3.5 stars

As a Taiwanese-American girl, I might go into Gloria Chao books with unrealistically high expectations. And to be fair, there are more than a handful of little moments that hit home — bilingual puns, for example — but for the most part Ali just infuriated me with her selfish decisions and lack of empathy or accountability.

Spoiler

There doesn't seem to be a single moment when she accepts any real blame for her objectively poor decisions, though apparently her parents' good intentions don't count for much when they're not executed the way Ali would like. "Sorry" doesn't fix everything, apparently unless the one apologizing is a well-intentioned YA protagonist.

For all Ali talks about her identity crisis (Allie vs Ali, American vs Chinese), I didn't feel like she had much self-discovery or character growth throughout the narrative. It felt more like a crusade, Ali and

Spoiler

Chase and Yun

against their parents and the rest of the world. She does a lot of preaching at other people, despite being humanly-flawed herself and not seeming to learn from her mistakes. And while I can empathize with the generational/cultural gap between Ali and her parents, it really doesn't feel like she makes any effort to understand or appreciate where they're coming from, which seems almost hypocritical when she's constantly calling out her classmates' racism.

Perhaps my biggest issue is the overproliferation of cliches:

Spoiler

Ali's (brief) hesitation to play nice with Chase because she was "burned" before when Yun (understandably) didn't want to be best friends after the well-meaning but insensitive way she reacted to his being gay; Ali's decision to not only keep secrets from but mislead Chase about her plans to find out about his family history; phrases like "a look that communicated more than words could say" and "in all the right places"; "Ali-fucius"; "sexy ninja Confucius"; the microaggressions Ali experiences, including Chinese food being called gross, racist jokes about being "yellow", mocking Asian accents; et cetera, et cetera

. I'm sure things still happen that way in real life — and I know I've been extremely fortunate not to experience it myself — but it's hard for me to really care when microaggressions are portrayed in extremes and cliches.

Honestly, I wanted to root for Ali and Chase but the scenes between them read more awkwardly than romantically — and while enthusiastic consent is certainly important in relationships, the way it was indicated in-text felt jarring and too overtly PC. (And this is coming from someone who identifies as an intersectional feminist.) The pacing of their relationship felt choppy, adding to my inability to wholeheartedly ship it.

I appreciate the attempts to be more intersectional throughout the book, though there are parts where the phrasing is incorrect

Spoiler

unless some people do say "coming out to [their] parents about being a lesbian", which I personally have never heard

or nuanced issues are glossed over with "it's okay if you feel that way"; it's far from perfect, though it's a step in the right direction, and that deserves recognition.

Also, while I'm talking about phrasing, there are several instances where the use of teenage slang is incorrect and made me cringe. I'm not saying authors can't use phrases that the cool kids are saying these days, but sometimes it seems like they're trying too hard to be Relatable^TM. The pop culture references went over better, since they're used sparingly and (perhaps more importantly) aren't comprised entirely of Harry Potter and Marvel allusions.

So overall, while the rep in this book delights me to no end and the premise contains so much promise, I can't help feeling that the execution could've used some polishing.

content warnings:

Spoiler

racism & microaggressions, loss of loved ones (secondary character's parent), mentions of torture & suicide

rep:

Spoiler

Taiwanese-American MCs & family, gay Chinese-American major character

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CONVERSION: 9.2 / 15 = 3.5 stars

Prose: 4 / 10
Characters & Relationships: 7 / 10
Emotional Impact: 7 / 10
Development / Flow: 5 / 10
Setting: 9 / 10

Diversity & Social Themes: 3 / 5
Intellectual Engagement: N/A
Originality / Trope Execution: 2 / 5
Rereadability: 4 / 5
Memorability: N/A