Losing what feels like your only connection to your heritage is something I know all too well and I cried this entire book. The entire thing. I love Marisol to pieces, she is me and I am her and we are both far too angry for our own good. I love her.

I'd Rather Burn Than Bloom touched my soul in places I didn't know needed healing. The angry teenager that I was in high school needed this book so much, and reading it now, as an adult, I realize how long it took me to heal without a story like this in my life. Family is and always will be so messy in ways that are impossible to understand, but it's also okay that our stories are messy.

Grieving a family member becomes so much harder when that emptiness also cuts you off from such a large piece of you. It isn't just a relationship you grieve, it's yourself that you grieve. The pieces of you that you could have had if life were just a little bit different. There is a particular grief in losing that connection that far transcends simple loss and gets tied up in all the complexities of immigration, yearning, and being a teenager.

This book owns my entire heart and I'm so honored that I was able to read it. Shannon CF Rogers has truly given a gift to young adult literature and I am forever grateful that she shared.

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