Review: I'M NOT DYING WITH YOU TONIGHT by Kimberly Jones and Gilly Segal

 

I'm Not Dying with You Tonight by Kimberly Jones
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

"An absolute page turner, I’m Not Dying with You Tonight is a compelling and powerful novel that is sure to make an impact." —Angie Thomas, New York Times bestselling author of The Hate U Give

An NAACP Image Award Nominee, I’m Not Dying with You Tonight follows two teen girls—one black, one white—who have to confront their own assumptions about racial inequality as they rely on each other to get through the violent race riot that has set their city on fire with civil unrest.

Lena has her killer style, her awesome boyfriend, and a plan. She knows she’s going to make it big. Campbell, on the other hand, is just trying to keep her head down and get through the year at her new school.

When both girls attend the Friday-night football game, what neither expects is for everything to descend into sudden mass chaos. Chaos born from violence and hate. Chaos that unexpectedly throws them together.

They aren’t friends. They hardly understand the other’s point of view. But none of that matters when the city is up in flames, and they only have each other to rely on if they’re going to survive the night.

--

I was watching a masterclass on Writing as a Political Act as part of YALL WRITE (the online Yall Fest 2020), and that's where I first came across Kimberly Jones and Gilly Segal, along with the other two panelists Yusef Salaam and Ibi Zoboi. This was one of the most useful masterclasses I've ever watched and afterward, I promptly bought this book (as well as Punching the Air by Salaam and Zoboi). So that's how I came across I'm Not Dying With You Tonight.

Prior to starting this book, during the masterclass, I heard Jones and Segal talking about the main two characters, Lena and Campbell. I was invested in these characters through hearing the authors speak, especially when they talked about how politically aware their MCs are and how this is different from being politically active.

I'm Not Dying With You Tonight follows two high-school girls--one black, one white--as an argument at their school turns into shootings and a riot that spreads across many parts of the town. These two girls are trying to get home and have to rely on each other to survive. Lena and Campbell aren't friends prior to this and in a lot of parts, neither understands the other's view. Campbell cannot understand at first why Lena, who is Black, is rightfully fearful of the police, and Lena cannot understand Campbell's (who is white) poverty. This book directly tackles racism and police brutality toward Black people and it's an informative and enlightening read. A very important read.

It's an addictive read and so, so powerful. I think it took me just over a day to read it. It's a powerful novel, and while I did find parts of it to be very plot-driven rather than character-driven, both Lena and Campbell are well-developed. Given the nature of this book, I do think it needs to be plot-driven, so it's not a criticism, as it's literally about how these two girls survive and depend on each other, when events out of their control are thrown at them.

The conversation on racism that this book delivers is the strongest part of this book--and I believe that's its intention. This book highlights the ignorance of white people as well as subtly-racist attitudes that are prevalent. It also speaks on socioeconomic issues too, like poverty.

I highly recommend this book.

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Review: GENUINE FRAUD by E. Lockhart

 

Genuine Fraud by E. Lockhart
My rating: 5 of 5 stars


From the author of the unforgettable New York Times bestseller We Were Liars comes a masterful new psychological suspense novel--the story of a young woman whose diabolical smarts are her ticket into a charmed life. But how many times can someone reinvent themselves? You be the judge.

Imogen is a runaway heiress, an orphan, a cook, and a cheat.
Jule is a fighter, a social chameleon, and an athlete.
An intense friendship. A disappearance. A murder, or maybe two.
A bad romance, or maybe three.
Blunt objects, disguises, blood, and chocolate. The American dream, superheroes, spies, and villains.
A girl who refuses to give people what they want from her.
A girl who refuses to be the person she once was.

I went into this book, having read some of the reviews that say it's not as good as We Were Liars, and so I was a bit hesitant at first...but I have to say that Genuine Fraud is amazing. I LOVED it.

It's very different to We Were Liars, yes. It's not trying to be the same. It's standing proud to be different, and I was really hooked after the first couple of chapters.

Genuine Fraud is all about character. It's about giving the reader snippets of Jule's life and Immie's life, all from Jule's POV. It's about constructing these complex and devastating characters through spinning a sort of web around Jule--as the web increases with each chapter, so does our knowledge of what these characters really are like. Jule becomes more and more complex with each chapter, and by about the halfway point, we know exactly what kind of person we're dealing with.

Jule is a murderer. She kills two people in this book--possibly three, I'm not quite sure. She's dark and when she doesn't get what she wants, she throws a tantrum. And her tantrums always end in the same way. And yet despite this there are still twists cleverly incorporated into this--proper moments that had me literally gasping.

This is a story of friendship and what happens when it becomes obsessive. It's a story of a damaged girl who's undeniably clever and so, so cold.

I loved the writing style. I'll be honest, I don't connect strongly with books that are told in third-person. I need that closeness to the main character. Yet third person was undeniably the right choice for Genuine Fraud, precisely because it keeps Jule at a distance. We're not supposed to see right into her mind. We're supposed to be wondering who she is and what she is capable. As we read, we're trying to learn more about her, and it often feels a bit like we're a detective and Jule is the mystery. And I think that's why I liked this book so much because we're kept on the outside a little bit. We're trying to work out who this character is--a character who freely admits that she lies and makes up her 'origin story'. I still don't know which of Jule's 'childhood origin stories' are based on truth, if any are.

