This was the first book I’ve read by Christina June and I quickly realized that she has her finger on the pulse of what a YA book should be. Teen angst in every emotional shade filled the pages. I loved how the story followed a Cinderella theme without being cliché. The character’s relationships were believable and heart-tugging. PS. The book cover and title are perfection!

I picked up It Started With Goodbye by Christina June to have a light read that was enjoyable, yet not too deep. I got enjoyable, but deep it was. While the book sounds like it's going to be a teenage drama filled with a love story, friend drama, etc, the story is so much more than that.

It Started With Goodbye follows Tatum as she endures a summer of lost friendship, community service, and life lessons. There are so many lessons anyone, teenagers and older individuals, can learn from. Tatum is this quirky teenager enduring what she feels is the worst possible case scenario for her summer. Constant work, straight home after, and no freedom. For a teenager, that is worst case scenario, but what Tatum finds out is that it's not all about beach days and hanging with your friends. There are things in life you learn as you make mistakes and experience different situations.

Tatum goes through so much growth in the few months you get to read about her in this book that you can almost picture your own growth period as a teenager. I learned so much my high school years and it's interesting watching Tatum do the same. Author Christina June did an incredible job of drawing out the emotions of Tatum, her cute cello-playing friend, her new community service best friend, and all the other little characters, including fairy godmother, abuela. These characters are lovable. I love them from the moment I met each one. They are all perfect in their imperfect ways and I felt this was the message June was trying to get across. It doesn't matter the mistakes we make as long as we learn from them, grow from them, and keep our eyes open to the world around us and the hidden things people are going through that you may not understand. All fantastic messages for everyone to absorb.

With that being said, It Started With Goodbye is the perfect summer read. Pick it up and enjoy the craziness that is Tatum's life as she goes through one heck of a summer.

It Started With Goodbye is definitely not what I was originally expecting. When I request this book, I was expecting the usual Cinderella retelling : absent (or dead) father, meanie stepmother and stepsister, and a happily ever after for the MC and the love interest. While we do get a happy ending, it was very different from what I had it mind, but I can't say that I'm complaining.

Why I like It Started With Goodbye (and why it surprises me) :

+THE FAMILY ASPECT. Given that Cinderella is not a tale focused on family love and such, I really didn't expect that this book would mainly focus on family. The "fairy godmother" is actually the stepmother's mother (aka Tatum's step-grandmother), and instead of being mean, the stepmother is actually just strict, and the stepsister is just quiet (I really can't explain her without giving away spoiler, but if you have read this book, you would have understood). I have to admit that Christina tackled the family's problem well, that by the end of the book I was pleased how this family turn to be. It's the reason why I add another star for this book, actually.

+The friendship. There's a lot of friendships here, be it a second chance or a new one. You'd know from the synopsis that Tatum and Ash's friendship kinda fallen apart because of the thievery, but again, I think Christina did a good job in resolving the problem. No necessary drama added. I also love the newfound friendship between Tatum and Abby, and Tatum with certain someone which was unexpected, but one that I was hoping will form!

+The romance. Sure, the romance wasn't the main focus here, but this (rare) time, I actually didn't mind. In fact, I kinda forget there's a romance going on in this book 😂 It was obvious from the start who this SK person is (I didn't think it was the author's intention to make us guess?). Nevertheless, it was cute and make the book more enjoyable.

Overall, It Started With Goodbye is a unique and thoughtful retelling of Cinderella. It's also one of those book that handle family aspect very well, and I think we need more YA books like that. Will I recommend this book? Heck yes. Go read it while it's summer, since this book is also set in one.

I’ve never read anything by Christina June before, I don’t think, but I wasn’t incredibly impressed by It Started With Goodbye. It started off on a really interesting foot, I thought, but it faltered early, and I never really felt as enthralled by it as some other reviewers have. A few people called it a modern Cinderella story… I don’t feel that, at all. Yes, the main character, Tatum, has an “evil stepmother” and a “fairy godmother” but there’s nothing magical about this tale, no matter how many times Tatum implies it.

