Category: Contemporary

Title: You Say It First
Author: Katie Cotugno
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary
Publisher: Balzer + Bray
Source: Publisher via Edelweiss
Format: Ebook
Release Date: June 16, 2020
Rating: ★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

Meg has her entire life set up perfectly: her boyfriend Mason is sweet and supportive, she and her best friend Emily plan to head to Cornell together in the fall, and she even finds time to clock shifts phonebanking at a voter registration call center in her Philadelphia suburb. But everything changes when one of those calls connects her to a stranger from small-town Ohio, who gets under her skin from the moment he picks up the phone.

Colby is stuck in a rut, reeling from a family tragedy and working a dead-end job—unsure what his future holds, or if he even cares. The last thing he has time for is some privileged rich girl preaching the sanctity of the political process. So he says the worst thing he can think of and hangs up.

But things don’t end there.…

That night on the phone winds up being the first in a series of candid, sometimes heated, always surprising conversations that lead to a long-distance friendship and then—slowly—to something more. Across state lines and phone lines, Meg and Colby form a once-in-a-lifetime connection. But in the end, are they just too different to make it work?

You Say It First is a propulsive, layered novel about how sometimes the person who has the least in common with us can be the one who changes us most.

Review:

Meg has her life planned out. She has a great boyfriend and she’s ready to go to Cornell with her best friend. She works at a voter registration call centre. Everything changes after her boyfriend breaks up with her. She calls a man at work to help him register to vote, but she learns from his son, Colby, that he died from suicide months before. Meg does something she’s never done before, which is give Colby her personal phone number. Meg and Colby end up making an unlikely connection that changes the paths that their lives are on.

Meg made some bad decisions in this book, but they ended up working out for her. She struck up a relationship with a stranger who she had only spoken to on the phone. She also drove many hours to meet him, without telling anyone. Meg acknowledges that it was dangerous, but she did it anyways. It should have been more clear that she was putting herself in danger by doing this, even though it worked out for her.

Both Meg and Colby had difficult things that they had to face. Colby was still dealing with the death of his father. He found out some things about his father, which changed the way he saw him. Meg lived with her mother, and her father had a new girlfriend. She also had to take care of someone with an alcohol addiction. Suicide and alcoholism were both difficult topics in this story, but I think they were handled well.

I enjoyed this story.

Thank you HarperCollins for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

What to read next:

Yes No Maybe So by Becky Albertalli and Aisha Saeed

What I Like About You by Marisa Kanter

Have you read You Say It First? What did you think of it?

Title: Followers
Author: Raziel Reid
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary
Publisher: Penguin Teen
Source: Publisher
Format: Paperback
Release Date: June 9, 2020
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

A naïve teenager is thrown into the high-stakes, back-stabbing world of reality television.

After a disastrous date results in her arrest, sixteen-year-old Lily Rhode is horrified to discover her mugshot is leaked on a gossip website. Lily is the niece of Whitney Paley, a Hollywood housewife and star of reality show Platinum Triangle, a soap-opera-style docu-series in the vein of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and The Hills, revolving around several glamorous families living in the Beverly Hills, Bel Air and Holmby Hills neighborhoods of Los Angeles. 

When Lily’s mom kicks her out of their trailer home in the Valley, Whitney (Lily’s mom’s estranged sister) invites her to live with her, her movie-star husband, Patrick, and their daughter, Hailey. Lily is set up in the pool house and thrust into the company of reality-star offspring — kids who are born with silver spoon emojis on their feed. Lily’s cousin Hailey and the other teens have lived their entire lives on camera and are masters of deception, with Hailey leading the pack.

As Lily learns from the Paleys how to navigate her newfound fame, she finds herself ensnared in the unfolding storylines. What Lily doesn’t know is that she’s just a pawn being used on the show to make the Paleys look sympathetic to viewers while distracting from on-set sexual misconduct rumors surrounding super hero dad Patrick Paley . . .

