Crew (Crew #1) by Tijan

Another Day another Tijan Book!
Do you all have an auto-buy author? Tijan is mine. If I don't get the arc, I buy it!
So... let's talk about Crew...

Crew, Tijan @glimpses_of_my_books
The Blurb:

To survive where I live, you have two options.

You can be a Normal--a cheerleader, jock, member of the debate team, or on the yearbook committee. You pretend everything is normal.

Or you can be crew.
You insult us? We hurt you.
You hurt us? We really hurt you.
And if you screw with us, we will end you.

My name is Bren.
I'm the only female in the Wolf Crew--the best, fiercest, and most dangerous crew there is--and we have a rule: There's no falling in love.

Well... too late.

3.8 Stars

I find Crew to be a story of trust, of how friends can become family, and of the struggles of growing up with a less than perfect childhood.

The story is told from Bren's perspective and she is a little messed up to say the list. I rather liked her dark personality and the way she started to trust and lighten up again. There are reasons for her to be how she is, in all honesty it would be more surprising if a girl that has been through what she has was not a little dark and closed off...
Bren is part of a Crew. To me it sounded very much like a gang without bloodshed. Bad beatings but no mortal wounds... Her Crew is her family, there isn't much she wouldn't do for those boys.
The love interest is Cross and I don't really have much to say about him apart from him being perfect for Bren. He understands her darkness better than anyone else and he is the one she trusts most. Because of that their relationship was a lot deeper than a mere physical attraction.
Tijan does a great job writing characters dealing with depression and those sides of us we so often pretend are not there. Bren's character was beautifully written! 

All that being said, this was the first time reading a Tijan book (and I have read at least 20 of them) where it took me a while to get into the story, I wasn't sure about it in the beginning. Although in the end I thought Tijan did and outstanding job (no surprises there) I am not myself into too much teen drama. So as a matter of personal preference I can't say I loved everything about it. This is actually one of the reasons I haven't read her Fallen Crest books yet. My favorite books by her are Carter Reed and Cole, that will say enough if you have read her books :)

Before I end this review I need to get one thing out of the way that has been bothering me: This is not YA. I have no idea why it has been classified as that by some but it shouldn't be. As a librarian who was on a board that decided those things for public schools I can tell you with 100% certainty that books with sex as portrayed in Crew are not YA. The best classification for this book is New Adult.

Anywho, Tijan rocks. Always have and always will. Sooooo...

Find the book at: Amazon - GoodReads