This Impossible Light by Lily Myers - OPTIONAL

Myers, Lily This Impossible Light. 339 pages. Philomel Books (Penguin) 2017. (Imprint of Penguin Random House) Language: G (0 swears) Mature Content: PG (Familial Separation, Depression, and Eating disorders) Violence: PG

Ivy is having a pretty rough year. From her father divorcing her mother, to her mother’s subsequent depression and her own distance from her best friend, she feels like everything is out of control. That is, until she decides to manage her eating habits. For a while, everything is great… until she’s eating way less then she should, failing school, and everything goes into a tailspin once again.  

This book had good intentions, and I’m glad that topics like depression and anorexia are being addressed in young adult novels, but in this case I feel it could have been executed much better. The main character has not much voice or personality, and the people she interacts with feel like stereotypical caricatures. I understand that sometimes authors don’t give their main characters much voice so that the reader can insert themselves into whatever the character is going through and relate to them more, but while I understand the motive of it, I don’t think it works. Because the characters don’t have anything in them, you are left with the external issues only. Normally these issues would be compelling, but in this instance they fell flat.

HS- OPTIONAL. Jewels