A review by jbellomy
I'm the Girl by Courtney Summers

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.5

I love Courtney Summers -- truly, she's one of my favorite ya writers -- but someone needs to rein her in. The forward of this book, in which she reiterates critical praise her writing has received in the past and claims that this new story is "groundbreaking," put such a bad taste in my mouth and kind of soured me on the whole thing. I kept expecting something truly """groundbreaking""" to happen and it just didn't. I have no idea why they included that forward -- was it supposed to serve as a trigger warning? Super weird. (And you might argue that I wouldn't be so annoyed if a male author had done the same thing. You'd be wrong! I'd hate that way more! If a male author had inserted that self-congratulatory, pointless forward into a book, I would have never started the story proper.)

Anyway this was fine, not out of the ordinary for Summers. Not as good as Sadie or All the Rage but better than The Project. Huge fan of Nora and the brother. It truly sucks that the forward tainted the experience.