You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson | Book Review | Book Tour

¡Hola, mi gente!

I’ve been failing at blogging lately, not really around here as much as I wish. But today I’m really excited to bring you a post for a book I loved deeply and filled me with happiness in the middle of these chaotic times we’ve been living.

GOODREADS| AMAZON | BARNES & NOBLE | BOOKS-A-MILLION | BOOKSHOP.ORG

Genres: Young Adult, Contemporary, Romance

Content Warnings: homophobia, racism, anxiety, panic attacks, chronic illness, outing

LOOK AT THAT BEAUTIFUL BLACK GIRL SMILING IN THE COVER!!!

Liz Lighty has always believed she’s too black, too poor, too awkward to shine in her small, rich, prom-obsessed midwestern town. But it’s okay — Liz has a plan that will get her out of Campbell, Indiana, forever: attend the uber-elite Pennington College, play in their world-famous orchestra, and become a doctor.

But when the financial aid she was counting on unexpectedly falls through, Liz’s plans come crashing down . . . until she’s reminded of her school’s scholarship for prom king and queen. There’s nothing Liz wants to do less than endure a gauntlet of social media trolls, catty competitors, and humiliating public events, but despite her devastating fear of the spotlight she’s willing to do whatever it takes to get to Pennington.

The only thing that makes it halfway bearable is the new girl in school, Mack. She’s smart, funny, and just as much of an outsider as Liz. But Mack is also in the running for queen. Will falling for the competition keep Liz from her dreams . . . or make them come true?

In You Should See Me in a Crown we follow Liz Lighty, a Black queer girl with anxiety in love with music. Her dream is to get into Pennington, the place where all her hopes seem to be possible. There’s a problem: she’s poor and the money she was counting on for her studies suddenly evaporates in front of her eyes.

“I never needed this race or a hashtag or a king go be a queen. I was born royalty. All I had to do was pick up my crown.”

That’s when an idea makes its way into her plans: run for prom queen and win the scholarship awarded to the winner. Liz is skeptical about winning, but it’s her only chance to get the money she needs and she refuses to give up without trying. Campbell has never had a Black prom queen, let alone a Black queer prom queen. Is Liz prepared to be its new queen? She’s not sure, but she’s fighting to show she is. As Liz finds her way to prom royalty, this question changes. It’s no longer a quest trying to see whether Liz is prepared to rule prom, but whether Campbell will even let her have a chance.

And Liz won’t take no for an answer.

THING I LIKED

Liz is my little baby and I’ll protect her against EVERYTHING OK?

• Liz is SUCH AN AMAZING CHARACTER. I was rooting for her in each and every page of the book. I loved seeing her grow from the shy Liz in the first chapters to strong, bold and confident girl. She refuses to settle down for something less than what she dreams for. She grabs her opportunity to make things happen, even if it means facing things that put her completely out of her comfort zone. I’m so happy that Black girls have in Liz such an amazing character to relate to.

• I loved the importance of family and friends in the story. Their dynamics are realistic. Through broken friendships, messy make-ups and imperfect family members, You Should See Me in a Crown shows how important having a supportive family and friends that stick with you no matter what is. It also shows how, as important as it is to take of others, it’s also important to accept that there are moments when you need to let others take care of you and that’s ok. You don’t need to be strong all the time.

• The depiction of anxiety in this book was both respectful and realistic. Anxiety doesn’t have a magical solution; it’s something we live with everyday and the book shows that. It also shows how a we can find strength and healthy ways to deal with panic attacks and I feel like it’s extremely important to show that in YA books.

• This book deals with many hard topics, but it doesn’t let this harsh reality obscure the cuteness in the story. And when I say cuteness, I MEAN IT. Liz’s story is a celebration to Black queer joy. Seeing Liz fall for Mack had me smiling like an idiot. It was so heartwarming and fun and SO SO SO cute.

• Leah Johnson’s writing is beautiful and compelling. I read this in one sitting and listened to the audiobook in one sitting as well. If you’re able to read it in both formats, I 100% recommend you to do it. The narration for this book is amazing, but as I read it in print I came to appreciate how well the writing flows. At the end of my reread, there were so many quotes that felt like they deserved to be framed and put somewhere everyone can see them. This book ended up with over 50 post its. Since I don’t want to transcribe the whole book (and, you know, that ain’t legal), here are some of the quotes that live rent-free in my head.

“Silence and shame aren’t the same thing – not by a longshot. But sometimes silence is simpler.”

