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challenging
emotional
hopeful
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Jenna Chen's life would better if she became more like her cousin Jessica Chen. For years, she'd been compared to her seemingly flawless cousin who's naturally gifted and academically efficient. After news broke out that Jessica got accepted into Harvard, Jenna spiralled. She wished to become her perfect cousin. By a mysterious chance, her wish became true, but she unknownly sees the flaws of her desires. Takeaways: the grass isn't always greener, and surviving off the validation of others isn't sustainable since opinions can change in an instant when one doesn't fall in line of conditional expectations.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Dysphoria
Moderate: Racism, Grief, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Classism
emotional
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This story was really sweet, though a little predictable. Being YA, I’d highly recommend this to teens that need help with their self-esteem and appreciating the life they have.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Racism
challenging
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Minor: Mental illness, Racism, Car accident, Death of parent
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I don’t even know where to begin writing this review. It hit a little too close to home at times. How dare Ann Liang write a book about me? Okay, but seriously I relate to the main character a little too much. Her feelings and motivations truly drive the story. Never have I understood a character this much. I feel like most people go through this at least once in their life. I have definitely imagined what it would be like to be someone else. But I think this story just proves that you never really know what’s going on in someone else’s life. How they view themselves is a lot different than how everyone else views them. And, on the other side, how you view yourself is very different than how others view you.
I do wish we got more insight into Jessica’s character (especially after the switch is over). It would have been cool to see this book as a dual perspective. You wouldn’t even have to erase the ambiguity and mystery aspect of where Jessica is the entire book. Her chapters could have just been flashbacks. Like what was she thinking when she won all of those awards? Or how did she view Jenna? How did she view her friends? What did she think about all the pressure applied to her?
I do wish we got more insight into Jessica’s character (especially after the switch is over). It would have been cool to see this book as a dual perspective. You wouldn’t even have to erase the ambiguity and mystery aspect of where Jessica is the entire book. Her chapters could have just been flashbacks. Like what was she thinking when she won all of those awards? Or how did she view Jenna? How did she view her friends? What did she think about all the pressure applied to her?
Content Warnings
Moderate: Racism, Death of parent
emotional
sad
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Summary of my review
Very emotional, with some relatable moments. The pacing was fast and I never felt bored while reading. Another great aspect of the book was that the first sentence already made me curious to know what will happen next and what that sentence means story wise. There was a part in the story that seemed a bit like a thriller or mystery and even though the reveal at the end wasn't that surprising it was still fun to speculate of who it was. Unfortunately most parts of the book were more tell than show, but I was able to read sometimes between the lines which made me able to think a bit for myself what certain things meant. The turning point happened too fast, making me unable to properly understand and connect, for example, with Jessica Chen. The ending was disappointing as it didn't feel like it resolves the issue of the story. I would recommend this to someone who is up to something emotional with a bit of romance and likes to read about magical realism which focuses about family drama.
The review
I was very hyped for this book, but now I'm not so sure any longer. After I read If You Could See The Sun by the same author, I had the feeling that the next book I would pick up from the author would be awesome as well.
First of all, the premise of the book sounds really promising. I knew this will be another book about self identity and discovery, just like If You Could See The Sun and I was feeling connected to such a trope, so I decided to read another one. The premise was just like it said, the execution however can be interpreted in many ways if it fits one's own expectations, in my case it was somewhat fitting my expectations, but not exactly how I wished for it to be.
Jenna Chen, the cousin of Jessica Chen, is a girl that has lots of insecurities aimed directly at herself. I had a hard time connecting to her as I never experienced self hatred as much as she did, I also never wished to be someone else than me. But I was able to understand her struggles in school and how it seemed sometimes unfair that one needs to work hard and others don't need to put any effort and score better than you. I used to see this as unfair too, until I realised that everyone is different and that everyone has their own talents, for some it's academically and for others it's something else. Jenna's talent is being artistically gifted. Though, she never sees this as enough or in general as an useful skill that helps one out in life.
The review
I was very hyped for this book, but now I'm not so sure any longer. After I read If You Could See The Sun by the same author, I had the feeling that the next book I would pick up from the author would be awesome as well.
First of all, the premise of the book sounds really promising. I knew this will be another book about self identity and discovery, just like If You Could See The Sun and I was feeling connected to such a trope, so I decided to read another one. The premise was just like it said, the execution however can be interpreted in many ways if it fits one's own expectations, in my case it was somewhat fitting my expectations, but not exactly how I wished for it to be.
Jenna Chen, the cousin of Jessica Chen, is a girl that has lots of insecurities aimed directly at herself. I had a hard time connecting to her as I never experienced self hatred as much as she did, I also never wished to be someone else than me. But I was able to understand her struggles in school and how it seemed sometimes unfair that one needs to work hard and others don't need to put any effort and score better than you. I used to see this as unfair too, until I realised that everyone is different and that everyone has their own talents, for some it's academically and for others it's something else. Jenna's talent is being artistically gifted. Though, she never sees this as enough or in general as an useful skill that helps one out in life.
