Trigger warning for bulling, self harm, cutting, suicidal thoughts and cyberbullying, relationship with a minor

What is it about: it is about a unpopular girl that was bullied. She discovers a night club and becomes the DJ.

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Intro: What a coincidence that i read my least favorite book the day after the day of love. I really wanted to enjoy this book but this book disappointed me. I read it because a youtuber mentioned it in a video and said that it was good. I looked at the reviews and most people enjoyed it. I expected it to be fun relaxing book about a girl with low self esteem discover herself through music. I didn’t know that it was going to mention self harm and get into some serous topics. I knew that there were going to be some bullying but i didn’t think that they would go beyond that. I was so mad when i was done with this book. I was going to give it two stars but as i kept on reading the number went lower and lower. I would give it zero stars if i could. It was terrible

Warning this post is long so you can skip through it if you like.

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Warning there are some spoilers

Bad

The book was too short:
It was only 276 pages long. Everything was so rushed. There were a few conflicts that the solution was just handed. Like when Pippa got Mad at Elise. At the end of the book, Elise was able to get Vicky to play at the club. Since Vicky was happy Pippa just stopped being mad at her.

Elise is a terrible main character:
Elise is supposed to be relatable to unpopular people with depression but she comes off as a jerk sometimes. HEY Elise! if you want people to like you why don’t you TRY being NICE and STOP FOCUSING on yourself! She is ok most of the time but she gets mad at anyone that wants to help her. The teacher asked if anything was wrong and she got mad at her for not asking until now. Also she got mad that Amelia called 911 because Elise cut her arm. Elise gets mad at her because she “Betrayed” her. SERIOUSLY! She did that because she cares about Elise’s safety. WHY IS SHE MAD! She saids that Amelia didn’t save her life but yes she did. She was literally a minute ago thinking of a way to kill herself but she decides to call Amelia instead. She even admits that she was scared that she hit a vein and that she wanted help.

I don’t know what she wanted to happen. During that part of the story Elise cut her arm then called Amelia to tell her that she cut her arm. Did she really think that she wouldn’t call 911 or tell her parents. Also another problem with that scene people that cut don’t like announcing to others when they cut themselves. Even when they do it for attention self harmers are ashamed of their scars and don’t like showing people. It is like a person with anxiety walking around announcing to everyone that they have anxiety. Self harmers don’t like being the center of attention. Elisa did that as revenge and that is not ok. She even saids that she wanted to make people feel bad that they didn’t help her. That is why she wanted to kill herself.

The author trys a little too hard to get us to feel bad for Elisa. She often comes off as rude and whiny. She mentioned that she way ahead of other students. She gets good at being a DJ too quickly. She is so good that people think that she’s better than Char at being the DJ. She gets the attention of START and they ask her to DJ Fridays. That is a day that not even Char is allowed to DJ. It is a big deal. She does all this and she is only 16. Not only is it not realistic it is annoying to hear her complain how much she hates herself then talk about being ahead of her grade.

Anyways back to her being rude. Her parents are divorced so she goes back and forth between parents. She doesn’t tell her parents that she has been DJing at a night club. The club is closer to her mom’s house so she keeps on asking her dad to go to her mom’s house. Her dad gets less and less time. She doesn’t care how her dad feels. She just does her thing. Even after he gets mad Elisa never says sorry. There was another scene that Elisa destroys her sister’s poetry castle because Elisa thought that she would become weird. That is no excuse. She spent weeks building it. She would stay up late working on it. Then what does Elisa do to make it up to her? Nothing. She just apologies. She doesn’t do anything special for him. Her apology wasn’t that good. She just saids that she is sorry and that she did it because she had depression. She actually used a metaphor. She still took blame but the apology could be better.

I’ll also like to add that she is supposed to be a character that has a difficult time making friends but it isn’t well done. When she actually trys it is simple for her to make friends. When she first met Vicky and Pippa they had one conversation then they snuck Elisa into a night club. She ditches them then suddenly they are friends. It isn’t with just them. Char just met her. They had one conversation. He has her switch the song because he has to go do something. Then he likes her. Elisa sits with Sally and 2nd person (i can’t remember the name). Elisa doesn’t talk to them because she isn’t interested in there conversations. That is because they mostly talk about the popular kids. Suddenly they are friends just because they sit at the same table.

