A Thousand Boy Kisses by Tillie Cole

When Rune’s family moves from Norway to Georgia, Rune never expected to love his time there. When he meets the quirky, talented, and shy girl that lives next-door things start to look up for him. Poppy knew the second she met Rune they were going to be best friends and didn’t hold back letting him know. Over the next few years the two spent every moment together. The two do everything together and as they grow so does their relationship. The two go from best friends to boyfriend and girlfriend. 

“Live hard, love harder. Chase dreams, seek adventures … capture moments. Live beautifully.”

Sadly, Rune and his family knew that there stay in Georgia wouldn’t be permanent and that they would have to eventually have to return to Norway for a period of time. When his family gets word that they have to return Rune and Poppy decide that even with the distance that they will find a way to work. At first this works out well until one-day Poppy just disappears. Two years later Rune and his family are returning to Georgia and to the house that is still beside Poppy’s the girl he hasn’t spoken to since… Only when Rune returns he isn’t the same sweet boy that Poppy loved. Rune has turned into a bad apple. Smoking, staying out late, and going to parties.

I heard from every review that this book was a for sure tear-jerker and that the end of the book was going to wreck me… Well here’s what I have to say about that. This book did in fact make me tear up, but it wasn’t the ending, it was the beginning. I did enjoy reading Poppy and Rune’s story once they were older and he returned, but I honestly I preferred reading about their young age more. I loved getting to see these two grow up and how adorable they were as kids. There stolen moments and precious moments really got to me. I loved everything leading up to the night Rune leaves.

“because sometimes all we get are moments. There are no do-overs; whatever happens in a moment defines life—perhaps it is life.”  

Once Rune returns, at first, I really enjoyed it. I liked hearing about awkward Poppy and the new bad boy Rune. However, as things progressed and the two start to spend time together again, I found myself getting a little bored. At first things are heated because we are so drawn to know why Poppy all of a sudden vanished. That theme just keeps getting repeated over and over again. The other bad part is that I figured out kind of early on what the big reveal is. It could really only be one of two things… So you’ll probably figure it out too. So with everything being repetitive and the reveal not being that big for me I started to get a little sick of this book. Found myself rushing to the end, not to find out what happened, but to just get the book over with.

Rune and Poppy are also pretty generic YA book characters. She even plays the cello… Something we’ve seen several times before… I mean seriously how many people do you know that play the cello?!?! Rune, in my opinion, is the stronger character between the two. He feels more authentic than Poppy. Neither of them really gave me what I was hoping to get out of them. Also the fact that not only did the story repeat, I felt like their relationship in general repeated. By the end of the story I knew where everything was headed right down to events playing out how they did.

I didn’t hate A Thousand Boy Kisses but I didn’t love it either. I think this would be a great intro to YA, but those of you who are a little more seasoned with it might not find it as interesting.

6/10 Stars
-Angela