Book Review: Temptation by Karen Ann Hopkins

Title: Temptation
Author: Karen Ann Hopkins

Number of Pages: 383

Published: June 26th 2012 by Harlequin Teen

Source: Author (paperback)

Genre: Contemporary

Reading Level: YA

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Your heart misleads you That's what my friends and family say.  
But I love Noah. And he loves me.  
We met and fell in love in the sleepy farming community of Meadowview, while we rode our horses together through the grassy fields and in those moments in each other's arms. It should be   
ROSE & NOAH   
forever, easy.  
But it won't be.  
Because he's Amish. And I'm not.

Temptation is your classic boy meets girl love story. Only in this story falling in love is forbidden. Noah and his family are Amish and are custom to the simple things in life. Rose was your big city gal until her Father decided to uproot her to live out in the country. On the first day as her family is moving into their new home some unexpected visitors arrive welcoming them to town. Noah a boy from a nearby Amish community is among them. Noah and his family is like nothing Rose has ever seen. Noah and Rose get to know each other and quickly begin to fall in love. Love at first sight truly is real and both seem to be feeling the same thing about each other. Noah understand that it is forbidden to love someone like a Rose, a outsider, a English girl a non-amish. While Rose comes to find out that Noah should not be with someone like her. This only makes them want each other more. Rose and Noah will now need to find a way to be with each other even if that means risking everything for true love.

I have always been quite fascinated by the Amish culture. I love how simple there lives are and how they have such strong family values. My understanding about how the Amish live has always been kind of hazy. I admit I have never really looked into this subject so it was very refreshing reading my first book about it and learning more. Author Karen Ann Hopkins did a wonderful job of not only writing a beautiful romance but having a unique background for the book to be set in. I honestly enjoyed learning more about Amish people and their lives. Temptation really pulled on my heart strings many times during the book and the ending had me in tears. I so felt bad that Rose and Noah had to hide what they were feeling and betray their families in the process. 

The romance in the story between Noah and Rose is so sweet and unconditional. I really became attached to how they had such a pure love for each other. I did have a couple issues as well I would like to address. One, I did feel that even know the love between the couple was real it happened to fast for my taste. I felt they should have gotten to know each other more, inside and out before falling so deeply in love. Two, Rose was a little to pleasing for my taste. At times during the book Noah would remark on things he thought Rose should do or how she should act according to what he was raised to believe. Rose never really got to mad at him for saying so. 

All in all I really did adore this book. I liked it a lot more than I though I would have. I feel the main things that make Temptation to be such a great read is the pure yet innocent love between the main characters and of course the setting of the story. The author Karen Ann Hopkins has written a lovey debut novel. Her writing style just flows off the page. 

So, would I read the next one? Yes! Definitely. For anyone who enjoys reading YA Contemporary novels I would so recommend Temptation. 

 Totally Awesome! I loved it, would read again.