How can you live a ‘normal’ life when you have a mental illness? Evie is a normal teenager in loads of ways: she’s a feminist just starting college, and she wants to date, party and hang out with her friends. But there are some major things getting in the way of having what she would call a typical life: her severe anxiety and OCD are so disabling, that often she can’t leave the house. When the story starts, she’s easing off her meds, and it’s a bumpy ride.  This book is about serious stuff, but somehow, it pulls off being absolutely hilarious without being insensitive. I couldn’t stop nodding my head on a lot of the points Evie makes about feminism and anxiety. Bourne has all her facts straight, and she addresses some of the problems with how society tends to talk about mental illness. “Now mental health disorders have gone 'mainstream'. And for all the good it’s brought people like me who have been given therapy and stuff, there’s a lot of bad it’s brought too. Because now people use the phrase OCD to describe minor personality quirks. 'Oooh, I like my pens in a line, I’m so OCD.' NO YOU’RE F***** NOT! 'Oh my God, I was so nervous about that presentation. I literally had a panic attack.' NO YOU F***** DIDN’T!” If you’ve ever felt out of place, or not ‘normal’ in some way, you’ve got a friend in Evie. As she tells her sometimes painful story, I found it easier to accept some parts of myself I’d rather didn’t exist.  This is the first in The Spinster Club trilogy, so if you like this one, check out the others.  This is a book for anyone struggling with #mentalhealth #fittingin #OCD #anxiety  Video review here

Grades are the most important thing in the world. Or are they? Frances has built her whole life around the lie (IMO!) that getting the best grades is the most important thing. She’s a self-labelled “study machine” and all that’s ever mattered is getting into Oxbridge, until she makes friends with Aled. He’s clever like Frances, but unlike her, he hates the thought of going to uni, hates the pressure, hates all the expectations.  I LOVE THIS BOOK. I remember feeling so awful around exams and working out my future, that all the pressure had the opposite to the intended effect: I just checked out. And because everyone else had all these ideas of what was important, I lost all sense of who I was. Some of Frances's experiences just felt so familiar. The characters in this book are so great and so relatable, that it’s actually a problem for me that I can’t be real friends with them. “What happens when you say no to the one thing everyone expects you to be? what happens when you craft your own future, when you nurture that one strange hobby that nobody knows about, when you give yourself to something that truly makes you happy?” This book is for anyone struggling with #examstress #pressureabouththefuture and #findingyourself. Video review here

Inequality between men and women in our society is lit up under a spotlight. Belle and Joni live in a society where if you identify as female you can choose to follow the Doctrine and try to become a ‘Pretty’. That means, amongst other things, you need to live up to nearly impossible beauty standards and be sexually passive for the benefit of men. Or you can refuse to comply and be labelled an ‘Objectionable’. If you do that , you face social rejection and ridicule. I’m not gonna lie, parts of the book made me REALLY uncomfortable. Descriptions of Smut (porn), where women are spat on and degraded, is something the Doctrine encourages people to watch to reinforce men and women’s places in their society. There are loads of descriptions of the pressures people face to look a certain way, and even though this is dystopian, it’s not that far from the truth. There’s a long way to go before there’s true equality between genders.  This book isn’t the right prescription for you if you want to feel warm and cosy about the world, but it is right for you if you’re fed up of misogyny, and you want some validation. “ . . . we’re all groomed to worry constantly about what we look like – it’s a deliberate pressure. It’s designed to keep us down. To limit us. Divide us. Masks…Beauty…it’s all about weakening and dividing us.” This is a book for anyone who’s pissed with the # patriarchy, # misogyny, or struggling with the impact of # sexualassault and #bodyimage (although massive TRIGGER WARNING — there are some deeply disturbing descriptions). Video review here

Mystery and tragedy on a private island. Cadence and her family spend every summer on their private island, along with Gat, who Cadence falls in love with, despite her grandfather’s disapproval that Gat isn’t white American. Gat, Cadence and two of her cousins hang out every summer, but suddenly, everything changes.  Cadence has a head injury that causes horrible migraines, and she relies on pain killers, which causes all sorts of gossip amongst her family. Worst of all, she can’t remember what caused it, and no one will tell her, even though they all know what happened. This book is full of twists, surprises and tragedy, and takes a hard look at the devastating consequences our actions can sometimes cause. It also explores the problems caused by class and racial tensions when they’re left unchecked.  “We should not accept an evil we can change.”  #drugaddiction #racism #classism #familydisagreement #consequences #privilege

Emmy’s accident has changed everything. Now her brother Joey’s in rehab, Luther’s in juvie and Candy’s dead. Rich parents, nice house, good grades, she shouldn’t have much to complain about, but everyone is talking. There’s so much noise that she finds quiet in the arms of the boy next door. But it must be secret, he says. “Just between us.” This book has everything that’s tough about being in high school as well as home issues like #controllingparents and #addiction. Recommending for 15+

This is a story about bullying and about hiding who you are. A combo of horrid bullies and the passing of her mother causes Libby to become  America’s fattest teen.  She was so fat she had to be cut out of her house and a film crew were there to see it. It’s not long after she restarts school that people discover who she is. Jack is hugely popular but is hiding a terrible secret. He has prosopagnosia or face-blindness and has trouble identifying even his family members. A dual narrative with a slow burn love story - I LOVE this book! This is a book for discussing #bodyimage and #bullying.

