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A review by overbookedmama
I Kissed Shara Wheeler by Casey McQuiston
3.0
I feel conflicted about rating and reviewing this book because I don't think I'm the target audience. Casey McQuiston's foray into YA in my mind is decidedly geared toward high school students. Ultimately for me, it was a little too similar to Paper Towns by John Greene. The writing defies genres...part mystery, part YA romance, part queer coming-of-age story. The romance really kicked in when the characters started communicating their feelings better in the last 25% or so of the book. There's a scene where Smith gets bored of trying to find all Shara's clues and it happened at about the same point I considered giving up on this book. I'm glad I didn't. There were some really important conversations that happened between the characters and I hope this book gets into the hands of the people that need to read it most. Smith's discussion with Chloe about the definition of non-binary was particularly tender, and something only Casey could have written so beautifully and tactfully. As always, there's great representation in this story. It's disappointing that Chloe was so boring yet it's through her POV we hear the story. I also appreciated the content warning at the beginning about elements of this story's setting in the Bible belt. This wasn't my favorite book, but it's one I might recommend to the right person.