Like so many members of the online book community, I grew up on YA literature – most of which follows high school age characters and deals with themes relevant to people in that age group. Also like many others in the community, I was frustrated when I aged out of YA and couldn’t find anything about characters my own age. It’s like authors and publishers think that as soon as you graduate high school, you become a full adult with adult privileges and problems.
Really, why high school? How many people actually think high school was the most interesting point in their life? And why are there so few books about being university-age?
This is why the summary for She Gets The Girl grabbed me. This story follows two girls navigating the epic highs and lows of the first few months of college. Molly Parker is impossibly shy, desperate to reinvent herself but with no idea how to go about doing it. Alex Blackwood is fun at parties and an incorrigible flirt, but bad at opening up to people and maintaining relationships. When the two girls meet at a party, Alex decides to help Molly win over the girl of her dreams… and hopefully prove to her own ex-girlfriend that she’s a good person.
You’ll never guess what happens next.
In these two protagonists, authors Rachael Lippincott and Alyson Derrick give us a painfully accurate depiction of what it’s like to move away to university. It’s a love story, yes, but it’s also a story about putting all your hope into a fresh start only to fall back into the same patterns. It’s about realizing that people are far more complicated and much less scary than you thought. It’s also a story about how your relationship with your parents changes when you move away and become your own person – something that isn’t talked about enough in fiction considering how many people struggle with it at this point in their lives.
As someone just out of university who definitely went through the whole “trying to reinvent yourself and then not changing at all” thing several times, so much of this book felt so cathartic to me. There’s something really special about seeing your own experiences reflected on the page and realizing that other people have gone through the same thing. Whether you have trouble meeting new people or with maintaining relationships, whether you have overbearing or absent parents, whether you spent your undergrad years partying too much or feeling lame for not partying, I think there’s something that anyone can relate to in this book. Moreover, even if you somehow can’t find anything of yourself in it, it’s still a great read because the characters are so well fleshed out. I’m extremely impressed that the authors managed to pack so many serious topics into a book so short and so light-hearted in tone. That takes skill!
Of course, the main draw of She Gets The Girl is the love story. Sapphic novels are still tragically difficult to come across, and this one promises lots of fun tropes. It delivers on those promises, too.
I don’t want to spoil anything about the romance, because I know it’s the main appeal of the book, but I will say that the pacing was great and the slow burn very believable. It’s one of those couples where they complement each other so well and each one makes the other a better person. I will be thinking about them for a long time!
I’d recommend She Gets The Girl to anyone looking for a fun sapphic romance that’s easy to read but still makes you feel things. It’s an especially good read for anyone in their late teens or early twenties who’s a little tired of reading about high schoolers. It’s already one of my favourite books of the year!
Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with an ARC of this book.
Goodreads rating: 4 stars.
She Gets The Girl comes out on April 5th, 2022.
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Brilliant review! I finished she gets the girl super recently and totally agree with your review! I thought the book was super sweet and cute… even if it was the slowest slow burn I’ve ever read haha. The cover is also so gorgeous! Here’s my review, check it out! 😊 https://hundredsandthousandsofbooks.blog/2022/05/10/recent-release-review-she-gets-the-girl/