Little White Lies | Book Review!

Little White Lies by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

⭐⭐⭐

Description from the Author

"I'm not saying this is Sawyer's fault," the prim and proper one said delicately. "But." 

Eighteen-year-old auto mechanic Sawyer Taft did not expect her estranged grandmother to show up at her apartment door and offer her a six-figure contract to participate in debutante season. And she definitely never imagined she would accept. But when she realizes that immersing herself in her grandmother's "society" might mean discovering the answer to the biggest mystery of her life - her father's identity - she signs on the dotted line and braces herself for a year of makeovers, big dresses, bigger egos, and a whole lot of bless your heart. The one thing she doesn't expect to find is friendship, but as she's drawn into a group of debutantes with scandalous, dangerous secrets of their own, Sawyer quickly discovers that her family isn't the only mainstay of high society with skeletons in their closet. There are people in her grandmother's glittering world who are not what they appear, and no one wants Sawyer poking her nose into the past. As she navigates the twisted relationships between her new friends and their powerful parents, Sawyer's search for the truth about her own origins is just the beginning. 

Set in the world of debutante balls, grand estates and rolling green hills, Little White Lies combines a charming setting, a classic fish-out-of-water story, and the sort of layered mystery only author Jennifer Lynn Barnes can pull off.

My Review

Page Count:400 pgs./9 hrs.,54 mins. 

Narrator: Katherine Littrell

Genre: YA Contemporary, YA Mystery

Series: Debutantes, Book 1

My thoughts are still kind of all over the place about this book. I really had fun with most of the book, but I agree with other reviews that this book should have been about 100 pages shorter. The story jumps between the present and the nine months leading up to the debutante ball. I definitely got a Gilmore Girls vibe from the relationships between Sawyer, her mom, and her grandmother. This is a contemporary story laced with a mystery surrounding the identity of Sawyer's father. 

The first half of the book was really funny, and I enjoyed reading about the Southern wealthy lifestyle. The second half was a little frustrating. A large chunk of the latter half of the book was a lot of characters running around trying to figure things out and building up to a big "event/plot twist," which ended up being very disappointing to me. The plot twist at the very end was something that I could have done without because it didn't seem to fit in with the rest of the story or the characters. 

Overall the scandals were really tame (except for one), which made the buildup disappointing. While this was a fun read for the most part, I found this book to be just OK. 

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Turtles All the Way Down

Turtles All the Way Down by John Green - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Description from the Publisher

It’s quite rare to find someone who sees the same world you see.

Sixteen-year-old Aza never intended to pursue the mystery of fugitive billionaire Russell Pickett, but there’s a hundred-thousand-dollar reward at stake and her Best and Most Fearless Friend, Daisy, is eager to investigate. So together, they navigate the short distance and broad divides that separate them from Russell Pickett’s son, Davis.
   
Aza is trying. She is trying to be a good daughter, a good friend, a good student, and maybe even a good detective, while also living within the ever-tightening spiral of her own thoughts. 

In his long-awaited return, John Green, the acclaimed, award-winning author of Looking for Alaska and The Fault in Our Stars, shares Aza’s story with shattering, unflinching clarity in this brilliant novel of love, resilience, and the power of lifelong friendship.

My Review
It is really hard to put all of my thoughts into words. Turtles All the Way Down is a book that makes you think...and think...and then think some more. This book contains some of the best descriptions of anxiety I have ever read. The character development was pretty good, especially Aza's character. She grew so much in this novel, and it was wonderful to see. I also enjoyed Daisy's character. Even though she was very wacky at times, she was human. She loved Aza, but also got frustrated with her because her mental illness affected Daisy too. Don't let the synopsis fool you. It reads as if the main plot is about finding Davis's father, Russell Pickett; however, this book is really about Aza's mental illness and her struggle in daily life. 

As someone who suffers from anxiety, sometimes this book was hard to read because the descriptions were things I have felt or experienced. Sometimes this book feels like you are in the middle of a panic attack. Your heart races, you can't get your thoughts together, sometimes you feel like you are dying, and you feel EVERYTHING all at once. I have seen a lot of reviewers state that they did not like that the book made them feel that way, but I am glad it did. This is such a raw, rare glimpse into how anxiety works, and it is hard to understand if you've never experienced it. John Green did such a good job writing this novel in a way that makes readers FEEL anxiety and how it can take over every aspect of your life. This book made me feel understood, and it made me feel like it is OK to feel the things I do because that is how mental illness affects everything. 

Aza talks about "thought spirals." Basically, your thoughts keep spiraling, getting tighter and tighter with no end, which is something that I experience very frequently. “The thing about a spiral is, if you follow it inward, it never actually ends. It just keeps tightening, infinitely.” This is exactly what my anxiety feels like! I am in constant battle with my negative thoughts, and most of the time they win. Reading about Aza's thoughts and struggles  makes me and my thoughts feel validated, and I know that I am not alone in this battle against mental illness. 

I also like that John Green addressed mental illness medications in this book. Unless you are someone who has had to take medication for mental illness, Aza's attitude toward her pills might be a little hard to understand. I do have to take medication for my mental illness. Sometimes I take it every day because it does make me feel better. Sometimes my mental illness wins, and I don't take it for days. Some days I simply don't want to take it because I am tired of having to take medication that helps lessen my mental illness but doesn't cure it. Aza feels this way in the book, and it was so refreshing to see such a realistic portrayal of this. 

Again, I am just in awe at how accurate the depictions are in this book. My respect for John Green has increased because of this and because he put his heart into the book. From what I understand, he struggles with anxiety and obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and, because of that, this book feels so incredibly personal. 

Please go read this! You will not be disappointed. 

Favorite Quotes
"To be alive is to be missing."

"Love is not a tragedy or a failure, but a gift." 

"I, a singular proper noun, would go on, if always in a conditional tense." 

"One of the challenges with pain--physical or psychic--is that we can really only approach it through metaphor. It can't be represented the way table or a body can. In some ways, pain is the opposite of language.” 

"You pick your endings, and your beginnings. You get to pick the frame, you know? Maybe you don't choose what's in the picture, but you decide the frame.” 

"Your now is not your forever."

My favorite: “There is hope, even when your brain tells you there isn't.” 

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