Why I read it: Jane from Dear Author told me about this one and that she thought I would like it (she was right). So I begged asked the publicist for a review copy. Lucky for me, she said yes.
What it’s about: (from Goodreads) Cami Broussard has her future all figured out. She’ll finish her senior year of high school, then go to work full-time as an apprentice chef in her father’s French restaurant, alongside her boyfriend, Luke. But then twenty-year-old ex-Marine Julian Wyatt comes to live with Cami’s family while recovering from serious injuries. And suddenly Cami finds herself questioning everything she thought she wanted.
Julian’s all attitude, challenges and intense green-brown eyes. But beneath that abrasive exterior is a man who just might be as lost as Cami’s starting to feel. And Cami can’t stop thinking about him. Talking to him. Wanting to kiss him. He’s got her seriously stirred up. Her senior year has just gotten a lot more complicated….
What worked for me (and what didn’t): Stir Me Up covers Cami Broussard’s senior year of high school. Just about to turn 18, her French chef father is pressuring her to go to college after she graduates. Cami wants to be a chef but her father thinks that job takes too much away from family time and wants her to have another option to fall back on should (okay, when) she get[s] married and have/has children. Cami’s father didn’t have the opportunity to go to college and it is clear he feels regret about not being around for her more.
Cami wants to cook. She’s been working in her father’s restaurant since she was 10 years old. She doesn’t need to go to cooking school and going to college won’t get her where she wants to go. For all, that Cami isn’t exactly sure what kind of chef she wants to be. She doesn’t want to work in her father’s restaurant for the rest of her life; she knows she wants to cook, but beyond that? Well, she’s got some things to work out, assuming she can convince her father she’s not going to college.