Is Lily safe under Patrick’s roof? Or will Lily be Patrick’s downfall? If she isn’t destroyed by Hailey first. When Lily catches the eye of Hailey’s designated leading man Joel Strom — it’s war!

Review:

After Lily Rhode is arrested for grand theft, her aunt invites her to move out of Lily’s trailer park and into her aunt’s Beverly Hills mansion. The catch is that she will star on the reality show along with her cousin, Hailey, and various other famous families. Lily is just there to recover from her arrest, but her aunt Whitney positions her as the villain to her cousin Hailey. Hailey has a storyline going on the show with a romance between her and Joel, but when Joel sees Lily, he’s drawn to her. Hailey and the other cast members have to plan out their storylines for the season, and try not to be overshadowed by Lily.

Kens by Raziel Reid was one of my favourite books last year, so I was excited to read this one! The show in this book, Platinum Triangle, was like a combination of reality shows: The Kardashians meets The Hills meets The Real Housewives. There were some storylines that were straight from those shows, such as someone faking cancer and having a transgender parent. I loved this connection to real reality shows that I’ve watched.

There were some tough subjects in this book, which need some trigger warnings. There was lots of drug use, faking cancer, dog fighting, eating disorders, and an adult having a relationship with a minor. These things were told fairly early on in the book, so they aren’t spoilers. Even though these could be upsetting subjects, they were so extreme in this story that they turned into a parody of reality shows. One of the most shocking things is that some of these stories are taken right from reality shows, so they are an accurate representation of that world.

I loved this book! The ending was so shocking I had to read it a couple of times to make sure I had read it correctly. If you love reality TV, you’ll love this book.

Thank you Penguin Random House Canada for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

What to read next:

Kens by Raziel Reid

Anna K by Jenny Lee

Have you read Followers? What did you think of it?

Title: Parachutes
Author: Kelly Yang
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary
Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books
Source: Publisher via Edelweiss
Format: Ebook
Release Date: May 26, 2020
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

Speak enters the world of Gossip Girl in this modern immigrant story from New York Times bestselling author Kelly Yang about two girls navigating wealth, power, friendship, and trauma.

They’re called parachutes: teenagers dropped off to live in private homes and study in the US while their wealthy parents remain in Asia. Claire Wang never thought she’d be one of them, until her parents pluck her from her privileged life in Shanghai and enroll her at a high school in California. Suddenly she finds herself living in a stranger’s house, with no one to tell her what to do for the first time in her life. She soon embraces her newfound freedom, especially when the hottest and most eligible parachute, Jay, asks her out.

Dani De La Cruz, Claire’s new host sister, couldn’t be less thrilled that her mom rented out a room to Claire. An academic and debate-team star, Dani is determined to earn her way into Yale, even if it means competing with privileged kids who are buying their way to the top. When her debate coach starts working with her privately, Dani’s game plan veers unexpectedly off course.

Desperately trying to avoid each other under the same roof, Dani and Claire find themselves on a collision course, intertwining in deeper and more complicated ways, as they grapple with life-altering experiences. Award-winning author Kelly Yang weaves together an unforgettable modern immigrant story about love, trauma, family, corruption, and the power of speaking out.

Review:

Claire’s parents decide to send her to an elite American prep school for her final years of high school to give her a better opportunity for university. She becomes a “parachute,” which is what they call Chinese students who are sent to the United States to study. Most of the students stay with a host family, unless they can afford to live in their own home. Claire moves in with Dani and her mom. Dani attends American Prep on an academic scholarship, and she works with her mom’s cleaning service after school. Dani is a star on the debate team, so she spends a lot of time getting private lessons with her debate coach, until he gets too close to her. Claire appears to have a great life at that school, since the most popular “parachute” boy likes her, but things aren’t always what they seem. Though Dani and Claire don’t really get along, they both have similar problems they have to deal with.

