If you enjoyed this, then I'd recommend Alice Oseman's novels, which are more somber and tense than the Heartstopper comics. This reminded me of Loveless in particular with regards to the setting and general character dynamics, but the main character in that book and the one in this book have quite different problems. This book is also a bit of a product of its time and some of the dialogue and attitudes are bit less culturally sensitive than a more contemporary book would probably be. I usually give books that I had a pretty good time with but didn't get really excited about 4 stars, but I can't quite give this book that rating. I started the book disliking all of the characters at least a tiny bit and none of them managed to fully grow on me. I mostly felt uncomfortable and worried while reading, right up until the end I just didn't trust that anything would be resolved or that Cath was going to make good decisions. I will say that it was interesting to read this after having read Carry On, since a decent percentage of the book is references to that story and the Simon Snow in-universe series. The audiobook narrator was a little too monotone for me, I had her sped up to 1.7 speed. 

My feelings towards this book are complicated. But after having read it, I understand why there is such a diverse response from readers. For the first hundred pages, I was bored. Fangirl read like a mediocrely written fanfic. BUT then around 200 pages in my feelings changed a bit

when Levi and Cath had their first kiss. No one writes soft, sweet romance quite like Rainbow Rowell.

I think the novel is slow paced which makes it feel impossibly long and it's arguable whether or not it needed to take up that much space, but it wasn't bad. And I'm a hopeless romantic so I fell for the last 200 pages, I couldn't put it down. I will say I love the characters. They're not exactly that elaboratelt written I guess (cause there's a LOT more that could be elaborated on) but they're just likeable. The world building was nice. I'd say this makes a good escapism book. I won't say it was love at first sight, but it's worth sticking it out 100%. I'm glad I finished it. 

Okay, I had such high hopes for this book because I really liked the premise HOWEVER. Cath sometimes reminded me of myself and I liked that but most times made me want to commit acts of arson because sometimes she was so unbelievably annoying, sometimes justified, most times incredibly annoying. I get that she’s scared of rejection and lonely but oh my god. She has anxiety, understandable, me too but sometimes if someone is annoying, it’s just because they are annoying. However the stuff with alcoholism and bipolar was done well and was interesting to see. I sort of liked the little splices of Simon Snow books and fan fiction because I knew what I was getting myself into but sometimes it goes on for too long. Another thing is the ending!! WHAT A LACK LUSTER ENDING OH MY GOD. I STUCK THROUGH ALL OF THAT TO GET THAT KIND OF ENDING? bleh. just one big bleh. Reagan was awesome and almost made the whole story for me. Anyways I can see how people like this but I think I’m just not a big fan of love stories anyway. Oh also I understand it is a “blatant rip off of Harry Potter” but I like that about it and like how it’s obviously about Draco x Harry