All Amber wants is a little bit of love. Her mum has never been the caring type, even before she moved to California, got remarried and had a personality transplant. But Amber’s hoping that spending the summer with her can change all that. Amber keeps trying to justify her hate for Melody, but it comes down to this. : she hates her because she happens to like a boy that amber has a bit of a crush on and so she takes it upon herself to slut shame Melody for pretty much everything that she does. I wish I could join the Spinster Club even though I am happily married because I wholeheartedly agree with a lot of the three girls’ logic. I think this is the true meaning of feminism-everything that is printed in this book because I think a lot of people mistake feminism as anything that shuns men’s vital role in women’s lives. The answer is, simply, yes. I'm probably going to annoy someone here, but I hated Amber's mam. I understand how hard alcoholism can be, for the person suffering, and their loved ones, but I felt like Amber's mam always had an excuse, or would blame someone else. The main reason she didn't want to see Amber for so long was because it could push her over the edge, and she treated Amber like crap when she was in California. She knew how much Amber hated her step-family, but she was content to let her suffer as long as it didn't effect her. Not the best example of parenting. The only time I really liked her was at the very end, and even then it wasn't much. Melody is such an interesting character, and I love how Bourne sets her up as a foil to explicitly deconstruct the “bimbo cheerleader villain” who so often appears in stories like this. You know, the one who robs the less-conventionally-attractive protagonist of her conventionally-attractive paramour, at least until the climax of the book? Bourne subverts this all here, and she does it in a very open way, pointing out to her presumably teenage audience the traps that women fall into as a result of the patriarchy.

I made a promise earlier this year that if a book made an epilepsy joke I would immediately DNF it. Epilepsy jokes aren't funny. Do you know what it's like to wonder if your mum will wake up with brain damage? If she will even remember you? If she will even wake up? My single mother was diagnosed with grand mal seizures almost five years ago. I was 14 at the time. I was a baby. I had to call an ambulance and talk to a paramedic while helping my mum. This wasn't her first seizure (that had been when I was 10), but it was the one that started the beginning of her epilepsy. I've spent most of my life waiting; basically, since I can remember I dreamed about finding a best friend and all that crap. Then I had a time while I tried to convince myself I didn't need anyone to be happy, and now I'm pretty sure I'll die alone.

Ik leefde enorm met het hoofdpersonage mee. ik voelde haar ellende, ik voelde haar uitgelatenheid, ik maakte me dermate zorgen om haar dat ik het in mijn buik voelde..

Bourne was one of the headlining authors of the 2019 London Book Fair, appearing as 'Children’s Author of the Day' on the final day. [15] Recognitions [ edit ] The whole "feminist plotline" (see: sarcastic quotations, please) that was attempted, failed. It was a BIG FAT MESS. It was done so poorly, I was struggling with a continuous cringe the entire time. it was really enlightening and i thought it portrayed how mental illness can literally take control of your mind and actions so wellLastly, Kyle deserves his own little paragraph of recognition it was so easy to fall in love with this character because he is so miss understood. I love how the author made sure to have an area where he talked about his feelings and the way he acted because I think it would be really easy for him as a character to be misconstrued whereas he actually is a lovely guy who has her best interests at heart. There was no cliched 'happy ending' or love making it all better in the end. It was about her accepting and finding herself first. There were strong elements of feminism and its theories in this book and I love how Holly Bourne infused that in. Everyone's on the cliff edge of normal. Everyone finds life an utter nightmare sometimes, and there's no 'normal' way of dealing with it... There is no normal, Evelyn.” So this book is pretty different from the mental health contemporaries I had read previously because it's split evenly between a story about romance/boy troubles and Evie's OCD. They are intertwined together and combined with a message on feminism. I related to our main character, Evie, immediately. I too suffer from OCDs and anxiety, and I learned somehow so much more about the two of it. I have been diagnosed with OCDs only recently so it felt good to read about it: It made me feel less alone and way more understood. And for that I’m very thankful.

Bourne talks about feminism so openly and truthfully in her books and if you ever doubted the intelligence, ability or passion of teenage girls read her books and you never will again. --Muchbooks reader review on Guardian Children's Books Review: Cat Clarke and Holly Bourne - Finding Resolve, EIBF 2018 | The Fountain". The Fountain. 22 August 2018 . Retrieved 3 September 2018.And then there’s prom king Kyle, the guy all the girls want. Can he really be interested in anti-cheerleader Amber? Even with best friends Evie and Lottie’s advice, there’s no escaping the fact: love is hard. a b Sheffield, University of (21 August 2014). "Holly Bourne: journalist, novelist, Sheffield graduate - Latest news - Journalism Studies - The University of Sheffield". www.sheffield.ac.uk . Retrieved 15 May 2018. In the end, none of the characters were perfect but they were perfect teenagers and made mistakes everyone does at their age. It felt so good to read about teenagers actually acting like some, and not trying to be all grown up. Holly Bourne is really good when it comes to writing through the eyes of a 16 years old, and I’m really glad for that. I’m also very happy with the anxiety and OCDs representation, which I found to be perfect and I never read a review saying the contrary. Plus, Evie talked a lot about all the stigma around mental health and all I could do was scream "HELL YES" while reading it. I started this book for two reasons, one being that Holly Bourne will be attending YALC 2018 in London, where I am going in a few weeks, and the other being my friend Roxanne who told me to do so. And so I did. While reading, I was thinking that this book aces the Bechdel test (girls taking about things other than boys). So I was amused and delighted to see that it was also IN the book as a topic of conversation.