There was a trigger warning at the beginning of the book that warns it will contain scenes of sexual harassment and rape. I was glad to see this warning at the book. I still chose to read it, but I liked that the warning was right there in the book. Sometimes I think that trigger warnings can be spoilers, because they give away things that will happen in the book. However, warnings are important to protect the readers from upsetting triggers. I was actually surprised at how the assault happened. It wasn’t the situation I expected.

The way the international students, like Claire, were treated was appalling. They were abused by teachers and their home hosts. Just because they were at a disadvantage because they weren’t in their home country, the teachers and hosts thought they could do anything and say anything to them. The school also separated international students from American students. That defeats the purpose of going to an international school, since the students end up only mingling with people from their own countries. That was only one of the problems that the school had.

The injustice in this book was upsetting and made me uncomfortable. There was racism and sexism. For some reason, the racism seemed easier for the authorities to punish than the sexism and harassment, which I found strange. I guess that was because the sexual harassment and sexism was often physical, so it is a larger issue, rather than words written down that are easy to erase.

I appreciated the author sharing her own personal connection to the story at the end of the book. This was an upsetting and disturbing story, yet it is an unfortunate reality that is important to share.

Thank you HarperCollins for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

What to read next:

Loveboat, Taipei by Abigail Hing Wen

Rules for Being a Girl by Candace Bushnell and Katie Cotugno

Have you read Parachutes? What did you think of it?

Title: Breath Like Water
Author: Anna Jarzab
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary
Publisher: Inkyard Press
Source: Publisher via NetGalley
Format: Ebook
Release Date: May 19, 2020
Rating: ★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

“Expansive, romantic, and powerful.” —Gayle Forman, #1 New York Times bestselling author of If I Stay and I Have Lost My Way 

Susannah Ramos has always loved the water. A swimmer whose early talent made her a world champion, Susannah was poised for greatness in a sport that demands so much of its young. But an inexplicable slowdown has put her dream in jeopardy, and Susannah is fighting to keep her career afloat when two important people enter her life: a new coach with a revolutionary training strategy, and a charming fellow swimmer named Harry Matthews.

As Susannah begins her long and painful climb back to the top, her friendship with Harry blossoms into passionate and supportive love. But Harry is facing challenges of his own, and even as their bond draws them closer together, other forces work to tear them apart. As she struggles to balance her needs with those of the people who matter most to her, Susannah will learn the cost—and the beauty—of trying to achieve something extraordinary.

Review:

Susannah’s dream is to go to the Olympics. She has a tough coach, but she knows he can turn her into an Olympic athlete. In the year before her Olympic trial, another coach is brought into her school with a completely different training method. Susannah meets a boy, Harry, who gives her a life outside of the pool. She also has something happen to her that is potentially life changing. Susannah and Harry both have struggles that they have to balance on her road to the Olympic trials.

I’ve never been an athlete, so stories about sports and athletes are completely new to me. There was so much tension leading up to all of Susannah’s swim competitions. I felt myself getting nervous for her, because I couldn’t imagine myself doing what she did. I found this world of competitive swimming quite scary, both mentally and physically.

The second half of the book was dark and emotional. I don’t want to give away the plot, but there are some possible trigger points about mental health and suicide. These are things that can happen to anyone, not just competitive athletes, so the story isn’t just about sports. It’s also about the pressures with growing up and discovering your place in the world.

This is a powerful and emotional story.

Thank you Inkyard Press for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

What to read next:

Every Reason We Shouldn’t by Sara Fujimura

Four Days of You and Me by Miranda Kenneally

About the Author:

Anna Jarzab is a Midwesterner turned New Yorker. She lives and works in New York City and is the author of such books as Red Dirt, All Unquiet Things, The Opposite of Hallelujah, and the Many-Worlds series. Visit her online at annajarzab.com and on Twitter, @ajarzab.

Have you read Breath Like Water? What did you think of it?