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A review by loischanel
Melt My Heart by Bethany Rutter
3.0
Melt My Heart is a boundlessly energetic and cutesy teen romance novel that sees Lily Rose, a fat, seventeen year old girl from Weston Bay, on a mission to step out of her comfort zone and try New Things before she has to go away to university. Part of her plan involves dating which is foreign territory for her, unlike her hot twin sister, Daisy, but thankfully she has her best friend, Cassie on hand to help.
I loved the way this book started, I was immediately on board within the first few pages. The writing has a presence that grabs your attention from the outset. I also loved the bisexual and fat representation and how these aspects of one's personality are things to be celebrated despite daily microaggressions that constantly typify the experiences of people like Lily and Cassie.
This book did really irk me inasmuch as I enjoyed it; I loved how authentic it was but it also felt hurried in places as though I was reading an abridged version of actual events. Certain story arcs ended before they even began and the development of the story overall felt more surface-level than I would've liked. It was so skeletal that for some sections, you could get away with just reading dialogue (not that I did that).
This book is really conscientious, but I had a few niggling issues in terms of how it represents different communities, such as the couple of occasions where Muslim hijabi women have their hijabs referred to as headscarves rather than by its actual name. I might be reading too much into things (since Muslim women also use the term 'scarf' as well as 'hijab' interchangeably) but there's an element of erasure in not defining things as they are and instead using words that might sound more palatable.
Despite my issues with the rushed nature of this book, I have to take into consideration the audience that Melt My Heart is primarily aimed at. As a light-hearted, teen romance (kind of coming-of-age) story, the breeziness of it will go down well with younger readers, especially those who can see something of themselves in Lily's lovable character.
I loved the way this book started, I was immediately on board within the first few pages. The writing has a presence that grabs your attention from the outset. I also loved the bisexual and fat representation and how these aspects of one's personality are things to be celebrated despite daily microaggressions that constantly typify the experiences of people like Lily and Cassie.
This book did really irk me inasmuch as I enjoyed it; I loved how authentic it was but it also felt hurried in places as though I was reading an abridged version of actual events. Certain story arcs ended before they even began and the development of the story overall felt more surface-level than I would've liked. It was so skeletal that for some sections, you could get away with just reading dialogue (not that I did that).
This book is really conscientious, but I had a few niggling issues in terms of how it represents different communities, such as the couple of occasions where Muslim hijabi women have their hijabs referred to as headscarves rather than by its actual name. I might be reading too much into things (since Muslim women also use the term 'scarf' as well as 'hijab' interchangeably) but there's an element of erasure in not defining things as they are and instead using words that might sound more palatable.
Despite my issues with the rushed nature of this book, I have to take into consideration the audience that Melt My Heart is primarily aimed at. As a light-hearted, teen romance (kind of coming-of-age) story, the breeziness of it will go down well with younger readers, especially those who can see something of themselves in Lily's lovable character.