Of all the teen/YA books I have read in recent memory (= the last 4 years), this one definitely stands out as one of the stronger ones. The characters are lovable and three dimensional, the general portrayal of teens (fandom, interests, weirdness that's actually not all that weird at all) was very well executed and believable, and the relationships of the characters to each other and themselves are organic and well-paced.

In all honesty, this would have been a five star book for me, if it wasn't for two factors. First and foremost: I'm not really the target audience for this story anymore. While a lot of Frances' worries and thoughts resonated deeply with me, I think I would have had a stronger reaction to them had I read this last year or back before I started uni. That's not the book's fault, but it also kind of makes it hard for me to give it an honest five stars.

Secondly, we have the pacing. While this is definitely the book's strong suit (the chapters are short and snappy), it also caused the tone and atmosphere to take a dip very suddenly. While a lot of it was foreshadowed, I found the themes to go from light-hearted and wholesome to dark and foreboding a bit too quickly, causing me to still be in the soft emotional state the first half of the book had left me in, while I was also processing the events of the second half. Maybe this is a general YA thing, though! I'm not one to say.