Review: Coming Up for Air by Miranda Kenneally

Title: Coming Up for Air
Author: Miranda Kenneally 
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Sourcebooks
Publish Date: July 4, 2017
Source: Library

What's the Story?:

From Goodreads.com: "All of Maggie’s focus and free time is spent swimming. She’s not only striving to earn scholarships—she’s training to qualify for the Olympics. It helps that her best friend, Levi, is also on the team and cheers her on. But Levi’s already earned an Olympic tryout, so Maggie feels even more pressure to succeed. And it’s not until Maggie’s away on a college visit that she realizes how much of the “typical” high school experience she’s missed by being in the pool.

Not one to shy away from a challenge, Maggie decides to squeeze the most out of her senior year. First up? Making out with a guy. And Levi could be the perfect candidate. After all, they already spend a lot of time together. But as Maggie slowly starts to uncover new feelings for Levi, how much is she willing to sacrifice in the water to win at love?"

My Two Cents:

Maggie eat, breathes, and dreams of swimming. She doesn't do much else because she doesn't have time. Her friends are mostly other swimmers, including her very best friend, Levi. Maggie suddenly finds herself attracted to Levi but isn't sure that she wants to mess up their relationship or take away from practicing for a spot on the Olympic team. 

It took me awhile to warm up to Maggie. She is obsessed with learning to "hook-up" and it felt a little bit forced. She at first seems to choose Levi just because he is the closest person around but eventually they seem to get a little closer and their relationship begins to fill a little more filled out, if you will. Their relationship becomes something that felt a little more real and caring, it just takes a bit to get there.

I loved the swimming aspect of the book. Although I was never gunning for the Olympics, I did swim in high school and I thought that the book captured the camaraderie and almost family-like atmosphere of swim teams. During swim season, you are with your team all the time. My school didn't actually have a pool so we'd drive to practice together. You hang out with each other before, during, and after practice and then there is the whole idea of "swimcest," which is a real phenomenon! Maggie is torn between trying to forge ahead with things outside of swimming while always being pulled back to her passion.  

Overall, this was a good first experience with the Hundred Oaks series.