A review by ratxheart
The Yearbook by Holly Bourne

challenging dark sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

 
The main character and her love interest are the only characters that aren't two dimensional and shallow. It's realistic for the protagonist at her age to be flawed - pretentious and judgemental of people. But it's problematic to leave her shaming other girls for caring about their appearance unchallenged by other characters or even herself realising later as she does the same things she criticizes other girls doing. 

 
  Book heavily focuses on domestic violence. Paige blames her brother for dad making him the 'golden child' and her unawareness of this dynamic doesn't make sense given that Paige is perfectly capable of noticing and describing the cycle of abuse patterns in her family. Even though her brother is vocal about how abusive the family is, he is "just like dad" and "so selfish" for refusing to spend more time in this toxic family as a pacifier. It's fine as an initial point - keeping abuser happy is a typical survival instinct of threat mitigation. However, there is no growth, the blame continues even after we learn that a) dad blowing up is inevitable; b) she herself spends all weekends with her aunt for a breath of fresh air leaving mom alone with dad, and it is hypocritical to be angry at brother for doing the same. 

Additionally, the story misses out on a literal adult with a power to intervene or walk away - her mother. Disproportionate blame on brother lets her completely of the hook for her neglect and enablement the child abuse. Paige's preferred solution is making sure Adam doesn't leave so it's safer for mom to be emotionally abused trad wife. It is sexist to portray mom as a 'helpless victim' but expect the older sibling to drop everything to "save them". Not registering mom's agency is unfair, she is not socially isolated, has friends, takes care of herself, goes to yoga and at the end it's her choice between her kids or her husband. Sure, abuse does mess up with your head but in this particular case there is nontrivial amount of freedom of time and movement to find help. As a parallel Paige registers Cara (ex-bullied girl who joins the bullies to please them out of fear) as complicit, but not her mom.

The payoff to bullying in the last few pages was so unsatisfying. Documenting every single act of bullying in the yearbook gives the bullies even more power, because it publicly victimizes all the other students all over again. There was even a scene with Cara being uncomfortable of featuring her mental health consequences of bullying in the yearbook, but the main motivation is exposing bullies, not thinking about the impact on victims. There were multiple opportunities to stand up or even console victims after the fact with no social consequences, but they weren't taken.   

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