“[...]Painting isn’t a useful skill,”
So, to sum it up, she is the protagonist who is deeply insecure about herself, especially her abilities and is trying to become someone else to no longer deal with all her ‘failure’. This isn't the thing that bothered me about her, she isn't the first person I met who is insecure. What bothered me is how long it took for her to realise that she doesn't need to be perfect and that she has her own talent too, even if it's not academically. Also, she didn't really have her moment of realisation by herself, but instead needed comforting words by another character to finally understand. Of course it's nice to see how another character cares enough about her to make her understand how much worth she actually is, but my issue is that she probably got such conversations (by her parents probably) in the past and one always needs to take the final step oneself to make a change. The book made it seem like the other character didn't just help her but was the reason for her to understand. In general, I would just have preferred if she realised this on her own with the experiences she collected by being in Jessica's body. This wouldn't just have been more impactful but also meant a better character development for the story.
Jessica Chen seemed like a brat the first time she got introduced. Fortunately, she was the other type of gifted child than what I initially thought. I was a bit disappointed that she wasn't shown more often in the story, I felt like something lacked in the story without her. After all, the title of the book mentions her, but all I got were conversations about her and Jenna being in her body but not that much about Jessica herself. Therefore, to explore the characters better (and to avoid one-dimensional characters) it would have been better if the story was a bit longer and the body switch happened a bit later and not already in early chapters. I barely get to know Jessica besides some memories, her daily routine and a journal and that's disappointing.
Aaron Cai (aka Cai Anran) was also a character I first met with skepticism (due to him being associated with a bad memory by the protagonist shortly after he got introduced). Turned out he wasn't as bad as I thought, but his behaviour was still a bit odd. At first he doesn't tell Jenna openly why he flew to Paris and then he decides to tell her anyway instead of confronting her with his feelings and talking about it from the start before deciding of flying away to put distance between them. All could have been resolved way earlier if he could have just been honest about all of this, but he decided to not talk about it for so long and deciding of coming back just to see her anyway, even though he wanted to put distance between them. I also had an issue how he never seemed to be really mad at her no matter what she said to him or someone he was close to. It felt like: Exaggerated green flag turns into red flag. 'Cause why is he so nice no matter what, it isn't even realistic. Like they had a fight and Jenna seemed to be the only one actually showing emotions and while she even said some things that could make someone mad Aaron never felt irritated by her. Every healthy relationship needs fights/arguments or it isn't healthy and by that I don't mean one-sided fights/arguments. He is like completely shallow and one-dimensional, I barely know anything about him and it's only the same things over and over again when a memory or the like is mentioned.
All the other characters not mentioned either didn't get enough moments to be able to be described or they were one-dimensional, which leaves me unable to really say anything else about them.
The romance definitely felt cute sometimes, but more than often also over the top. I won't get into detail as this could spoiler any content from this book + I usually don't like romance (as a main plot/trope) anyway.
Now, after finishing talking about the characters let's talk about the plot/story.
The first sentence already got me hooked into the book. It didn't need any time for me to be lost in the story, which is great. The pacing was also fast and as a result I never felt boring while reading. The turning point of the story happened quite soon, which I interpreted as bad. I wanted to explore the characters a bit more before the whole body switch occurred. In general, now that I look back, I was more or less thrown into the story than being gently taken inside the world. At first it might seem thrilling to have an immediate start, but in this case it was rather a weakness of the book. That I was immediately lost in the story isn't bad, but that the turning point was so soon was. The first sentence of the book was perfect to get started but then it just was too fast to really appreciate more things in the story.
I really liked the idea of using a shooting star to fulfil one's own wish, it reminded me of the book and film named Your Name (but that's maybe 'cause I recently read another book by the author of Your Name). So, I felt nostalgia from the shooting stars as it reminded me of something else. It was also fitting the first sentence of the book!
I think the feelings of the characters, especially of Jenna can be relatable for some. I never experienced something like this so unlike the last book I read from the author, I wasn't able to connect properly with any of these characters. Nevertheless, I found myself connecting once more about the school life. Yes, school is hard and I think we all can agree to that in some way. For me, it were the exams and in general trying one's best to be able have a proper job later on. Grades don't say how smart you are, but they tell other's if they should hire you or not, so I always felt a bit of pressure in getting at least decent grades. In this story Ivy League schools (i.e. Harvard) should safe one's future career, which sounds silly to me, but I don't live in the USA, so I can't really say I know anything about the school system there.
Another thing I could connect to are certain moments where characters say things that I just agree on. Sometimes it's also the things I understand by reading in between lines. For example, that one can have as many accomplishments they want but just one single mistake can ruin it all. It's like you were so great but all they see now is just this one mistake, as if these accomplishments don't matter anymore, as if they are in the past and never have a chance to return. It was never said like this in the book directly, but by the way teachers and students reacted when Jenna said wrong answers immediately let me think that it was meant to mean all the things I wrote above. I can say that I also agree to this as I even experienced this myself and saw it by other people as well. If you give anyone room to set high expectations for you — they will. Teachers want to get the best out of their students, but some don't understand where the limits are in some of us and that we aren't as perfect as teachers or even other people think.
