Alex H

This was the worst book I have read in 2021 and that is saying something considering I have abandoned many books this year because I did not like them. The fact that I couldn’t abandon this book because I was reading it for class just made my disdain for this book even greater. I loathed almost everything about this book from the writing style to the characters. The writing style is so repetitive using the same analogies for everything. For example, whenever someone is crying or sweating a lot the author uses the analogy of “Niagara falls” and it’s so annoying if I had a dollar for every time that line was stated in this book I would be the richest person on the planet. Again on the topic of the writing style, it is so simplistic, there is barely any imagery or poetic writing, obviously not every book needs those things to make it good one of my favorite book series doesn’t have very poetic writing or complicated writing but I love it to death. This book I feel embodies the phrase “show don’t tell” in the worst way possible. The author rarely makes you infer or think when reading and that makes this book such a drag and boring. I also have a big problem with the characters they are all very annoying because they were all are written like someone who has no idea what 13-year-olds are actually like. And don't even get me started on the middle school, it hurt my soul to read, it was so obvious to me that it was written by someone who hasn't been in middle school in at least 20 years. Again on the topic of characters, besides how they are written, I do not like them one bit. I as a trans/non-binary person I did not at all like Lily or her whole arc I just found her annoying and this book horrendous. Also with Lily's father I still hate him, once you get on my bad side your never getting on my good side. I think his "character arc" was done so sloppily and poorly that it made the whole 'trans girl with transphobic father' dynamic that COULD have been written in some nuanced why and explore themes of culture and the trans community and the dynamics between transphobes and trans people but no. They had to make him a supportive father at the end which is something that would most likely NOT happen in real life. For a realistic fiction book this book has so many elements that are fantastical. Also as a LGBTQIA+ person the use of the f slur in this novel made me extremely uncomfortable. From what I could tell the author is not LGBTQIA+ in anyway and her use of the f slur in this novel was just something that should not have been allowed in the final published novel. Even though the slur is used by the bullies to display that they're mean and bad and whatever but the author did NOT have to use the slur to show that they were bullies and "bad people" especially because she is not LGBTQIA+ if she was gay I would have been fine with it because it is a slur used against us but from my google search she is not and it was just really uncomfortable. The only saving grace of this book was its ending and it was only good because it had reminded of other books that I believe are 1000 times better. If I could give this book zero stars I would have. Do not buy this book it is not worth it.