She does what needs to be done.īut then, Ella moved into the Royal Mansion and the intriguing, unique independent was suddenly reduced to a lovesick, heart-on-her-sleeve dupe.

Obviously, I don’t condone this, but it was interesting to see a main character have such a pragmatic and slightly pessimistic view of the world. When we first met Ella, she was stripping, despite the fact that she was underage, because she needed the money. Ella was a captivating protagonist whose survival instincts were impressive. Admittedly, I enjoyed the first few chapters of the novel. I picked up Paper Princess, because the novel had been generating a lot of press for months. I don’t often read romance novels, but last year I fell in love with Colleen Hoover’s contemporary romances and wanted to further expand into this genre.

It’s what I’m comfortable with, because squalor doesn’t lie to you. Each Royal boy tries to make her life a living hell, but Ella can’t help but feel drawn to one of them: Reed Royal, who is determined to send her back to the streets where she belongs. This should be a dream come true for Ella the only problem is Callum’s five sons, who all hate Ella the second she walks through the door. Callum promises to see her through to college and pay for anything she wants or desires, if only she will live with him and allow him to care for her. Ella is then plucked from poverty and strip clubs and sent to live with Callum in his remarkable mansion. But then Callum Royal appears, a man who says he was best friends with her unknown, and now late, father.

Struggling to make ends meet, and determined to climb out of the gutter, Ella is fiercely resolute and wants nothing more than to make something of herself, especially after the death of her mother. The novel follows Ella Harper, who has spent her entire life flitting from town to town with her unreliable mother. What followed was two days of confusion, occasional interest, boredom and antagonism. This book was recommended to me by several people, so I went out and borrowed it immediately. It felt like almost all of my Goodreads friends had read, devoured, and fallen in love with this novel and the subsequent series. Paper Princess had been stalking me for many months. Sometimes I look around at my surroundings and think, I don’t belong here.” Sometimes that feels too young to have lived the life I have.

Paper princess goodreads