All book reviews are subjective. This is a good thing to remember while scrolling through Bookstagram, or Goodreads, or wherever you get your book recommendations. I know that personally I can't help but be drawn to the books featuring characters that either remind me of who I was, who I am, or make me think about who I want to be. Ashley reminds me of who I was and sometimes still am to an uncomfortable degree.

As a Black person who has lived in majority white spaces for most of life, I can attest that, if you're not careful, you begin to believe the things the people around you say about Black people. You begin to distance yourself from the other Black folk. You begin to believe the lies that if you behave a certain way, dress a certain way, embrace certain things, you will be accepted. But the truth is that you can never stop being Black. And instead of seeing the myriad of different ways to be Black and concluding that Black people are not a monolith, the white folks will see you and decide that you are the exception. All other Black people are the same.

I loved the unlikeability of Ashley. I love the slow journey Christina Hammonds Reed take her on through this journey. The exploration of casually racist friends and selfish boyfriends and the conflict between wanting to fit in while knowing you stand out. But it's the scenes with Ashley's family and with the other Black kids that were the most powerful for me. The Black kids who hang out with each other, not to be divisive, but because with each other they are not expected to be perfect in order to be human. And Ashley's parents who are criticised for abandoning their people and their history but whose only wish is to protect their daughters from the horrors of the world.

Christina does a fantastic job of not providing the answers and honouring the experience of the reader to form their own conclusions. If you're a fan of coming-of-age novels, then this is the next one to reach for.