When Sana and her family move to California she begins to wonder if it’s finally time for some honesty, especially after she meets Jamie Ramirez. Jamie is beautiful and smart and unlike anyone Sana’s ever known. There are just a few problems: Sana’s new friends don’t trust Jamie’s crowd; Jamie’s friends clearly don’t want her around anyway; and a sweet guy named Caleb seems to have more-than-friendly feelings for her. Meanwhile, her dad’s affair is becoming too obvious to ignore anymore.
This was a good book and there were aspects that I really liked but there were also things that annoyed me.
Firstly I liked the premise of the book - Sana is having to deal with figuring outher sexuality and coming out (or not), as well as dealing with being the only Japanese-American girl (in her first school) and then being racially stereotyped when she moves to California.
I really liked Sana and Jamie's relationship - it was very sweet. I think the cultural expectations Sana faced (like enduring hardship and going out of your way to not make other people uncomfortable) andhow this affected her sexuality were sensitively portrayed. Her mum could be a right old dragon, but that's coming from a white girl who was brought up by fairly liberal parents. I liked that she and her mum resolved their differences in the end, although everything got wrapped up quite quickly in the last couple of chapters.
I had kind of mixed feelings about Sana. In some respects she was really quiet and obedient and respectful, which I get was part of her upbringing - her mother never lost an opportunity to tell her where she was screwing up or to correct her or reprimand her. And that's okay, some characters are quiet and it's not a dreadful thing, but this side of her character left her making really dumb decisions at times.
Then other times, Sana could be really confident and outgoing and made good decisions, like the way she pursued Jamie and made her intentions clear, and it just left me thinking, 'Why can't you be like that all the time??'
Overall I think this book was okay, but it left me vaguely unsatisfied.
3 stars