"I had very low expectations for this book as I did not know much about it, and it still managed to miss the bar by a mile.

I am not one to criticize a book just to criticize it, or for the sake of being contrary. I am very critical of everything I read, but at the end of the day I can disregard most of the things I find wrong with the book because the overall picture overshadowed the bad or the mistakes. This book is different, and very very deserving of criticism that I have not seen from anyone else.

To begin, I would like to point out that this book was a bit too explicit to really be considered young adult. There were a lot of sexual scenes that I was very uncomfortable listening to, especially because I had absolutely no idea they would be included. That, however, is the least of my issues with this book.

My main issue with This is Why They Hate Us was a glaring one, and it was the borderline (or, let's face it, blatant) pedophilic ideas it pretty much praised. First of all, the book Call Me By Your Name was praised by the main character despite being a very problematic book that promotes unhealthy age gaps in MLM relationships, as well as being written by an author that is literally an admitted pedophile. This was challenged a little later in the book by Mr. Chastman, but the main character Enrique didn’t seem to get the message and didn’t denounce the book at all. Worse than that is what happened after Enrique found out that his friend whom he had just hooked up with often used dating apps to find men in the area. Enrique creates a profile later when he is feeling lonely, lying and saying that he is twenty-one despite being seventeen. He starts chatting with an older man and makes plans to meet up with him and drink, hoping to hook up. The man he meets up with ends up being his English teacher, Mr. Chastman, which is horrifying in itself, but what was more horrifying was that Enrique was invited into Mr. Chastman’s house afterward and proceeded to stay there for hours, flirting with his teacher, outing his friends, and even going on a long thought-tangent about how he would hook up with his teacher if he was down and that he wished his teacher would just kiss him or initiate something. I almost had to stop listening to the book. Besides the obvious inappropriateness of the teacher inviting his student inside in the context that he did, the conversations that happened were disgusting. Mr. Chastman even speaks about sexual things to his student and gives him advice that crosses a boundary.

This book was also extremely oversexualized, considering it was about a minor. Minors have sex, that’s a fact. But in this book, it was not only described in way too much detail but it was just way too much in general. There was no conversation about safe sex or the dangers of not engaging in such. There was also no conversation of consent, within a sexual context or else. Enrique and his partners never ask for consent, except for maybe one time. Enrique just kisses people or starts sexual acts without checking to see if it is okay first, which sets a terrible example for anyone reading the book.

I hated the way that this book dealt with the topic of mental illness, too. Enrique was constantly referring to himself as ‘crazy� or ‘insane� and acted as if being mentally ill was the worst thing that could ever happen. As a mentally ill person, I hated this representation. Mental illness manifests differently in everyone, of course, but this just reinforced stigmas that have surrounded depression and did nothing to normalize it. Mental illness was used as a plot point, rather than a truly important part of Enrique. There was also a part of the story where Enrique finally confesses his struggle with suicidal ideation to his best friend Fabiola, and she literally just asks him how he would’ve killed himself and then tells him that his way of choice was a good one. That is a terrible thing to say and is especially bad for mentally ill people reading this book that could take that as an encouragement to go through with that method. Keep in mind that this book contained no trigger warnings that I know of.

My last big issue was with Fabiola, Enrique’s best friend. Despite being bisexual herself, she constantly makes inappropriate jokes at Enrique’s expense. She fetishizes him and makes terribly inappropriate and sexual comments about him, going as far as to say she’s going to “beat off� to the thought of him doing something sexual with a guy and then getting mad at Enrique when he says that’s gross. Her comments go beyond what is okay for friends to say to each other, yet her behavior is never challenged in the text. She also is ignorant about mental health issues and encourages Enrique to do things that will be harmful to him.

As for small issues, I don’t feel the need to elaborate on: the book perpetuates the idea that there is a way to “look� gay; there is no mention of asexual people and the book promotes the idea that everyone is interested in sex and that you aren’t “normal� if you don’t have that interest; there is no discernable plot (or at best the plot is all over the place); Enrique’s relationship with Saleem was not developed whatsoever; there are a lot of storylines that are never finished; there are no non-cisgender characters; and the voices that the audiobook narrator gave to the female characters felt vaguely misogynistic.

Tl;dr, this book was awful and awfully problematic. I would not recommend it to my worst enemy. 1.25/5 stars, and that’s being generous. I am almost never this harsh in my reviews for books, but I was horribly offended by this book and after much thought I feel that this review was warranted.

That being said, thank you to NetGalley and Dreamscape Media for the ARC."

"Huh. Talk about disappointing. I was all set to like this book because the blurb sounded really interesting. And let me preface this by saying I don't mind insta-love AT ALL, but this just didn't ring true. I felt no connection between the MC's. In fact, I felt no emotion while reading this book. The love scenes weren't emotional or sexy to me. Even the descriptions of the killings were unemotional.

I've not read any books by either of these authors, so maybe they aren't for me. I don't know. But I just did not connect with this book on any level."