Reviews with content warning for Bullying - Maybe He Just Likes You

Reviews tagging 'Bullying'

Maybe He Just Likes You by Barbara Dee

10 reviews

lawbooks600's review against another edition

emotional 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

4.0

Representation: Black, Asian and Latina characters
Score: Seven out of ten.

For a book targeted at a younger audience this was surprisingly heavy. I can't believe this one isn't YA. Maybe He Just Likes You by Barbara Dee circled my recommendations until I saw it on a library shelf and picked it up. I headed in with high expectations, and when I closed the final page, it was enjoyable, yet flawed.

It starts with Mila recounting her life at school when she notices something, the boys, like Callum, sometimes hug her without consent and for a strangely long time, a few seconds too long. Mila doesn't know what this feeling is yet for the first opening pages, but what she does know is this isn't flirting. This is something else, despite her peers calling her reactions immature and over-the-top. Mila drives the central storyline with her character development of realising what sexual harassment is. Why didn't she tell anyone about this? I presume she didn't have the words yet. Or another reason.

I'm glad Dee put in effort by also making her see words are better than actions, which made me like her, despite her flaws. The pacing is enough to keep the plot going, with a length below 300 pages, but I sometimes feel a lot is going on. Mila has a lot of character dynamics with her friends, like Mila and Naomi and people she prefers not to interact, like Callum, and Dee dedicated lots of subplots to them, like the one about her mother attending an exercise program, but it detracts from the narrative.

The writing style is okay, except for one choice: if Mila (and therefore Dee) can say Asian, like in the term Asian American, why can't she say Black or Latina? Like others, Maybe He Just Likes You solely focuses on characters' experiences based on gender, but there's no intersectionality, which felt like a missed opportunity given the cast is diverse. The concluding pages are engaging though, as I get to see the satisfying end of Mila's arc.

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unusuallyy's review against another edition

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sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.0

Content Warnings

greatexpectations77's review against another edition

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challenging emotional informative reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

The amount of rage that this book made me feel is such a feat. The INJUSTICE. The REALISM. The AMOUNT THAT I WAS THINKING MURDEROUS THOUGHTS ABOUT THESE MIDDLE SCHOOL BOYS. It was so incredibly, horribly spot-on about how lonely sexual harassment can feel. Mila was failed in a hundred different ways by the adults in her life that she needed to be keeping an eye out for her. The only thing that I didn't love was that I felt like the ending was a little faster than the build-up, and I, to be honest, wanted everyone to have to more harshly understand their roles in Mila's hurt. But I guess it's also important to understand the culture that shaped these boys' actions and that they didn't invent harassment. But god was I ready to just explode of anger. Also a huge example of parentification of Mila on her mom's part.

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ellewoodsfanclub's review against another edition

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challenging emotional hopeful inspiring sad fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

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sallenreads's review against another edition

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challenging emotional inspiring fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

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kell_xavi's review against another edition

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challenging emotional hopeful medium-paced

5.0

This is quite honestly one of the scariest books I’ve read, and one of the bravest. Mila is thirteen, caring about trumpet, her small family, and her close friends, when the boys at school start touching her and talking about her body. Mila’s discomfort is palpable, her stress growing as she begins avoiding places, topics of conversation, clothes she loves in order to make it stop. The confusion, fear, anger, helplessness she feels comes through strong, and I was on her side the whole way through. There’s a sadness to the silence of those around her, the misguided advice, how small it makes her. I wanted someone to stick up for her, but I understood too, that support came in different ways, and there was a realism to every scene. Barbara Dee creates a tense, difficult scenario, but she is gentle through it, gentle with Mila, with her readers, and with the ending. It made sense, I thought. A kind of restorative justice, a kind of reshaping, a kind of repair. I was so proud of Mila, and so glad this book was there to read.

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kxc319's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful medium-paced

4.0

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gurnoor's review against another edition

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emotional inspiring medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

0.25

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thejackalopeswarren's review against another edition

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challenging emotional informative sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

Content Warnings

sierranorgan's review against another edition

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challenging emotional informative reflective sad medium-paced

4.0

VRC read! I think this is a SUPER important book for middle grade students to read. I think this age group has a hard find understanding boundaries sometimes, and this is a good way for them to understand how that can go wrong.
The only thing that I didn’t totally enjoy with this one was some of the language. It sounded like someone from back in the 50’s or 60’s with phrases like “being fresh” used to mean being rude, which sounded completely outdated. I think if some of that could’ve been updated it would have felt more authentic.

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