whatthedeuce's Reviews (1.39k)

I have now tried to read this book twice, and each time, I am so bored that I just can’t make it to the hundredth page no matter how much I tell myself to keep going. I am baffled as to why this book is so incredibly popular and highly rated. And I say that as somebody who loves coming-of-age stories and stories about female friendship. 

This book has a great message of why banning books is a terrible idea, but my lord, it was completely lacking in finesse and subtlety. It felt like I was reading a middle schooler’s take on racism, sexual assault, homophobia, white supremacy, etc. I had zero problem with the sheer number of characters we had to follow, but each person came off as a total caricature. The antagonists may as well have been twirling mustaches and tying people to railroad tracks for all the overt villainy in their attitudes. And the dialogue was very often laughably bad, and I couldn’t take the book seriously at all.

I got 35 pages in and couldn’t do it anymore because the dialogue is so awful, and Liz is so irritating and judgmental. Like I can spot from a mile away that she’s gonna be completely wrong about Laney who doesn’t seem to have done anything awful to warrant the dislike Liz has for her.