A review by meeklovestoread
Addicted to You by Krista Ritchie, Becca Ritchie

adventurous emotional funny sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

I'm sorry in advance for how long this is.😅

Okay I'm really surprised by this book. I've been putting it off since I've heard about it on the book side of social media for about a year now. It has alot of popularity, but all the tropes I heard people listing weren't favorites of mine. Plus the main thing that made me put this book off for so long was that I heard it depicts a toxic relationship. And I personally loathe reading about toxic relationships. 

However, I've finally conformed. It's been on my reading list for a while so I finally decided to pick it up and I can say that I'm pretty surprised on how much I enjoyed it. 

Don't get me wrong the relationship between the main characters Lily and Lo is nothing to emulate your relationship after. But in my opinion their relationship is more so "dysfunctional" rather than flat out toxic. Throughout the book both parties have displayed on numerous occasions how much they care, love, and appreciate one another. (the shower scene) They have the potential for an honest, heartfelt, and healthy relationship. 

However like I stated previously, their current relationship is nothing to emulate your romantic relationships on. They enable each other's addictions with knowledge that it's not gonna help them out in the long run.
there's an scene in the book where Lily and Lo are at a Halloween party and Lo breaks into the owner's cabinet of expensive booze and she just let's him have at it. By the end of the night Lo almost gets into disastrous dibocal and then passes out leaving Lily to clean up his mess. And she's so desensitized to his problem that when Ryke and Connor (especially Ryke) are looking and Lo passed out in concern Lily sorts just brushes it off because "he's always like this". And she's always taking care of him when he goes over the limit.
And I also think Lily can be too occupied with her own addiction to really realize that Lo is down bad. I hope we get more insight into how these addictions started.

Lo also becomes desensitized to Lily's actions as well.
Up until he found her having sex with two guys at the same time and hooking up with random guys through random phone exchanges, and even considered Craigslist was when he decided to drop the ball on her. And urge her to dile it down. He was so desensitized that it was said that he'd often offer the men that come out if Lily's bed coffee.


Lo can be pretty nasty towards Lily especially when she tries to interfere with his drinking. And when they do start dating for real Lo literally expects Lily to cheat on him because Lily is constantly fighting her sexual compulsions in order to stay celibate/monogamous to Lo. Of course in a healthy relationship you shouldn' t have to constantly worry that your partner is being unfaithful. And the fact that Lo has a tendecy to be pretty hot and cold with Lily (one minute he's a sweetheart, the next a dickhead) is a big red flag. Also Lo's aggressive tendencies are not ideal either (he doesn't hit her at all; there is no physical abuse depicted in this book; he just always has a tendecies to pick up fights with other people). He's just very immature and lacks ambition. They both defintely have alot of growing and maturing to do before they can reach consummate and stability in their lives and relationship. 

So dysfunctional and unhealthy. Like I said nothing to aspire to, but definitely not damaged beyond repair. Plus they do seem to be trying to fix themsleves towards the end of the book. And I think that maybe what the writers' objectives are. To showcase the ugly parts of their relationship so they can commence on the journey towards healing. At least that's what I hope the other books are about.😅

Also, I actually like how the authors depicted their addictions and them as characters. Lily being all shy and introverted with a sex addiciton and Loren battling his was really well depicted. And her inner dialogue that she has with herself where she talks about on herself for having her addiction, her social anxiety, and her friendship with Lo, and their background was very entertaining to read about. I was really it was dual POV.

Oh and we also got to meet the future characters of this book series which was cool. So here are my first impressions:

Connor -  superficial privileged prick who says out of pocket and insensitive comments and thinks he's above everyone else due to his wealth and intelligence, but deep down has a decent, loving heart (he's okay but certainly my least favorite out of the bunch)

Rose - superficial mean judgmental privileged girl, but the way she scares about Lily and her family warms my heart (also I have to admire how unapologetically smart she is)

Ryke - nosy, but really means well; I liked him and I admired how much he stood up for girls (didn't appreciate him the comment he made about Lily's weight though) so far he's my favorite guy
I saw the twist of him being Loren's brother a mile away, but it sure it make the book more emotional


I'm more into plot driven books so it took me a while to get through this because a whole lot of nothing was happening. So this is definitely a character based book. I think when it was around the 70-80% mark was when I started to feel it just a little bit (it was still entertaining though) and because I read this as in e-book it did take me quite a while to get through this, but I surprisingly enjoyed the read and will be continuing on with the second book.
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