It Started With Goodbye wasn’t terrible, but it also wasn’t memorable. Tatum was fine, but I didn’t find anything about her that stood out from other main characters — although I’ll go ahead and admit that after reading 180 Seconds on the same trip, maybe my standards are even higher than usual — and could care less about how “misunderstood” she felt. Her deep, terrible problems were fairly superficial, and even now, thinking back over it, I’m just rolling my eyes.

Warning: There will be spoilers below. There’s really not much to spoil, and if you pay attention and aren’t as dense as Tatum, you will have already figured out the only real “plot reveal” that there is. But still. Spoiler alert.

The writing

June’s writing is fine. Nothing problematic, nothing outstanding. I definitely didn’t get the modern-day Cinderella vibe or the idea that anything about Tatum’s life was “magical,” and I really disliked the emails back and forth between Tatum and various characters — Abby, SK-Shay-Seamus, other clients. It might have been the formatting on the galley, too, but it was really hard for me to keep up with who was writing who, especially when Tatum and SK started to exchange many emails at once. Their voices read exactly the same. Not a fan.

The characters

Meh. Like I said above, Tatum is fairly superficial as far as “misunderstood” characters go, and I hardly had sympathy for her as the Cinderella of this story. I like that she was a hopeful graphic designer — a rarely seen aspiration in the young adult genre! — since that was my major in college, but if I hadn’t had my own experiences with Photoshop and trying to design posters, I probably wouldn’t have cheered for her much there. Tatum lost me pretty early on in the book — she was so broken when she realized she’d lost her keychain that she sought comfort from in moments of anxiety and stress, but about 5 pages later, it was all but forgotten for the rest of the book. I also have an impossible time believing that she couldn’t figure out that Seamus was Shay was SK was hot guy. Maybe not right away, but for goodness’ sake.

SK-Shay-Seamus was a pretty great love interest, but… if he was only going to show up in the last 25 pages or so of It Started With Goodbye, I would’ve been fine if he hadn’t shown up at all. The performance of “Tatum’s song” was pretty swoonworthy, but I wasn’t too invested in their relationship at that point. And hell, Tatum wasn’t invested enough to even figure out who the guy was.

Everyone else was fine. Abby was fine, Tilly was fine, Tatum’s parents were fine, Blanche was fine. Meh.

The plot

This is what lost me the most. Good lord.

Tatum gets a misdemeanor charge and 100 hours of community service when her best friend and her best friend’s delinquent boyfriend got in her car after he stole more than $3,000 in stuff from a store. I literally cannot comprehend how anyone would charge Tatum with anything (especially noting that Ashlyn, her best friend, had ALL of her charges dropped) considering she was just in a damn car when this shoplifter she didn’t even know that well climbed in… and even more than that, I cannot comprehend how her parents thought she was irresponsible and had made a dangerous decision by not telling them that her best friend’s boyfriend was sketchy? For god’s sake. I’m not a parent, so I can’t say this for sure, but I find that pretty ridiculous.

Ashlyn is punishing Tatum and won’t speak to her — OK, Ashlyn, pretty sure no one told you to date a sketchy guy who you met at a convenience store and dropped out of school, especially not Tatum — and Tatum’s stepmother sets some pretty strict guidelines on where Tatum can go and when. It’s intense, but that part I get — it makes perfect sense for Belen’s character. But Tatum is trying to 1) make money from her new graphic design business, 2) make new friends, 3) rebuild her relationship with Ashlyn, 4) finish her community service, and she’s constantly acting like those restrictions from her stepmother are absolutely unrealistic and out of the ordinary and cruel. Considering how Belen is described the entire time, I wasn’t surprised at all — sounds about right to me. And Tatum, who lives with the woman, should know that better than me. It doesn’t even sound like Tatum has anything better to do than be on house arrest, anyway.