Love triangle:
This book has the worst love triangle i’ve ever read. Elisa and Pippa both really like Char. Pippa and Char slept together. Pippa saids that she is in love with Char but Char doesn’t feel the same way. He only slept with her because she was hot. He even saids that. We don’t get any cute moments with them together that would make me support there relationship. There is only a few times of Pippa trying to flirt. Within a week that Pippa went to England, Char went after Elisa.

With Elisa and Char there is an age difference. Char is 20 and Elisa is only 16. That is a four year age difference. It would be fine if they were older but at this age they are at different paths in there life. When you are a teenager you change a lot in two years. This relationship is not only gross it us illegal. There is multiple times in the story they feel the need to point out that Elisa is only 16. That isn’t the only reason why there relationship is terrible. The only thing that they know about each other was that they both like music, that she is ahead of most students and that she is friends with Vicky and Pippa. He doesn’t know her other interest, her family, friends and life outside if DJing. Elisa didn’t even know his actual name until Vicky told her. Even with all that Char gets upset with Elisa for saying that she doesn’t love him. Char said that he loves her though but No he doesn’t. He bearly knows her. It seems like in the story that Elisa is only with Char for comfort. I am not kidding. At a certain part of the story Elisa gets upset and walks to Char’s house. Do the talk and calm her down. Nope. They kiss and have sex. Not too long ago Elisa told Char that she wasn’t going to have sex with him. I guess that was thrown out the window.

How this love triangle ends is terrible too. Char breaks up with Elisa. Why? It isn’t totally clear. It is either because Pippa got upset that he had sex with Elisa or he was jealous that Elisa gets to DJ on Fridays. Elisa doesn’t get that upset. She gets over it quick. It ends with the guy choosing non of the girls and Elisa learns nothing. It is mentioned at some point that it was believed that Char saw her scars. Either he didn’t know what it was or he ignored it. That plot point was dropped.

The characters:
All the characters are bland or bad. Non of the characters get any development. We bearly know anything about the characters. We only know enough to fit the plot. Vicky we just know that she liked to party and that she’s in a band. Pippa we just know that she is Vicky’s best friend, she came from England and she likes Char. The only back ground we learn was the information that was supposed to teach the authors that it is good to be unpopular.

The message of it is good to be unpopular:
I get what they were going for but nope. In part of the story they have Vicky’s band tell Elisa what they were like in high school. Everyone was unpopular exept Vicky. Vicky had a eating disorder. Sence she was skinny she was popular. She went to a therapist to get help. Eventually she started eating nornally and she gained some weight. Vicky wasn’t popular anymore. The problem i have with this message is that during that scene they were saying that unpopular people are more interesting than popular people. This message is saying that it is not good to be popular and that popular people have to change themselves or aren’t interesting. Including popular people everyone has there demons. Every person has there own story. This story shows popular kids in a negative way. It is mostly Vicky’s story that i don’t like.

The ending twist:
Towards the end of the book a mystery person has been writing a fake dairy and put it under Elisa’s name. A paragraph was posted every day and the whole school knew about it. It turns out that it was a random girl in school that we didn’t even see. Elisa even points out that she has never even head her name until she came in here. Then what is this random girl’s excuse? It wasn’t about her. She just wanted to do creative writing and the character so happens to have the same name, and go through the same stuff that Elisa went through. The worst part was that i think that she is serious. She acts like she doesn’t know what the problem was and that it was just creative writing. What kind of person would write how much they hate themselves and want to kill themselves for creative writing? Even if someone chooses that, most people would write a story on it not just a bunch of notes. And why would you open it to the public. *sigh* so stupid. Why did she pick a name that do happen to be the same girl that has depression? If the whole school was talking about it how could she not know what was going on? Does she live under a rock? Did she know but not care? Did she think that people were talking about her diarys? Sorry i’m asking so many questions. The point is that there are too many holes. It would be so much better to say that Amedia and Misty (the girl that wrote it. think that’s her name) are friends. Amedia was worried about Elisa so she talked to Misty. Misty doesn’t like Elisa so she writes a diary online. That makes more sence than what actually happened.

