Overall, this was okay! 

The first few years dragged on a lot for me, and I wasn’t a fan of a lot of the characterisation - which meant I was largely let down, since it’s very much a character-driven story. 

Year 4 was definitely the strongest and redeemed some of the rest of the book for me. The Maya plot line was my favourite and the graduation was cute and made me appreciate the characters more. 

Also all of the Chiyo’s dad scenes were great.