I received a free copy of this book from Black&White Publishing exchange for an honest review.

Kiko is about to graduate from high school and has her heart set on an art college that can send her far away from her troublesome family, and emotionally abusive mother. When she doesn’t get in, Kiko is distraught but the return of an old childhood friend ends up helping her in more ways than one.

This was a beautifully told story that was hard to read sometimes because of what the character of Kiko had to struggle through but was also amazing to read because as a reader, we got to see how she grew from strength to strength in each chapter and really came into her own.

I loved that each chapter ended with a description of a drawing Kiko had completed, and how the simple descriptions were able to sum up all her emotions and feelings of that particular chapter. It was a really nice touch that I really enjoyed.

The book does deal with some touchy subjects that may be hard for people to read about: sexual abuse, emotional abuse, suicide, anxiety.

i really, really liked the relationship between Jaime and Kiko. Their chemistry was very real, and while it wasn’t sparking hot for me, it was more on the warm, and bubbly side like hot chocolate or something. I was just urging them to kiss for chapters before anything exciting happened between them but it was so natural, i loved it. I also love that this book shied away from the ‘love interest heals all’ trope and Kiko realised she needed to work on things on her own before allowing Jaime back into her life, and she couldn’t use him as a crutch. It was such a healthy thing to see, and I really appreciated it.

Kiko struggles a lot in this book with self-love and self-acceptance, mostly because of the way her mother (who is a narcissistic of the highest degree) has belittled her her entire life. I loved that Kiko eventually discovered that uniqueness is beauty and everyone is beautiful in their own way, and beauty doesn’t mean white, blonde and blue eyes. While I’m not biracial, and can’t speak for the own voices rep in this book, I truly believe that some of Kiko’s struggles about being mixed race may hit close to home for many readers, and I just hope that they also feel the same self-love that Kiko achieves.

I think I would have liked to known more about Kiko’s relationship with her siblings in the epilogue. Things were okay with them but I would have liked to have known if they were any better as sibling relationships are so important too.

Overall, a really lovely book despite it touching on tough subjects. It was all done in a really great way, that made the book really enjoyable to read and a fun read despite being very real at the same time.