**I would like to thank Source Books for sending me a copy of this book, though I didn't get to it until after release date**

I'm Not Dying With You Tonight is a contemporary about two girls from polar opposite worlds colliding together (literally) and working together to survive the crazy events of just one night. Lena, an African American girl who has grown up in Atlanta, and Campbell, a Caucasian girl who moved to Atlanta only months previous. Although they are not friends, they must work together to survive a shooting, fights, and a riot. The streets of Atlanta aren't safe for these two girls, and they will do what it takes to survive the night, together.

I was really intrigued by the premise for this book since it was dealing with some real world issues. There is, unfortunately, still racism alive in this country, and that is something that is heavily pressed on in this book. I would say it is done in a very realistic way too, since we see both girls points of view throughout the story. As the reader, you can feel Campbell's and Lena's unease around African Americans they don't know in a neighborhood they've been told to stay away from, but Lena is more fierce towards strangers, while Campbell is more reserved. There is also the point Lena makes a few times that African Americans are always looked at like they are doing something wrong even if they are just going about their business, which is a hard truth. There was also the subject of white police officers targeting black people for things they had no part in. I think that the line for the stereotypes and breaking them was well done, especially towards the end. Throughout the story though, I wish they had been bent a little bit more.

I enjoyed this book, but it didn't do much to wow me. Literally everything that could go wrong did go wrong, and there were times where I found myself wanting to yell at the characters because of some of the choices they made. It really irritated me that Lena kept trying to get to Black even though he didn't really seem that interested in her well being, and then in the end his whole demeanor did a 180 and he acted like all he cared about was her. It would have honestly been more realistic if we never saw or heard from Black again based off of how he was treating Lena at the beginning. I do like that she wasn't all over him at the end and it seemed like she might do some thinking about him instead of continuing to follow after him all the time like a neglected puppy.

I also really liked the narrator change throughout the story, since it really put a hammer on the different lives these girls come from. Lena has grown up in the same place her whole life where there is financial struggle and fights break out regularly and the way she talked vs. Campbell moving into the situation and not understanding that this is a normal occurrence for some places and people and the way she talked. Campbell's chapters were like you would expect, in a "proper" way since she grew up in a different town with different dynamics, where Lena's chapters were more of how you would hear people talking on the street in Atlanta. Even though these two girls have very similar financial standings, they are completely different based off of their race and where they originated from. But both were able to pull their strengths into the other's weakness and survive the unthinkable.

I would recommend this book to anyone who is looking for that racial dynamic in a book and to kind of open your eyes to some of the stereotypes that still plague our country. It is one thing after another for Lena and Campbell, but their determination makes the story what it is.