Raziel Reid

Not sure where to begin. This is a very provocative book. The author (and the defender of the book on Canada Reads) clearly communicated what I feel is the superficial message of the book: the intolerance of boys who are a) gay and b) like to wear makeup and high heels. I feel this does the book a disservice. The larger message about the failure of society to care for the welfare of the wider group of children living in poverty, with drug addicted, violent, absent parents is overshadowed by the graphic language used by the writer.

It is this very explicit and overly dramatic language that can be very off-putting. It will prevent most people from either picking up the book, or persisting through it past the first half dozen pages. It was the winner of the Governor General's Award for Children's Literature, and I would suggest that 16 year-old teens do need to read it - followed by much discussion and guided analysis in the classroom.

Had this not been a Canada Reads finalist, I would have stopped reading after 50 pages (my default stop point for books that do not engage me). I would also have missed the best part of the book: the last 50 pages.

… (plus d'informations)

*I received this book as an Early Reviewer on LibraryThing.*

Reading this book felt like reading the first couple of chapters in about 5 different books in a series. The characters are all unlikeable and we shifted into way more POVs than necessary. A majority of the storylines are purely superficial with no strong actions, momentum, or consequences tied to them. Rather, they just never resolve and we move into the next problem or misunderstanding. I feel as though many of these various storylines were purely going for clickbaity shock value... *SPOILERS* ...(i.e. car crash, predatory relationship, dog fight, another car crash). All but one of these came out of nowhere, which makes it feel random and inauthentic to the story.

I think the world was set up well, from the cast list on the first page to the Instagram comments that start each chapter. Aside from that, the through line of the plot and character development leaves something to be desired.… (plus d'informations)

I received this book as part of Early Reviewers and was drawn to it for a specific reason. I'd come off a bender of long and difficult reads and and wanted a quick dip into the shallow end of the pool. I was totally unfamiliar with the author when I read it and still am. Reading this is like coming onto the scene of an auto collision with mangled vehicles--you don't want want to look, you don't feel great about looking, but you can't resist the urge to look. This is indeed a glittery-yet-shallow read stuffed with vapid characters. Years ago (maybe it still lives on) there was a Rich Kids of IG to capture the disaffected adventures of those without talent, but born into money. This shares a similar vibe - an uber-rich west coast kid YA reality show in book form, including copious use of text speak. The amount of machination, backbiting, and drama - both real and manufactured - is laid on thick throughout, as are the name drops of designer brands. It's written in a way that makes me think the author runs in similar circles to these characters and/or is at home in this world. Hard to tell if the reader is supposed to admire it from the outside, nose-pressed against the glittering glass, metaphorically speaking. This reader doesn't want any part of people like this except out of disbelief they exist IRL and without irony. All the 20-something angst and the social issues are on parade here (suicide to adult/minor sexual contact, substance use, and more represented from what seems to be a 20-something's point of view). Layered and nuanced, this is not. An eye-opening realization to at least one of the characters is that the surface of reality TV the viewer sees may be very different than the reality underneath. That alone should tell you something, maybe everything. None of this is to judge, and certainly this book doesn't, but if you take it on, you'll want to know what you're getting. Recommended, if only to a very small and highly specific venn diagram of readers.… (plus d'informations)