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maiakobabe 's review for:

Turtles All the Way Down by John Green
4.0

A very engaging young adult novel, with one of the most insightful portrayals of a character with extreme anxiety that I've ever read. (Note: I do not have anxiety, so for me this was a peek into an experience I don't have. I hope readers with anxiety feel this is an accurate depiction.) When Aza was eight years old, she met a boy named Davis at a camp for kids who had experienced grief- she had just lost her father, and he his mother. By high school, the two have drifted apart, though they still live very near to each other in Indianapolis. Now sixteen, Aza tries her best to get through day after day of school while plagued by frequent intrusive thoughts about the terrifying possibilities of infection and disease which are constantly present. Daisy, Aza's best friend, hears that Davis's father- the enormously wealthy owner of construction company- has gone missing. What's more, there is a $100,000 reward for anyone who can deliver information that leads to his recovery. Daisy decides it's time for Aza to rekindle her childhood friendship with the missing billionaire's son. All three teens have the weight of too much on their shoulders, and their steps and missteps at caring for each other and themselves felt gratifyingly true.