Touch Me Not

 

Title: Touch Me Not – Apryl Baker

Genre: New Adult Romance

Pages:

Rating: 5 Stars 

 

Summary: For Goodreads Summary click here

Lily can’t bear to be touched, not accidentally, casually or intimately. Between that and the fact her best-friend Adam is engaged to another girl it is impossible for her to confess her feelings and tell him she loves him. Nikolai is the campus man whore, he doesn’t date girls. Just one night stands, Lily is the only girl to turn down his charms making him want her only more. Cue a little bet; Nikolai promises to help Lily get over her fears if she goes on a date with him…

Bets are on and the stakes are heightened when Nikolai’s beloved car is thrown into the mix; they each soon find out there’s a lot more to the other than what meets the eye…

Review

The Premise of Touch Me Not was very intriguing, drawing me in to find out more about Lily’s character. My first thoughts before I started the novel were ‘How can you have a romance novel with a main character who doesn’t like to be touched?’ In honesty I thought this concept wouldn’t really work well, but I was pleasantly surprised. Lily’s phobia is a focus point of the whole novel, it isn’t simply touched upon and then she is magically cured or brushed under the carpet. It is focused on throughout and dealt with accordingly in a slow way, she seeks therapy alongside her own special kind of therapy she is seeking from Nikolai allowing us to see an extra insight into the previous methods Lily has attempted in order to overcome this fear.

The concept is very original and unlike anything I have experienced before therefore this alone sets it apart from other romance novels of the premise of boy meets girl, or girl falls for bad boy. Lily’s phobia means she cannot even hug her loved ones without shrinking back in absolute fear. Touch Me Not is a journey towards her recovery, learning to let Nikolai in and return to how she once was before her sisters death.

Apryl Baker’s writing was very easy to digest and fall into the story, it wasn’t overly descriptive keeping the novel concise and easy flowing. As like most New Adult Romances, Apryl alternates between the male and female main protagonists point of view, although the difference for Touch Me Not to set it apart from other novels is this is mixed throughout one chapter, so you alternate within the same scene. Which might seem confusing but I never got lost as the narration is in third person.

Touch Me Not is more than a simple Romance story, it has comedic elements, little bits of banter/jokes seen through Nikolai and Lily as they get to know each other better. There is also a mystery element thrown in with the mention of a serial killer attacking young girls which adds a suspense element and feeling to the novel. Furthermore adding to this suspense element is the ending scenes (I won’t be a spoiler sue and tell you what happens because it came out of the blue and shocked me) but the ending scenes kept me on my toes, wanting to read faster to find out what happens and who may be the cause of it.

Overall Touch Me Not was absolutely fantastic, it had all the characteristics of a great book to me. It was unpredictable, keeping me guessing throughout as to whether Lily would get over her fear, whether her and Nikolai would venture into something more and had me questioning who the mysterious serial killer was. Adding to my feelings of fulfilled enjoyment is the characters in which Apryl Baker has created, they have so much depth to them and we learn more about them as the novel progresses and as the other character learns it too. Lily has deep psychological problems, she see’s herself as being insufficient and not how many other people see her which is as beautiful, shy and smart. Nikolai is seen to be the campus man whore yet their is a hidden depth to him that only Lily can draw out, one of which that is kind and caring.

If you are looking for a New Adult Book with an interesting and original concept be sure to check out Touch Me Not on Goodreads!.

*ARC exchanged for an honest review*

A Fan of Maybe Someday by Colleen Hoover? Then Touch Me Not offers an original and unique concept wrapped within a romantic love story.