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emilyctrigg 's review for:

You Truly Assumed by Laila Sabreen
4.0

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for sending me an advanced audio copy of this title in exchange for an honest review.

You truly assumed is the story of three Black Muslim girls who are reeling from a recent terrorist attack by an Islamic extremist. They are seeing a lot of backlash in their individual communities and hate crimes against Muslim people increasing exponentially. They no longer feel safe and feel like they've lost their identities in some way-- the intersection of Black and Muslim is a hard one.

Bri writes a private blog post expressing her thoughts about how Muslims are painted by society as a whole and how that impacts her family. There's only one problem. She accidentally didn't make that post private. She starts getting a lot of support from other Black Muslim girls who want a place where they can connect and build a community. This is where Bri meets Zakat and Farrah, two other girls who want to contribute to the blog.

The rest of the story follows each girl as she figures out how she's going to be part of "YTA" and also consider how she's going to follow her dreams.

I sincerely enjoyed this book. I learned so much and really was able to broaden my horizons by reading something written from such a different perspective. I liked seeing how each girl was committed to her faith and living it in the best way she knows how.

I do think that some of the scenarios were a bit far-fetched and that made it hard for me to suspend my disbelief. My only other complaint is that the voices of each of the girls was too similar-- not the narrators. Just the words and inner monologues of each girl. I think they needed to be a little more different in order for each girl to stand apart more.

Each of the three narrators was great and I would listen to an audiobook read by any of those narrators in the future.