And there is the very small thing of… NOTHING HAPPENED. There was no climax to this plot. I don’t think so, anyway. Nothing happened. Tatum finally ‘fessed up to her parents about her graphic design business and everything else (which really amounted to a whole lot of nothing) and Tilly told them she was passionate about contemporary dance and the book ended. Boom.

Snore.

So, there’s that.

Also, I spent the entire book wondering – what does this title have to do with the actual book? What started with goodbye? Did I totally miss something?

3.5 stars

It Started with Goodbye was a story about a teenager who was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and had no one who’d listen to her. I have to say, I found that last part incredibly frustrating. Tatum was a good girl, but her parents wouldn’t give her the benefit of the doubt or listen to her when she tried to tell them she was looking out for her friend. She could have handled the situation with her friends less than stellar boyfriend better, but it wasn’t like there was a teenage handbook for that kind of situation. Her parents were heavy handed with the punishment, and it was terrible that after she was essentially ‘sentenced,’ her father left for eight weeks on a business trip. It wouldn’t have been so bad, but he left Tatum with her step-mother, who she had an already tenuous relationship with. And on top of that, I think it was unfair to his wife to put the burden of enforcing punishment on her. Having said that, those things didn’t make me dislike the story, because I think they were realistic.

One thing I really appreciated about this story was that even though we only got Tatum’s point of view, I didn’t feel like her step-mother, Belén, was always the bad guy. The author did a good job of capturing the sometimes over-dramatic reactions of a teenager, and while I didn’t always agree with Belén’s decisions, I could see why she went the way she did. I really enjoyed the progression of the relationships in this story, particularly with Tatum and her step-sister, Tilly. And I liked that even though Tatum was sentenced to community service, she wasn’t bitter about it. She knew that what she was doing was helpful and took pride in that fact. There was also a cute romantic aspect to this story that didn’t overshadow the bigger picture of Tatum coming to terms with the way she treated people. I liked the mystery and the reveal surrounding it, and the meet-cute was adorable. I do like it when a story explores the talents of a character (though Tilly’s may have been exploited a bit,) because I think we all have something we’re talented at. That Tatum was able to use hers not only to make a little bit of money but as the one thing she had to hold onto while she was being punished was a good message. There’s always a healthy outlet available if we’ll just take the time to explore it. And the valedictions - I loved Tatum’s preoccupation with valedictions!

I do think that everything in this book was resolved in a smack you in the face kind of way and could have used some subtlety, especially abuela, who was brought in as a fairy godmother of sorts. I prefer my YA to have a few loose ends, because I think that’s how life is. It was just too neat of a package for me. Having said that, I found myself finishing It Started with Goodbye with a big, cheesy grin on my face, and very much enjoyed Tatum’s story.

Lots of love,
Angie Elle ;)

It Started with Goodbye is a modern contemporary YA spin on Cinderella, though a bit darker, and much lighter on the romance (sorry Prince Charming). There is humor and heart and friends and lots and lots of feelings. So if anything sounds like it is up your alley... read on!

Our story centers around 16-year-old Tatum, who gets falsely accused of shoplifting and has to spend her summer in house-arrest and doing community service. First off, Tatum is a very likable character. There are many true to life moments as she has her interior monologues and arguments with herself about what valediction to use as she closes letters. If you overthink small decisions, you will find her relatable. Of course Tatum is also into doing freelance graphic design, so that is even more relatable to me.

It is also important to note that this, as many re-tellings are, is inspired by Cinderella but it is not a reimagining that follows every detail. Yes, there is a step-mother and a step-sister, but the father (who turned out to be the most annoying of the characters for me) is still in the picture. Like so many well-loved contemporaries, Tatum has to find confidence in herself, which isn't something I had really considered in a Cinderella before... again, very relatable.

While this book will be good for fans of Cinderella re-tellings, it is also a good for when you need a contemporary YA fix. Very enjoyable debut novel.

Thank you to NetGalley, Blink/Harper Collins for an ARC in exchange for an honest review. This in no way changed my opinion of the book.

This modern day contemporary Cinderella tale is a delightful fun read!! Super charming and sweet! Well written with an inspiring story about family, friendships and self-discovery. If you love YA definitely give this one a try.

