This came in one of my subscription boxes. It’s a YA, I guess, but with actual young adults not high school kids.

Our main character is 20 years old, working nights at a bodega, up to his eyeballs in credit card debt, embarrassed that he dropped out of college after a semester, too full of shame to ask anybody for help getting out of the messy hole he dug for himself with bad decisions he made. He’s alienating his family & his roommates with his behavior and his only happiness comes from if Instagram account devoted to exotic snack food & sneakers.

One night a pop star (I think it’s supposed to be Ariana Grande maybe?) wanders into the bodega in the wee hours of the night and she happens to share his affinity for weirdo snacks. They spend a few hours together in the store and an unlikely romance takes root.

The rest of the book is about their complicated and unlikely romance. It’s all top secret because of NDA contracts and It’s a mess for a million reasons. How it all plays out, good and bad, is the bulk of the story and how things change because of it.

It’s a wacky way to explore the drama, fear, and uncertainty that overwhelm people when they are taking their first real steps into adulthood but somehow it all worked for me.



( )

"Alice is an editorial assistant for a book publisher. . . She lives in Midtown in a brand-new studio apartment with a washer and dryer, with her boyfriend, who pays half the rent since he got a job in Albany and reverse commutes for weekends."

Ummmm WHO copyedited this book?! Which editorial assistant worked on it?! Did the editor read this?! Because I assure you that, even going halvsies, an editorial assistant would not be able to afford a frikking MIDTOWN studio with IN-UNIT laundry. This is publishing! They don't pay us! NO WAY! Show me that lease and that girl's paystubs because I am CALLING BULL.

Anyway.

And we never hear what happens with Alice anyway. Well. My real issue with this book is my own darn fault: I was stressed out the whole way through. I come from a culture that is very different to the US in terms of money. Kiwis barely have credit cards. Loans are thought about drastically differently. And while I relate so hard to being paralysed when I'm overwhelmed like Pablo, I can't fathom the not acting for so long.

I was accepted to my first choice school, Sarah Lawrence, which at the time was the only school in the country more expensive than NYU. They gave me minimal scholarships. At that point, I'd already been accepted to other schools with almost full scholarships. And there was the option of community college. Turning down SLC SUCKED. But did I even remotely seriously consider going? No. Because to be over $200k in debt sounds ridiculous to me. So I just can't relate to Pablo's decisions at all.

But Pablo was so well crafted that though I didn't relate, I could understand exactly his actions at all times. And I adored this throughout. I loved everyone's characters, from Rain and the vibrators to Wyn and the old nemesis. Even Lee was beautifully multifaceted. Choi is a brilliant writer and this is 2/2. ( )

No lie, Pablo gave my anxiety anxiety but this was like reading about myself if I was a twenty year old half-Pakistani half-Korean manboy (I am instead a thirty-something half-Puerto Rican half-Japanese half-Black womanchild [I know that’s one too many halves but if I have to deal with it so do you]). But reading about Pablo’s ride on the struggle bus was deeply moving. I hesitate to call this a romance even though there is one at the heart of it (sorry can’t help myself) because the romance is only a catalyst. I loved Pablo’s family and his friends and how beautifully captured his sometimes fraught but always deeply loving relationships with them all were. Also, this got the spirit of New York like, 100% correct. ( )

The FEELS!! The perfect description of debt and anxiety and what it feels like to be a brand new adult trying to make it on your own and what it feels like when you fuck it up!! Pablo is one of my fav characters ever, and it was so, so great getting to see him learn and grow. I could relate to him on so many levels. For being such a whirlwind wtf-how-is-this-even-really-happening romance, it seemed pretty realistic and totally believable. I just want to hug everyone involved in this book: the characters, Mary H.K. Choi, the cover illustrator... ( )

3.5
First half did not really had me, second half resonated a bit with me. ( )