This gut-wrenching YA novel spotlights how teen girls are so often used, manipulated, exploited, and disregarded by society. Jo-Lynn Kirby is learning how to navigate her world after facing cruelty and rejection by her peers along with disappointment and dismissal by the adults in her world. Her confusion is exacerbated by the sudden disappearance of her former best friend. Did she run away, or did something bad happen to her? Jo refuses to follow the community in writing her off, which leads to a suspenseful mystery. But the real story is in how Jo-Lynn learns to accept responsibility for her own actions, and to place blame on those who have hurt and abused her. 

One of the best young adult novels I've read in years, this debut novel focuses on Jo, aka Jo-hyphen-Lynn Kirby, as she searches for her former best friend. Maddie disappeared unexpectedly and no one seems to know why. The simplest answer is that she ran away...but did she? And if so, why? Jo and Hudson hatch a fake dating scheme to get Jo back into the circle of friends that she needs access to in order to figure out what happened to Maddie, and the dramatic twists and turns take off from there. 

This book is about consent, trauma, misogyny, the struggles of being a young girl in today's world, the beauty and heartbreak of female friendships, and finding yourself amidst all of it. The main characters in this book are seniors in high school, on the cusp of the next chapter in their lives. It's exciting and terrifying, and we all remember what that feels like. 

There is so much in this novel. It's a mystery, a romance, and a coming-of-age novel. There are a lot of places where it could go wrong, where some aspect could have been underdeveloped, where a character could have been swept under the rug -- but it never happens. Meredith Adamo writes an absolute gem that is unputdownable. 

Do not even think about skipping the Author's Note at the end, but don't you dare read it before you finish the book. 

This book left me in beautiful agony. It's not the kind of pretty you see in a curated insta post. This book is raw and emotional, leaving me bleeding. It was an absolute heart-wrenching and transformative experience to envision how stories told by others and by ourselves can be twisted and contrived, manipulated into a new narrative that fits a box. Fills the gap. Eases others around us. But it is not our true story.