Thank you, NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC.
This was probably my favorite YA contemporary of the year. It was great! The storyline wasn't the best, but I really enjoyed the characters. They felt real and were so simple. I really enjoyed it!

Teens who have made a bad decision and had to face consequences, will relate to Tatum. It covers a variety of relationships from friends to parents to boyfriends.

This feel-good Cinderella story is a light, quick read with a good message. I have to admit I almost gave up half-way through. Even though it's well-written and the characters are well-rounded, it is predictable. Which isn't always a bad thing. If you're in the mood for a dependable story, and one you won't have to think about too much, then this might do the trick. However, when you have a stack of books just like it filling up your to-read list, you might find yourself ready to move on.

It’s been ages since I’ve read a good young adult contemporary novel. I’ve had It Started With Goodbye on my wishlist for ages so I was super, super excited when my wish was granted on Netgalley. So excited that I had to start reading it right away! It took me a bit to get into It Started With Goodbye, but it turned out to be an incredible read. What I struggled with at first was how harsh Tatum’s dad (whose name is never mentioned?) and step-mother Belén react to her being arrested, which may sound bad, but Tatum didn’t actually do anything wrong. And I kind of don’t understand how it got to the point of her paying a $500 fine and to do community service, because SHE DIDN’T DO ANYTHING! She wasn’t an accomplice or anything, she was literally the innocent driver but what do I know about American law? The whole punishment thing, though, just seemed like an exaggeration so much like Tatum, I was aggrieved for the first portion of the novel, because it was like being punished for nothing. (Actually the whole plot would have made more sense to me if I knew it was a modern day Cinderella – I didn’t see that in the description til just now, but if I’d known, I’d have had more perspective.)

However, I liked how it brought Tatum and her family closer together. So there very much was a moral at the end of this story, and Blanche was very much the kickstarter to that, seeming to know just when Tatum needed a push in the right direction, to do the right thing. I actually really liked Tatum, considering she could have just gone off the deep end, and refused to do anything Belén said, she wasn’t actually a bad kid. Yes, she rebelled a bit (deserved, actually) but she was hardly a career bloody criminal, y’know, so it was all entirely justified.

My favourite part of the book, though? Tatum’s secret graphic design business and the absolutely swoon-worthy subplot with the mysterious SK. Did I know who SK was right at the start? Yes. Did I care one jot that Tatum was oblivious? HECK NO. Because it was delightful. Pulling off flirty via email is hard, but Christina June nailed it. I felt everything Tatum and SK were saying to each other, and their spark was visible just via email. It made my heart sing and want to burst with happiness all at the same time. I’ve been desperate for a good romance and this one was A+++++++++++++++++. Yes, that is a lot of pluses but that’s just how I felt OK? *Heart explodes*

I genuinely loved It Started With Goodbye. It was such a nuanced read, but it also read really light, as if you were just floating through the pages. I have no idea if that even makes sense, but the book never got me down, despite everything, despite Tatum basically being on house arrest for much of the novel. Christina June is a fantastic new talent to the world of YA and I’m incredibly excited that it appears that her second book will feature Tilly as the main character – HUZZAH! PLUS that could mean more Tatum, and I’m *SO* on board for that.

DNF

Mini review:

I received this E-ARC via Netgalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

I was looking forward to reading this. But when I started it I couldn't stand the MC's parents. It was so stupid how they were being hard on her for no reason and yet Ashlynn didn't get held accountable. I felt that it was just used as a plot device.

Do not recommend.

When I first started this book, I wasn't sure about it. I didn't like the first encounter we had with Tatum, but then as the story progressed I started to enjoy her and wanted to know more about her.

The story clearly has some Cinderella influences. It was interesting seeing the dynamic between all of the characters. Especially, Tatum and Blanche. I think Blanche was my favorite.

I loved the way that SK and Tate interacted with each other through their email corespondences.

I have to say this book was an easy five stars and I wouldn't mind reading more from Christina June.