“Music is something I understand— the notes are a thing I can always bend to my will“

“Terrible people aren’t always the ones doing something wrong. Good people mess up too, but that doesn’t mean we should let it slide.”

“She doesn’t understand that the stakes are always higher for me, that I don’t get the option of not being in control.”

I wanted to dedicate a small part of this review to this quote. Growing up Black in a society that expects you to fail affects the way we see the world forever. Only recently have I seen that my constant need to be in control of how I present myself, how I would look to others, how I spoke and how well I do are rooted in this need to be the acceptable Black. If I’m in control of everything, there’s no way they’ll find fault in me… right? is something that has ruled my actions for pretty much the first two decades of my life. Reading a character that looks like me struggling as I did made me cry (y’all shouldn’t be surprised by now. I cry with everything). I wish Black teens didn’t need to feel this pressure to be acceptable to others.

• The audiobook is amazing. I know I already said this, but I can’t recommend the audiobook enough. They chose the perfect narrator for this story. Alaska Jackson did an amazing job at letting us feel Liz’s emotions through her voice and she managed to make each character distinct and unique.

THINGS I DIDN’T LIKE

• The only thing I didn’t like has nothing to do with the story, but with the audiobook. There are some moments when there’s music in the background of the narration. This is a nice touch, but since I speed up audiobooks, it sounded loud and distorted. If you don’t listen to audiobooks in 1x-1.5x speeds, this might make it difficult to understand the first few words in sections with music. Other than that, I had no problem with neither story nor format.

Overall, You Should See Me in a Crown was a heartwarming, inspiring read that made me smile A LOT. Black girls deserve to be happy, Black girls deserve to be celebrated. This book gave me Black queer joy in the middle of some very tense days and I absolutely love it for that.

4.5/5★

Thank you to Scholastic Press and Hear Our Voices Book Tours for letting be part of this tour. Take a look at the rest of the reviews and creative posts here! 

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Leah Johnson (she/her) is an editor, educator, and author of books for young adults. Leah is a 2021 Lambda Literary Emerging Writers Fellow whose work has been published in BuzzFeed, Teen Vogue, Refinery29, and Autostraddle among others. Her bestselling debut YA novel, You Should See Me in a Crown was the inaugural Reese’s Book Club YA pick, and was named one of Cosmo‘s 15 Best Young Adult Books of 2020. Her sophomore novel, Rise to the Sun is forthcoming from Scholastic in 2021.

And that’s it for today’s post! Have you read You Should See Me in a Crown?

Stay safe. Drink water. Give yourself a break. Celebrate small victories. This year hasn’t been easy, but you got this.

Besos,

Linda

Miss Meteor by Tehlor Kay Mejia & Anna-Marie McLemore | Book Review | Book Tour

¡Hola, mi gente!

I hope y’all are staying hydrated and safe! I’m so happy that Latinx Heritage Month started. I mean, if Miss Meteor is a forecast of what I’ll be reading this month, I’m in for one of my best reading month this year.

I absolutely adored this book -this review is more of a gush than anything else. I’m also really excited for everyone to see my version of Lita (scroll aaaall the way down to see it). I had so much fun drawing her. I truly I’m getting addicted to Procreate.

Y ya, sin más preámbulo, my Miss Meteor review!

Genres: Young Adult, Magical Realism, Romance

Content Warnings: bullying, xenophobia, homophobic comments, transphobic comments (all challenged in the story)

“There hasn’t been a winner of the Miss Meteor beauty pageant who looks like Lita Perez or Chicky Quintanilla in all its history. But that’s not the only reason Lita wants to enter the contest, or why her ex-best friend Chicky wants to help her. The road to becoming Miss Meteor isn’t about being perfect; it’s about sharing who you are with the world—and loving the parts of yourself no one else understands. So to pull off the unlikeliest underdog story in pageant history, Lita and Chicky are going to have to forget the past and imagine a future where girls like them are more than enough—they are everything.

Witty and heartfelt with characters that leap off the page, Miss Meteoris acclaimed authors Anna-Marie McLemore and Tehlor Kay Mejia’s first book together.”

The story takes place in Meteor, New Mexico, a town that received it’s name thanks to a meteorite that crashed in the desert. In this town, there are two events that give the people a needed boost in tourism: the cornhole tournament and the Miss Meteor pageant. This year, for the 50th Miss Meteor pageant and with the need to keep the cornhole tournament cup in the town, everyone is looking forward, for one thing or another, to the next drew weeks.

