Am I Normal Yet? (The Spinster Club #1)
by Holly Bourne
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary
My rating: 4 hearts
Publication date: August 1, 2015
Publisher: Usborne Publishing Ltd.
Synopsis:
All Evie wants is to be normal. She’s almost off her meds and at a new college where no one knows her as the girl-who-went-crazy. She’s even going to parties and making friends. There’s only one thing left to tick off her list…
But relationships are messy – especially relationships with teenage guys. They can make any girl feel like they’re going mad. And if Evie can’t even tell her new friends Amber and Lottie the truth about herself, how will she cope when she falls in love?
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Am I Normal Yet? was recommended to me by a friend who usually gives great recommendations, so I was very excited to read this one. And it didn't disappoint. It was a touching story about a young girl's struggle with mental illness, and it's such an important book. I would tell everyone to read this, because it mentions several issues connected to mental health that are real issues in society. Because of that, it's a very difficult book to review.
Evie was such a relatable character. I don't have OCD, like she does, but many of her thoughts and feelings are still highly relatable for teens. All she really wants is to be normal, and what teen hasn't at one point felt the pressure to be normal, to fit in? Of course, I think it can be especially good for people dealing with mental illness of different kinds. I'm going to get a little personal here. I have anxiety since a few years back, which has gotten way worse lately. And Evie's struggles mirrored mine so much, and it was such an amazing experience to read about a character like me.
The romance was great. You know how in all Young Adult books, the main character meets The One, falls in love and everything turns right in the world? Am I Normal Yet? threw all of that in the trash and did something totally different. Evie didn't meet a guy and suddenly all her problems were unimportant. Instead, it focused on the friendships in the story.
Speaking of the friendships, the friendship between Evie, Amber and Lottie is such a great example of what friendship should be like. It warmed my heart to read about them, and I think all YA authors should read this and take notes, because friendship - true friendship - is such a rarity in YA books nowadays, and I hate that. In reality, friendship - or the lack thereof - is one of the single most important things for teens, so why shouldn't teen books reflect that?
Another important theme was feminism. Guys, this was such an inspriring read. It was highly feministic, and dealt with many important topics that are a bit taboo in society. Also, the part about feminism connected to mental health was amazing and again mentioned several important issues, reinforcing the fact that this is a very important book.
Am I Normal Yet? was such an emotional, relatable story. Even if you don't have any mental health issues, it is an eye-opening book, even for me, who is very passionate about mental health. Honestly, I want every teen to get to read this book, because I truly think it could help so many kids struggling with fitting in, anxiety and romance.
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