Sweet, swoony and cute. I really liked Tatum and Tilly and Tilly's abuela (can she be mine too?). I haven't read a lot of fairy tale retellings, but I loved how It Started with Goodbye was done. Just enough Cinderella in it to see where it's going, but not so much that I don't feel like I'm reading anything different. I enjoyed watching Tatum and Tilly become friends and work things out and also how Tatum begun to see how her actions have consequences.

I wish there was more of the things with Ashlyn. I wanted to know more about their friendship and how they were going to fix things. I also wish that the ending hadn't wrapped up so quickly, but I did love how it ended. Mystery guy for the win. :)

So many Cinderella stories, oi vey! However, this one has spatterings of the classic, but still unique enough to be interesting. Definitely a great book for middle grades and even high school, I am quite sure it will be a crowd pleaser for many, especially those who know Northern Virginia and can picture exactly what park needs trimming, the parking lot at Dulles, or going to a music concert in the Plains.
A young girl is banished by her stepmother to her room over the summer for a wrong-place-at-the-wrong-time incident. Her only solace is starting up a clandestine graphic design business (thank you, fairy Godmother). She also has to do some community service where she meets some new friends and discovers some growing up realizations herself. In library world, it's called bildungsroman. Seriously there is a word for that- I didn't make it up.
Despite the predictable and somewhat simplistic story, it is a great book for people to read to get a new perspective of someone else's shoes. You can never go wrong with that theme.

This book was such a wonderful surprise! I was expecting a cute romanic story but it was so much more than that. Actually, the romance wasn't the main focus at all, family and inner strength were. I think that's what made me fall in love with it! Plus, it's a modern version of Cinderella, a fairytale I absolutely love.

The book is about a girl (Tatum) who is falsely accused of committing a crime. This sends her life in a direction she wasn't prepared for and strains her relationship with her family who claim that they can't trust her anymore. So, when not completing her community service, she works on her covert graphic design business which she uses to raise money to pay off her fine.

I loved Tatum! She's what I love seeing in female characters. Tatum's strong, independent and willing to work hard. My heart went out to her from the very first chapter. She's blamed for committing a crime her best friend was participated in! How she dealt with it was both realistic, honest, funny and at times heartbreaking. I particularly enjoyed how the incident changed her relationships with those around her. Like in Cinderella, she wasn't close with her step-mother or step-sister. But how things developed added a nice twist to the traditional story and one that I smiled a lot at while reading.

I cannot recommend this enough! If you have enjoyed books by Kasie West or Jennifer E. Smith then this story is definitely for you!

16-year-old Tatum Elsea is not having the best start to her summer. Her bestie's skeezy boyfriend shoplifted $300+ worth of merchandise with the two ladies around, meaning all three of them were arrested. After offering her testimony in exchange for a less-harsh sentence, her BFF isn't talking to her and Tatum is under house arrest. When her traditional summer babysitting gig falls through, Tatum is prepared to do nothing but suffer community service and the company of her terrible stepmother. Things cannot get worse.

The way this book started out was a bit of a dud for me. I struggled to believe that Tatum would be charged with grand larceny in this situation. I also couldn't understand why her stepmother, Belén, and her father were so unbelievably hard on her. No one was having real conversations with her, they were only looking down on her and holding a hard line. From the perspective of a Cinderella re-telling that made sense, I guess. But from a realism perspective it didn't.

But Tatum's character was incredibly realistic. I can relate to the terrible feelings and poor self-esteem that Tatum is going through in It Started with Goodbye. 16-year-old me would have been bestie's with this girl. She is vocal, strong, knows what she wants-- and yet she is constantly questioning herself, her personal worth, and her future. This is a perfect 16-year-old.

I adored watching the relationships between Tatum and the people in her life mature throughout this book. Tilly and Abby's relationships were my personal favorites. It was fun watching Tatum come into who she wants to be with friendships, family, and her future career aspiration. In retrospect, Blanche, Tatum's step-grandmother didn't really develop much as a character, but with her fairy-godmother status, I didn't mind.