I may be made out of the same dust and glow as the lights in the sky, but if you read any of the astronomy books in the library—even our little library—you’ll realize, isn’t everyone?

We follow Lita, a girl made of stardust, and Chicky, her ex-best friend and school’s outcast, as they decide to join the Miss Meteor pageant. Each of them have their reasons: Lita wants to do something she’s always wanted to do before the sky takes her back. Chicky wants to get back at the people who have hurt her, her family and friends.

In a town this small, for girls like us, survival is based mostly on how well you can camouflage, not on dredging up the bloodred and sunshine yellow of your secrets and splattering them across your chest.

I don’t even know how to say how much I loved this book. It touched very important topics while giving us a sweet story about friendship, family, love, and self-confidence.

THINGS I LIKED

• Is it ok if I just say EVERYTHING? No?

• There are such great reps in this book I almost cried. The trans rep was casual and respectful and I might want to give Cole the biggest hug ever [I will protect him from anyone that DARES try to hurt him, I swear]. The pansexual rep DID make me cry at some point.

• I can’t believe I’m saying this, but there are not one but TWO friends to lovers relationships in this book and I loved both. For those of you that don’t know my reading taste, I usually dislike anything with friends to lovers (idk why, it just happens). Leave it to Anna-Marie McLemore and Tehlor Key Mejia to make me rethink my ways. I’ve been changed.

• I loved both protagonists SO MUCH and I would fight for them. Lita is struggling with her image, her sense of self and where she belongs. I loved going with her through her journey and seeing her blossom into someone stronger, more confident and happy. On the other hand, Chicky is struggling with her sexuality, her place in her family and the town, and being herself. She’s been hurt for a long time and is afraid of showing any part of herself to anyone. Seeing her heal and grow as the story went was beautiful and it made shed a tear or two (ok, a river, but!). I was so happy for both of them at the end of the book. I wanted a little more of them, to see them find more of their happiness, but I’m happy with what we got and, as stated before, I WILL FITE ANYONE FOR THEM.

• THE WRITING. Sometimes I’m a little wary about books written by two authors because, more often than not, the writing falls into one of two categories: books where you can point out the parts and scenes that each author wrote or books where the writing feels clunky and weird. Alas, I’ve been changed again by McLemore and Mejia. I was glued to the book from beginning to ending. The writing style of both authors are beautifully woven together and made the story even better.

• THE FOOD. Mira mi gente, necesito mencionar esto. I had to stop reading at some points to get snacks because this book made me so. damn. hungry. It’s part of the celebration of both identity and community: any Latinx person has felt the importance of food in our culture. And yes, my list of dishes-I-need-to-try-without-burning-the-house-down has grown by at least 10 items.

THINGS I DIDN’T LIKE

• I have nothing, other than I wanted the book to be longer, but that’s really a hidden pro that speaks about how much I liked the story and didn’t want it to end.

Overall, Miss Meteor is a beautifully written story about learning to accept yourself and showing the world who you are, who you love, and what you believe. I need EVERYONE to read this. The story is amazing, the writing is amazing, the characters are amazing… everything is amazing! It’s the first book that has made me feel like this in a while and I’m so glad I got to read it.

5/5 SHINING STARS

FANART

I promised that if I got an iPad and an Apple Pencil I would make fanart for as many Latinx book I read as possible and I’m not going back on my promise. My skills are still a little rusty because it’s been a LONG time since I sat down to actually draw, but I’m really happy with how Lita turned out. She deserves the world and for all Meteor to see that she shines, not because of the start dust that makes her, but because of who she is. I hope you like her as much as I did.

Lita in all her glory being the Miss Meteor she was made to be.

And that’s it for this review, folks! Have you read Miss Meteor? Are you planning to? Miss Meteor comes out on September 22 (just three days away!) and you are still in time to preorder it here today!

Besos,

Linda

Each of Us a Desert by Mark Oshiro | Book Review | Book Tour

¡Hola, mi gente!

I hope y’all are staying safe and hydrated during these stressing days. Today I want to talk about a book I read last month that I ABSOLUTELY loved. I’ve been trying to write this review for a while, but could never get the words to describe it. I finally could piece something coherent, so let’s jump to it!

Genres: Young Adult, Fantasy, LGBTQ+ 

Content Warnings: animal violence, on-page graphic violence, injury, death, abuse (both emotional and domestic)

This cover is unfairly stunning, just look at that.

