I felt like there were just a few too many stereotypes in this book. It became tiring after a while. Actually, I take that back. It became tiring almost immediately but filtered out as story progressed. 
 If you can look past the stereotypical characters, the character interactions and dialogue was good. My main problem was that I actually read the dust jacket blurb for the sequel before I even started the first one, so I had a good idea of how this one ended up. I highly recommend NOT doing that. My preconceived notions definitely affected the way I perceived the story. 
 Apart from that, there were a ton of horrendously cheesy lines. Many of which came from the male lead character. Most of the time it was obvious that a woman had written it and that really took me out of the story. 
 I did start to fall for Alex, just like Brittany did. I really looked forward to their scenes together. They really do have great chemistry. Although not the most riveting romance, it was overall a fairly entertaining read. But I'm not sure yet if I will read the next one. 
 The best thing about the book was the message, however. There's always hope for a better future no matter where you're from or what you've done. Cheesy, yes. But also very, very true.