A cute, quirky, and modern take on Cinderella, I strongly recommend this to any fan of contemporary YA and romance.

Christina June swept me off my feet with It Started With Goodbye! Like the original tale, there is an adorable romance but the heart of this story centers around family and friendships which made it a refreshing YA contemporary read!

We meet our main character, Tatum, as she is getting caught in a crime. It’s all about her being in the wrong place at the wrong time because she’s far from a criminal. I easily fell in love with this book because the characters felt so real. It was like a breath of fresh air to read Tatum’s story. The aftermath of the crime leaves her completely isolated since her family doesn’t believe she had no involvement.

Everyone has been in a situation that caused us to be misunderstood and lose the people we love’s trust. Even when Tatum was a little uncertain of herself because of this she never quit fighting. There are moments when she wonders what the point even is in trying, but after crying it out, she keeps going. That’s where her strength came from and why I adored her.

As the story progresses, we learn more about her family. Her stepmother and stepsister play important roles and I enjoyed their family dynamic so much. I thought I knew where this story would go since it’s inspired by Cinderella, but there was so much more to this story than what was in the original tale. It Started With Goodbye is its own while keeping fun aspects of Cinderella woven throughout.

Honestly, in most contemporaries, I feel as if the love interest plays too big of a role when it concerns family drama, but this book’s heart was always family. The love interest didn’t help her see things from a new perspective, although there are certainly a few adorable moments between the two! Tatum’s personal journey alone was what kept me reading until four in the morning.

I enjoyed the great set of diverse characters that help play in Tatum’s life. My favorite was her step-grandmother, though! She brought a lot out of Tatum by challenging her thoughts concerning her goals and relationships. Also, when they immigrated from Chile she renamed herself Blanche after The Golden Girls. If that’s not awesome then I don’t know what is.

The story wraps up in a beautiful way! Christina June’s writing is absolutely wonderful and I’m looking forward to reading whatever she writes next! We’ve all felt abandoned at least once in our life and reading Tatum’s story will help anyone feel less alone. I highly recommend this book to anyone who loves Cinderella or enjoys contemporaries! It’s on sale May 9th so make sure to pick up your copy then!

It Started With Goodbye is a touching story about a girl who is falsely accused of a crime and tries to strengthen her relationship with her stepmother and stepsister. I loved the main character’s independence and the focus on family and friendship instead of romance. Fans of authors like Sarah Design will definitely enjoy this book!

This book is kind of like a modern version of Cinderella. Tatum is falsely accused of a crime that her best friend helped commit and is placed under house arrest by her strict stepmother. She must earn $500 by the end of the summer to pay her fine, so she decides to start a graphic design business to keep her busy when she’s not doing community service. I loved the use of emails in the book and the mystery identity of a certain client named S.K. If you like your contemporaries a little more on the serious side with less of a focus on romance, you will enjoy It Started With Goodbye.

I loved Tatum’s character in the novel. I felt so frustrated just reading about her sentence for a crime that she didn’t even commit. Despite all this, she still stays strong and agrees to work hard for forgiveness. Tatum is also an avid graphic designer, which I found really interesting. I loved the fact that she is able to become an entrepreneur at such a young age because of her talent. Strong and independent female characters are my favourite, so Tatum really hit the bullseye for me.

One of my favourite aspects of It Started With Goodbye is the strong focus on family and friendship. Tatum doesn’t have the best relationship with her stepmother and stepsister, but she really bonds with them throughout the book. It was so touching to see her prim and proper stepsister open up to her. Tatum also spends a lot of time trying to connect with her friend (the one who assisted in committing the crime), who has been shipped off to a boarding school. Romance isn’t the priority in this book, which I really enjoyed. We need more YA books like this one, about friends and family.

It Started With Goodbye is a modernized version of Cinderella with a main character who is strong and self-reliant. The focus on family and friendship is really touching, and much better than a story all about romance. Definitely pick this story up this summer!