From award-winning author Mark Oshiro comes a powerful coming-of-age fantasy novel about finding home and falling in love amidst the dangers of a desert where stories come to life. Xochitl is destined to wander the desert alone, speaking her troubled village’s stories into its arid winds. Her only companions are the blessed stars above and enigmatic lines of poetry magically strewn across dusty dunes. Her one desire: to share her heart with a kindred spirit. One night, Xo’s wish is granted—in the form of Emilia, the cold and beautiful daughter of the town’s murderous conqueror. But when the two set out on a magical journey across the desert, they find their hearts could be a match… if only they can survive the nightmare-like terrors that arise when the sun goes down.

Hauntingly poetic and unique, Each of Us a Desert was a book that grabbed me from page one. There were times when I just wanted to mark every single page because the writing style is amazing.

The story follows Xochitl, a young girl that lives in Empalme, one of the small cities that came together after the world was completely burnt. She is a cuentista, a person who is destined to take the stories from people and returning them to Solís, the god of this world. If she doesn’t take their stories, the guilt turns into a monster that can kill them once they get too strong. After years of taking the stories of everyone in the city, Xochitl is exhausted, but feels like there’s no way out of this life.

This all changed when the fire nation attacked when one story she takes shakes her entire being. Xochitl starts to wonder about her destiny, her own story… and decides to make a choice for herself for the first time in a long time.

“I wanted it more than anything. To be free of these responsibilities and rules and expectations. I wanted my own life.”

As she runs from Empalme, she confronts the reality that maybe everything the village has told her, everything the village believes, is a lie. Through her journey, she confronts many of her prejudices and the barriers other had raised for her. The story takes us through a journey with Xochitl, making us see how expectations from others tend to shape our lives and how we can discover ourselves when we break free from those chains.

“I believed in myself despite everything that told me not to. Is that really so bad?”

THINGS I LIKED

• I truly loved how atmospheric Oshiro’s writing is, the way it touched important themes and topics, and the world building. The descriptions of the desert and the cities made me feel like I was there.

• The poetry interwoven with the story feels magical on its own; unapolegetically bilingual and full of beautiful images, too.

• The mythology surrounding Solís and cuentistas was super interesting. Los Pálidos, los sabuesos, los guardianes and cuentistas play a vital part in Solís’ play. The relationship between these actors is as important to the story as the characters and their motives: their existences have been marked by fire and blood. It’s imporant to keep in mind that, like Oshiro has explained many times, this is a fantasy book, not a book based in mythology from our world.

• From the way we explored the world created in this book, I was left wanting more. I would love to explore more of the cities mentioned through the book without the sense of urgency of this particular story. It would be great if Oshiro could return to this world later, maybe in a short story or a companion novel, and we could take a better look of one of those far away cities we never visited with Xochitl.

THINGS I DIDN’T LIKE

• I needed 5 more pages to get a better sense of the ending.

• Although I love the writing style, some times I would feel extremely lost because too many things were happening at the same time.

One important thing I have to mention is that Each of Us a Desert is NOT a romance. It has a very small romantic arc, but the romance is not one of the main themes of the book, contrary to what a lot of the things I’d read at that time stated. I actually appreciate this now that I’ve had time to think about the book as a whole, but when I read it I was under the impression that this would be the story of a sapphic romance in a fantasy world and I was a little disappointed that I didn’t get that. Instead, it is the story of a fantasy world with some (mild) elements of sapphic romance. This is not something I didn’t like, but something to keep in mind when one is going into the story.

When I was commenting this book with Gabi (she has a review of the book too!), we both found it a little ironic that the book is mainly about expectations and our expections for the romance where the only things we felt the story fell a little flat.

Overall, Each of Us a Desert was a book that surprised me in the best way. It has stayed in my mind for a long time after reading it. I’ll probably end up rereading it once my finished copy arrives, because the story and the characters have me enchanted. I’m fairly certain that y’all will see this book among my favorite reads of the year.

4.5/5★

I’m really happy that I got to participate in this tour and I’m excited to see what other people thought about the fantastical world Mark Oshiro has created. If you haven’t done it yet, you can register your preorder here before September 14 to receive a beautiful art print with one of the poems in the book.

*Keep in mind that all quotes used in this reviews are taken from the ARC copy. Once I get my finished copy, I’ll check them, but they might not appear on finished books like this.

What’s your most anticipated release of September? Is Each of Us a Desert on your TBR? Let me know in the comments!

Besos,

Linda