The story was paced a little slowly but it rattled along okay and I guess it shed some light on topics that are relevant, like constantly feeling compared to other girls, self-harm, parental pressure and eating disorders. There were some aspects of the book that didn't feel so relevant, though. Like the problems Olivia has with being in the public spotlight (can't see that being a major issue for 99.9%of the population) or being super-rich (yeah .....) or having a famous boyfriend.
Just as a bit of background, I've never had an eating disorder so I can't speak from first-hand experience, but something about this story felt a bit off, like it didn't quite ring true. I think it was the way she seemed to recover from her bulimia so quickly at the end. I may not know much about eating disorders, but I do know it's not like tonsillitis. You can't just take a pill and get better. It takes months and years of therapy and support. I think the author was trying to do a really brave and worthy thing in writing about this, and I'm not saying that every story has to be like an own-voices thing, but it still has to have authenticity and some of the description of Olivia's bulimia just felt a bit ... functional.
I really liked Sam in this story, but Olivia was a bit bland and naive. Zack was utterly charmless and I was zero-surprised when he turned out to be an arsehole. I wasn't a massive fan of Antonia either - she really pressured Olivia.
The writing felt a bit tell-don't-show. Like this paragraph here:
I love being around Antonia. She makes me feel so alive.
Don't tell me these things - show me.
There were two characters from one of the author's previous books included in this story. They weren't integral to the plot of this book and they didn't really have a proper story arc of their own, so it felt like they were just shoehorned in because the author wanted to catch up with them again.
All in all, not a winner for me.
2 stars