Color Me In brought up a lot of really great issues regarding racism and colorist. It also was very accurate to the experience of growing up in New York City (I especially liked how Stevie and Nevaeh had their coffee orders on lock since fifth grade because that’s so true). Nevaeh’s poetry felt a lot like it was written by a teenager and made her feel more real to me. Most of the characters I really liked, especially Corinne’s entire side of the family and Jesus. The biggest problems I had were that some of the characters felt like stereotypes (especially her dad’s relatives) and that Abby and her family were so cartoonishly evil. I feel like this book would have been better if they had more nuance. Overall, this is an interesting, quick, own voices YA read that starts an important conversation. Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC.

this book was way more fun than I expected. I read swing time when it came out and found that book to be a lot slower and less enjoyable. white teeth was funny and unpredictable, while also teaching me about british society and culture.

I would give this one 3.5. The citizen chapters and quotes before each chapter were my favorites. The women characters were just not written well in my opinion. Franklin was horrendous and I don’t get why he had the first person POV. Overall though this book was really compelling and offered a clear picture of what Manhattan could possibly look like as a result of climate change.

Octavia Butler was a genius and the world is worse because she's no longer with us.