Representing Depression:
Even though it is clear that Elisa has depression the book doesn’t give that much information about depression. I don’t think they even used the word. Even though Elisa has depression she seems like a person pretending to have depression for attention. Like i said, earlier in the story she called Amedia to tell her that she cut her arm. People with depression don’t do that. Not even if they want attention or did it for attention they don’t like drawing attention to themselves.

I can’t give this book points for trying because i rather they get it right or not try at all. If it is done badly it gives the wrong message to people with depression or people that want to learn about depression.

Also with Elisa being a jerk thing, i don’t feel bad for her. If i met her i would tell her to see a therapist then leave. It is not a jerky move. Elisa is kinda toxic. I have my own junk to deal with. This is good advice for anyone that is in a toxic relationship of any kind. This can include friendships. You are not responsible for anyone’s happyness unless you are a parent. To help someone they have to deserve your help. They should be respectful. They have to be a person that you would want to help not a person that it is a chore to hangout with. You have your own junk to deal with. If you hangout with someone toxic they’ll bring you down with them.

The book could of been over long ago:
At the end of the book, Elisa’s mom ends up letting her continue being a DJ because she doesn’t want to take away something she loves. If Elisa told her mom the truth long ago then that would of saved so much drama. If Elisa told the school that she was a DJ then that would of solved the bully drama. If Elisa wanted so much attention she should of told everyone that she was a DJ. Then eventually more people would talk to her and some of them would be her friend.

When the fake dairys have been going around Elisa decided to not tell anyone. Not parents or the school. Cause that would of been the smart thing to do. That would of ended the drama. We can’t have that can we. Actually she didn’t tell anyone because she didn’t think that anyone would do anything. That is because the last time someone made fun of her she told her dad. He brought her to the basement to smash something that i can’t remember. After that they didn’t speak about it again. But the thing is they’ll find out eventually. Same thing with DJ. Did she expect to keep it a secret forever when there is a website. Oh yeah there is a web sight that pictures of the night club are posted. Even if it wasn’t did she expect to be able to go to her mom’s and sneak out whenever she wanted to go to the night club. Her parents end up finding out about the diarys from Amedia. It was predictable. I don’t know how Elisa didn’t see it coming.

The message of the story:
The main character learns nothing so there isn’t that much of a message. I guess you could say that the message could be do what you love but this story didn’t show it realistically. It could be self love but there was no development at all. It just happens. The story never even gives tips for people with depression.

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[U] Good

This section is going to be a lot shorter because i hated this book. There was only a few things that were good.

1.The writing was decent
2. Most of the characters were alright
3. Elisa didn’t end up getting back together with Char.
4. The characters didn’t take pity on Elisa because she has depression. When Elisa does something bad they don’t imediently forgive her. When she breaks her sister’s castle she doesn’t forgive her right away. When Elisa’s parents learn that she has been DJing they still ground her. When the whole school found the fake diary no one except Sally and other girl felt bad for her.

The TV show on Netflix, Bojack Horsemen, does a much better at this. Even though Bojack has depression the characters let him know that all the stuff that he does isn’t ok. His depression may explain the bad stuff that he does but it doesn’t excuse it. I have to give the book some credit. At least they tried.

5. This book does teach us the comments that people like to make to people with depression. If they see scars on someone’s arm there are some people that would say “you did it wrong”. Other part in the story people were mixing up narcissist and depression. Believe it or not some people do that.

6. Expect for the whole being a whiny jerk thing there were many moments in the story that was relatable. Like the scene that Elisa goes with the girls to the night club and ends up leaving because she feels like it doesn’t feel like it matters if she is there or not.

7. The shout out to different songs. It was kinda fun to see some of the songs i like mentioned in a book.

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Conclusion:
This book was terrible and you shouldn’t read it. It was rushed, had the worst live triangle ever and there was no development. The main character is bad and this book is offensive to people that gave depression. If you are really interested in this book look up the review. Even though this book was terrible i still had the urge to keep on reading and it was fun to find stuff that i hated. I think that this book still shouldn’t exist because it gives the readers the wrong idea of depression.

Sorry to all the people that liked this book. This is my opinion. I personally didn’t it. It is great if you liked it but this wasn’t for me.

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