Crash (Sequel to Clash) - Nicole Williams

The only easy thing about Jude and Lucy’s relationship is their love for one another. Everything else is hard.

Especially when it comes to reining in Jude’s trigger touch temper and Lucy’s increasing jealousy of Jude’s Spirit Sister on the cheer squad who’s attached herself to him in just about every way a girl could. Feeling the stress of trying to hang on to her quintessential bad boy while becoming the foremost dancer in her class, Lucy knows something’s going to break. She wants both. She needs both. But if she doesn’t make a choice, she risks losing everything.

For Lucy Larson and Jude Ryder, love might be the thing that just isn’t enough.

I LOVE JUDE AND LUCY!!! Okay, in all seriousness, if you enjoyed Crash, you will love Clash. You will still want to slap Lucy around a little for being such a girl but if I looked back to myself at 18, I'm pretty sure I'd want to slap her around too. All that says to me is that Nicole Williams created a character that we can all identify with.

Clash picks up where Crash left us off, with both Jude and Lucy following their dreams (although Jude's is a relatively new dream) and trying to work on their relationship together. Their schools are five hours apart which only then gives them weekends to be together and Jude is of course the starting QB for the Orangemen. College football, college parties, college girls...

Enter our new girl-to-hate, Adriana Vix (can't hate all the cheerleaders in the world, but definitely dislike this one). Adriana is the type of girl who has used her looks to get what she wants and isn't shy about making what she wants known...this cheerleader wants Jude Ryder (of course I'm sure she's not the only girl who wants Jude Ryder at Syracuse either).

Insecurities and trust issues will creep back into Lucy's world...between both their schedules, her school and dance and their family's issues, is this relationship really meant to be?

We also got to meet a few teammates of Jude's. Tony was easy to love right from the beginning. His banter with Jude and even Lucy was great and I thought it felt very normal college guy. That helped make them all totally believable characters (I know, the likelihood of a ballerina at Julliard dating any starting college qb is low but the actual characters were believable and likeable - well except of course the slutty ones).

This book was a quick read and I of course loved it. Mix a love story with some football, Nicole Williams may have tipped the "Tara's favorite author" scale in her favor...I love me some football!

I know this was a bonus book as Crash was supposed to be a stand alone novel, but even after this I'm still left wanting more.