I really enjoyed this one. I didn't want to be the one person in the world who dislikes it, so I'm glad that it was just as good as everyone says. I was buddy reading this with a friend and wound up finishing a few days early because I couldn't make myself put it down.

The family dynamic in this was such a wonderful element. I loved Starr's relationship with her father, and for me that was one of the driving forces of the story. His character seemed to be subtly influencing every aspect, which I love in a YA novel because as a parent, that's his role in his kid's life. It wasn't an overt pressure, but the ideals and beliefs he passed on to Starr. I also just appreciate his character alone. He was as fully fleshed out as any main character.

In addition to the father, I also loved the other minor characters. They were all interesting and all propelled the story along. Each character fit so well into their role in the story. No one seemed out of place. I just wish there had been more time for some of them, like Kenya and her brother Seven. But her school friends were crafted really well and I really enjoyed the conflict created by Starr's two worlds.

The emotion was absolutely there for me. This book hits you hard and while I didn't cry, I definitely felt it. At the end of the day, this is the most important aspect of a book for me. I want a book to make me feel something, and this one definitely did.

The main reason this gets four stars instead of five is because of how fast paced this book is. I felt like I would blink and skip two scenes. I was fifty pages in when I realized there had already been about eight scenes. I just really wanted this book to slow down and take its time. Some things happened to quickly and I found myself having to reread sections in order to keep up because it was so easy to miss something small. It obviously didn't ruin the book for me, but I wish so badly there had been fewer scenes and elements just so it all could have been drawn out a little more.

I also felt like the last third of the book was kind of choppy. I was still completely engrossed, but when it started skipping time and jumping ahead, it didn't flow as well. It felt like an attempt to wrap the story up more quickly because it was taking too much time.

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this book and would definitely recommend to anyone who likes issue driven ya contemporaries. It was incredibly well done and I'll definitely be picking up more from Thomas.