So, to keep my point clear: The author knows what she is writing about and isn't just trying to make it relatable by something she doesn't know of or never experienced herself. One sees that she writes about these things as she actually knows about them and isn't just trying to make an emotional story just for the sake of it. I appreciate the way she describes it as she doesn't just write it out directly but some of it can be read between the lines, which is a beautiful way of writing about emotions.
The moments that can be deemed as plot twists (especially as I couldn't remember what the blurb of the book said again) were a bit too obvious, but since this book isn't meant to be a thriller or mystery I wouldn't mind it that much. It was still fun seeing how Jenna (and later also Aaron) tried to find out who wrote her the letters. I had many ideas also what happened to the real Jessica and it was fun seeing how it all turned out. In the end it was simpler than I thought, which was quite funny to me.
The climax of the story, where everything started to get worse was near the end and left me wondering how Jenna is going to fix this all. I was even a bit afraid that this book will have a sad or bad ending where she will be trapped in the wrong body and life. It was pretty tense and I was eager to see what the ending will offer me (regarding message the book was trying to convey).
The ending was actually a let down for me as the real issue in the story never got resolved. I was glad that everything turned out well, but I was a bit confused how it was a bit too much of a happy ending, as nothing really changed in the daily lives of Jenna and Jessica and they still need to get through school as before. Yes, they got new optimism and motivation to keep going, but in the end it didn't seem like anything really changed. This left me wondering what the book was trying to tell me. ‘Love yourself and then everything in life is becoming perfect’ or what? Self love and confidence is important but that's just one aspect of many in life. It's more of an emotional state and how healthy one is mentally but it won't help you out with everything, life struggles will still happen. So yeah, the ending left me unsatisfied as it was just them all being smiling and all happy but not addressing if something changed in their school and social life or not.
I think the book can be still enjoyable, leaving out the parts that I disliked and I was still happy to see how this book turned out to be as I was waiting for it to get published for a while now. If I have to recommend this book I would say one should be prepared for romance (I wasn't, I expected for it to be more of a side plot like If You Could See The Sun which turned out to be a bit stronger in this book). One also should be in the mood to read something emotional and perhaps also a bit tense. The book features tropes like drama (especially in the family, social groups and school) as well as magical realism and finding one's own identity. Regarding the romance it's childhood friends into lovers with a bit of teasing eachother.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Toxic relationship
Moderate: Mental illness, Racism, Blood, Abandonment, Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Bullying, Cursing, Emotional abuse, Grief, Car accident, Death of parent
dark
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Racism, Grief, Classism
Minor: Death of parent
hopeful
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I received this book from Netgalley in exchange for review
Jenna has worked her whole live to make her family proud, to make herself proud, to reach her goals, to be perfect. And she has fallen short, in her eyes. Meanwhile, her cousin, Jessica, is everything she wishes she could be. One wish later, she wakes up in her cousin's body, with her own, and her cousin's mind, no where to be found.
Through her misadventures in her cousin's life, she learns that the boy she loves, likes her more, that her cousin is far from perfect, to stand up for herself, and mostly, that she wants to live her own life, imperfect and all.
This story was a wonderful adventure in loving yourself and a lesson in "the grass is always greener on the other side." Layer in is racism issues from her Asian heritage (google says Chinese-American, specifically, but for the life of me it is slipping my mind.) and a romance plot in which Jenna realizes she is more than enough.
Jenna is a lovely protagonist, and damn I recognize the struggle of not feeling like you're enough. Some of those lines hurt my heart a bit.
Great book for anyone struggling with not feeling like they're enough.
Jenna has worked her whole live to make her family proud, to make herself proud, to reach her goals, to be perfect. And she has fallen short, in her eyes. Meanwhile, her cousin, Jessica, is everything she wishes she could be. One wish later, she wakes up in her cousin's body, with her own, and her cousin's mind, no where to be found.
Through her misadventures in her cousin's life, she learns that the boy she loves, likes her more, that her cousin is far from perfect, to stand up for herself, and mostly, that she wants to live her own life, imperfect and all.
This story was a wonderful adventure in loving yourself and a lesson in "the grass is always greener on the other side." Layer in is racism issues from her Asian heritage (google says Chinese-American, specifically, but for the life of me it is slipping my mind.) and a romance plot in which Jenna realizes she is more than enough.
Jenna is a lovely protagonist, and damn I recognize the struggle of not feeling like you're enough. Some of those lines hurt my heart a bit.
Great book for anyone struggling with not feeling like they're enough.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Death, Racism, Death of parent, Colonisation
adventurous
challenging
hopeful
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This book was amazing. I was anxiously waiting for it to release. Ann Liang is a mastermind. The plot, the characters, the conflict was well written (also, can we talk about how amazing Aaron Cai is?), and I couldn't put the book down. Would definitely recommend.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death of parent, Abandonment
Moderate: Racism, Grief
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Panic attacks/disorders, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Racism, Xenophobia
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Moderate: Racism, Abandonment
Minor: Grief, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail