This Is What It Feels Like

September 1, 2018
Three indomitable young Californian women graduate high school while grappling with friendship, love, and living authentically.They were best friends and they made music together, a "weird mix of punk and grunge and R&B": Hanna, who is white; Juliana, a brown-skinned Bajan lesbian; and Dia, a copper-skinned girl with natural curly hair who has a baby. The prologue offers a taste of their former life, but by Chapter 1, the band is no longer, and Jules and Dia are estranged from Hanna, whose excessive drinking made her family and friends lose faith in her. Jules and Dia don't know that Hanna went to rehab and has been sober for over a year. So when the Sun City talent search contest announces prizes that would mean the world to all three of them, Dia is reluctant to agree with Jules that they can only enter with Hanna. Will they be able to rebuild trust, put their resentment from past mistakes to rest, and make the music they know is in their hearts? While the action builds slowly at first, readers will root for all three characters, who are featured in alternating chapters, as they navigate complex relationships--Hanna's guilt and anger at home, Jules' budding romance, and Dia's resistance to love because of past tragedy.A realistic, impassioned portrait of young women coming into their own in all their messy glory. (Fiction. 15-18)

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October 1, 2018

Gr 8 Up-Dia, Jules, and Hanna just graduated from high school. They were in a band together when they were sophomores, but they had a falling out. In the meantime, Dia has had a baby and Hanna has gone to rehab. When a local band competition announces a juicy prize, they decide to get the band back together. In order to make this happen, they need to deal with some of the issues that made them break up in the first place, especially Hanna's past self-destructive behavior. Each of the three young women has a subplot on their way to the band competition: Dia is in love with Jesse but is terrified that he will die (like her daughter's father did); Jules has just ended an unhealthy first relationship and is finding new love with Autumn; and Hanna is working to earn trust back that she lost while she was drinking. Music becomes the catalyst for them to focus on what is most important in their lives. The conclusion is happy but realistic. Ultimately, this is a story with a diverse cast of young women taking charge of their own destinies and taking risks when they are ready to take them, without compromising to those who might not understand. VERDICT A fun girl-power novel for teens who like their rock hard and their main characters tough. A good choice for YA collections.-Kristin Lee Anderson, Jackson County Library Services, OR

Copyright 2018 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

November 15, 2018
Grades 9-12 Redemption and healing lie at the heart of this earnest, realistic novel about friendship. Hanna, Dia, and Jules were best friends and bandmates, torn apart in their sophomore year of high school by Hanna's drinking and Dia's impending motherhood. After graduation, the three former friends forge a d�tente to enter a music competition run by their heroes. Along the way, they work to heal their friendship and move into new phases of their lives that include developing new loves, gaining independence, and letting go of demons. This story covers a lot of territory?grief, heartbreak, coming out, teen motherhood, love, sobriety, and parental relationships?but manages to incorporate all of those issues naturally and without overshadowing the core of the book, which is the friendship between the bandmates. Readers will also appreciate that the band is not just a plot device to create high stakes; the characters care deeply about their music and work hard at their craft. Recommended for teen collections where realistic fiction is popular.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)