I’m so glad I pushed through the exposition — while Clara starts off as a too-cool-for-school (both literally and figuratively) cynic who seems to dislike other girls on principle, the character development she undergoes is very real. I just wish it wasn’t so explicit; readers should be trusted to notice the shift on their own, the difference between her old and new friends, her new willingness to get invested in things unironically.

There is a significant amount of fluffy teenage summer romance, a good bit of “he’s not like any boy I’ve ever dated,” but Hamlet’s a sweetheart and his relationship with his grandparents is so pure. Equally emphasized, though, is that Clara’s relationship with her mother, a social media influencer who’s constantly traveling, is less straightforward than she acknowledges initially, but her father is her rock — and it’s so fitting that it’s his food truck and restaurant dream that Clara gets genuinely invested in. And the development of her friendship with Rose (who starts off as the token goody-two-shoes tryhard school nemesis) makes me so happy.

There’s a lot of good representation in this book: Clara’s Korean-American with Korean-Brazilian parents, Hamlet’s Chinese-American with parents in Beijing and Chinese-American “grandparents” (one by birth, one naturalized), Rose is African-American, Felix (Clara’s friend and ex) is Mexican-American. All of these cultures are more than mentioned; they play a part in the LA setting as Clara interacts with it, most notably through the themes of family and food. Sometimes Clara’s inner dialogue is overly politically correct and, on the other hand, I do wish there was LGBTQ+ representation, but otherwise this was a great read in terms of diversity.