And (spoilers ahead), I just have to talk about this: this book shows how someone can just step into someone's life so quickly, claiming that you used to be friends at school--when in fact you weren't. And the way it's done in this book is just so amazing. Because Jule and Immie knew each other from school--and yet they didn't. Each chapter adds a little bit to the puzzle, until we realise that Immie is someone Jule has become fixated on and vowed to find a way into her life. Jule gets all these tidbits of info about Immie's schooldays (from names of classmates to what Immie was wearing at a concert), getting these pieces of information through hiding her intentions, and then 'reminds' Immie of how they were at the same school. And that means Immie has this instant trust for Jule. Trust that is her downfall. I just wanted to talk about that because that revelation that Jule's memories of Immie and their shared schooldays were constructed and not organic just blew me away. That was the point where I realised just how clever E. Lockhart is.

And each chapter does build a new layer, add a layer to the onion that is Jule, so to speak. And the timeline jumps back and forth too. We're not given things in a chronological order, which adds to the puzzle-feel of this book. And I just loved that.

As expected from any book by E. Lockhart, this one covers some dark topics: you've got suicide mentioned, murder, desperation, obsession... But this is a must-read.

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Review: LUCKIEST GIRL ALIVE by Jessica Knoll (audiobook narrated by Madeleine Maby)

 

Luckiest Girl Alive by Jessica Knoll
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

HER PERFECT LIFE IS A PERFECT LIE.

As a teenager at the prestigious Bradley School, Ani FaNelli endured a shocking, public humiliation that left her desperate to reinvent herself. Now, with a glamorous job, expensive wardrobe, and handsome blue blood fiancé, she’s this close to living the perfect life she’s worked so hard to achieve.

But Ani has a secret.

There’s something else buried in her past that still haunts her, something private and painful that threatens to bubble to the surface and destroy everything.

With a singular voice and twists you won’t see coming, Luckiest Girl Alive explores the unbearable pressure that so many women feel to “have it all” and introduces a heroine whose sharp edges and cutthroat ambition have been protecting a scandalous truth, and a heart that's bigger than it first appears.

The question remains: will breaking her silence destroy all that she has worked for—or, will it at long last, set Ani free?

--

This is the first audiobook I've ever listened to, and it was a great one to start with. LUCKIEST GIRL ALIVE is a complex story of lies, trust, and one woman's desperation to be 'perfect'. We meet Ani when she's in her late twenties, and she seems to have it all: a great job, a great boyfriend, an impending marriage, great prospects in life. But right from the start, there's something disturbing about our narrating character. It becomes clear very quickly that Ani has a dark side. And I just LOVE dark narrators. She's also pretty unlikeable and not your typical female narrator--and that I just loved.

(Spoilers ahead:)

Ani is a disturbed woman with lots of secrets--least of all that she murdered someone. I hesitate to call her a murderer because as the book reveals it was in self-defence and happened when she was 14. And wow, this girl's past is just phenomenal. The book alternates between present-day action where Ani is preparing to take part in a documentary to 'set the record straight' about what happened when she was school, and gives us real-time chapters of that time.

We follow Ani as she joins the Bradley school, as she becomes mixed up in toxic friendship groups, as she becomes victim of sexual assault and rape, as she suddenly finds herself in a school shooting. This book is POWERFUL. That, I can't stress this enough. And the characterisation is so phenomenal. In the present-day, Ani comes across as an entitled and arrogant woman who cares wholly about perceptions and what others think when they see her. Yet, from reading everything that's happened to her, it becomes understandable. This new identity is one she's actually constructed to protect herself.

And it's not just her characterisation which is amazing. Every single character in this book has amazing characterisation--and this makes it quite complicated in some respects, as Ani's rapists are shown to have good traits. It makes it realistic, but it also makes for such a disturbing read. Jessica Knoll is an expert.

I particularly liked as, the more we read, the more layers of the main characters were revealed. This was especially the case with Luke, the 'perfect' fiance. By about the halfway point, his true character had been revealed, and I desperately wanted Ani to do better than him. So, I was really satisfied with the ending, where she leaves him.

There's also a big emphasis on names and identity in this book. Throughout it, Ani has multiple names referring to the various different identities she has been through--she reinvented herself after leaving the Bradley school, going by Ani then (whereas before she was Tiffany). And this just seemed really realistic and added to the idea that 'Ani' (the successful and rich magazine editor) is a construction. Ani is a cage around Tiffany, one to protect her--and that final line of the book, where Ani reclaims her identity as Tiffany FaNelli, is just so powerful because of this.

There are some difficult scenes in this book, as can be expected. At 14, Tiffany is invited to a party by her male classmates. She is the only girl there, and she's raped by three of them. She later attends Planned Parenthood to get the Morning After pill. When her mother finds out about this, we get a victim-blaming narrative from her (which is challenged by other characters). We're also dealing with content about suicide and mass-shootings in schools. Children do die in this book and it is heart-wrenching. The shooters are both children too--one of whom is Tiffany's friend.

Madeleine Maby is a terrific narrator. That has to be said too. I was apprehensive about audiobooks, thinking I wouldn't be sucked in in the way I am when reading a paperback or ebook, and although the experience of listening to an audiobook is different, this really was excellent.

I highly recommend this story of identity, revenge, loss, lies, and secrets.

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