Deaf teen on the run hides from her abusive Chief of Police father with famous band. Alison is desperate to run away from her abusive dad who does not understand her need to be part of a Deaf community. Famous rock star, Jace, has promised himself he will never, ever speak sign language again. This is, until he meets Alison, who has bruises on her arm and a swelling on her face that he cannot just ignore. Battling with huge emotional baggage, the pair embark on a secret friendship that changes both their lives. A teen, clean #romance that explores #deafness #physicalabuse fame and corrupt policemen.

The true story of an 11-year-old British boy who swam across the channel! From the first page, this is an incredible story of achieving, seemingly an impossible dream. Although I’d never attempt something so barbaric myself, I was fascinated to find out just why (seriously, why?!) and how Tom came do something so incredible. Tom Gregory writes beautifully. It’s not so much a book about swimming but of growing up and having the determination, dedication and passion to complete such a task. Anyone can be inspired, just as he was: just an ordinary kid, from an ordinary background, pretty much proving that anyone can do anything. A book for exploring #change #comingofage #findingyourself and #growingup “I finally understood …that what I was doing was not normal. In the final act it had become so utterly unpleasant that I wished it all away. I decided I would never do this again, ever. Nothing could possibly be worse than this form of mental and physical torture. The thing I thought I wanted for some years now, to hold a world record and be the youngest swimmer, turned out not to be something I wanted at all.”

Self-harmer surrounded by addicts breaks free of old habits. Charlie Davis doesn't know how she got to Creely, but she doesn't want to leave. The doctors are kind, it's warm and she has a bed to sleep in. The bandages on her arms and legs hide her shame for a while; selective mutism keeps her secrets hidden too. But sooner, rather than later, her time is up. The bandages are off, her voice must be used and she's back in the real world of addicts and bad influences trying to find a place to stay, a job and trying hard to not cut. This is a book for exploring #selfharm #cutting and getting over #additction.

A non-fiction self-help guide to not giving a hoot about what anyone else thinks. Growing up is confusing, especially when you’re trying not to ‘let people down’ or ‘live up to’ someone else’s expectations. If you fancy being free from all that, this is the book for you. Matthew Syed is a two time Olympic champion tennis tabler and has plenty of experience doing the wrong things (like, almost burning down a bakery! Carrying a skateboard to and from school every day for a year! And worst of all, throwing his favorite book in the bin before he’d finished it!) just because it seemed ‘cool’. He even took a job he hated because everyone else thought it was such an opportunity for him. Although some of the language in this book might seem a little patronising at times, it’s sage advice for adults just as much as younger readers. It’s also pretty funny as he recounts his childhood of fashion disasters, embarrassing parents and stupid decisions. It would be enormously useful if you’re someone who often says no to things because that pesky Kid Doubt (Matthew’s metaphor for your own worries) gets in the way and makes you believe things that aren’t true. Things like ‘I’m not good enough’, ‘I don’t deserve this’, or even , ‘I couldn’t possibly.’ Matthew’s question is, why ever not? Stick to the plan, your manifesto for living (which he’ll help you create along your reading journey) and dare to be you. This is a book for #anxiety #growingup #isolation #selfdoubt

Misogyny in a religious setting, this book examines girl-girl friendships and fear of female sexuality in a hostile environment. Tierney, like all the other sixteen year olds from her town, must survive her ‘Grace Year’. Some of the girls have been promised in marriage before they are all abandoned in a desolate place, barely protected from poachers who will try to take their skin and body parts. It’s a tradition to rid the girls of their ‘magic’ by depriving them of their basic home comforts. Soon the trapped together girls turn nasty. But why? Criticising social norms and examining this violence of girls towards other girls, this book plunges into some serious trust issues. At times, I was sweating and fearful of the poachers (from the safety of my warm bed) and genuinely rooting for true love. Friendship, a fickle thing for a 16 year old, takes courage and trust. A book for those feeling disappointed by society, religion or friendship and for exploring  #isolation #complicatedgirlfriendships #feelingdifferent #misfitism #feelingtrapped “Maybe we had to destroy everything in order for something to be born anew”

A story of being completely and utterly lost among school bullies, immigration proceedings, political prisoners and hidden truths. Sade’s mother is shot on their driveway in Nigeria just as she gets ready for school one morning. Why shoot the wife of a journalist? Because that journalist, Sade’s father, wrote the truth about the Nigerian government. Her brother Femi stops speaking and within the space of two days they are abandoned in London not knowing who they can trust or how much truth they can tell. Not knowing where their father is, or whether he’s dead or alive. The rhetoric around immigration and refugees among politicians and newspapers can be confusing. If you want to understand what it’s really like to have to flee your home country under difficult circumstances, this is the book for you. #refugees #immigration #politics #isolation