well in the book. There was just something that didn't fit right?. But the romance between the characters how they fell in love and everything was fit together perfectly.
WHEN THE WATTPAD AUTHORS DO IT, THEY DO IT RIGHT!!
this was fun and even though it was completely unrealistic, i loved every second of it. this was technically a reread bc i have read it on wattpad😝🙏🏻but guys… why was i kicking my feet over kyler??🤭HIS “yeah?” COMMENT??????? IM KNAWINF AT THE BARS OF MY ENCLOSURE I LOVE THAT NICHE TROPE SM😩😩😩😩
I didn't know if I would love it at the beginning but when i started to read more into it I started to like it a lot better towards the end of the book. It was crazy that Brynn got a gun point to her head when it got really good.
It was a fast and easy read but very predictable. I guessed the criminal 17 pages into the book. It felt a bit like a wattpad book and I think there could’ve been more development into the characters and create more options on who the criminal could be. I like the play with the title though
I would say if I could you should read this book. It might sound very cliché but it’s really not. . . Well sort of but not in the bad way. I don’t want to spoil anything, so just read it. Ha ha ha
So this was listed as a "funny" book, and although there was some humor in the banter, it was definitely more of a dark mystery. Kind of a convoluted, stretched plot, but some good characters.