The writing style didn’t work for me, but the premise is cute and I think some teens will like it very much.

It took me much longer than usual to read this book because I kept getting distracted by things that were more...interesting? I don't know, I did love the message of finding and pursuing your own dreams and learning to take chances on yourself despite what others might think. But I found myself getting kind of annoyed with the characters, especially at the beginning of the book. Rachel just seemed too angry for no reason, and though some of that was explained throughout the book, I didn't feel like the justification fully explained why she was always so angry. I liked the character arcs overall and liked how they tied into the overall messages of the book, but the plot didn't hold my attention very much. I love a good, light rom-com as much as the next person but this just didn't grab me like I was hoping it would. A good story with good messages about self-identity and family but overall an average read.

*Big thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the eARC in exchange for an honest review!*

I have been so excited for this book that I even preordered it, & it did not disappoint.
Not only does Aminah Mae Safi do such a great job of writing sassy girls who aren’t afraid to tell it like it is, but this may even be MORE feminist than her previous book if that’s even possible, with so many great quotes about how women are overlooked in society.
I adored this book, I loved the writing, and the way that even the simplest things like waiting to hear back about another opportunity before putting down a deposit for college are presented as such a high-stakes conflict that makes the main characters sick to their stomachs with suspense at every turn.
The characters, even the side characters, were well-rounded and beautifully written with such great dialogue. Even the parents in this book have such witty banter.

2.5 stars

I was so excited for this book, you don't even understand. The cover, the synopsis, the f/f rep, the tropes, the setting? It seemed like an immediate new favorite book. Unfortunately, while overall I thought this book was cute and I hardcore shipped the two main characters, even that couldn't save this book for me. I'm usually perfectly satisfied with an average book if it has characters I adore, however, in this case, I found so many issues with the writing and characters it took away from my enjoyment of the book. I am FAR from a writer and I've never been too good with grammar, but even I could see the inconsistencies in the characters, writing, and flimsy plot devices. It got so irritating that I had to talk about it. Again, I went into this book actively wanting to love it and it still let me down which really disappoints me.

Despite all that, let me get into what I did like. I loooooovvveeeee the cover. It's honestly so beautiful and makes my heart happy to look at. It's so rare to get a mainstream-ish YA book with a f/f couple PROUDLY shown on the cover. I hope that despite my issues with this book we get more of this sort of thing in the future, preferably with better content though. I thought that the characters were both super different, interesting, and amazing in their own ways. I sometimes think the writing and flimsy plot devices took away from them which is such a shame because they deserved so much better. I shipped them so hard during the first 70% or so and I'll get into why the end kind of ruined it for me later, but, overall I loved them. They both were ambitious and independent and had very interesting backstories to read about and I'm so glad we got into that. I also love all the representation (rep) in this book! Of course, we've got the f/f rep (lesbian rep, in this case), Mexican rep, Jewish rep, and Muslim rep. That's always so important and amazing to see in new books! It makes me very happy to see these stories and experiences portrayed, however as amazing as that is I still had a few issues with this book. Let's start with everything wrong with the writing:

To start, one of my biggest issues with this book was that the MAIN, IMPORTANT conflicts were so half-baked and seemed like conflicts that either wouldn't have happened with any two reasonable human beings, would've been fixed with BASIC comunication skills, or flat out didn't make much sense to the characters and their motives. I'll give a couple of examples, which are :

**SPOILERS** so beware until I say they're done. (view spoiler) Next example: (view spoiler)**SPOILERS DONE**

Besides the SUPER flimsy examples of conflicts I gave, there is somehow MORE bad writing. Something I HATE in multi-POV (point of view) books (two POVs in this book) is when the writer randomly switches POVs in a specific person's chapter. I distinctly remember reading a chapter (which had to have been either from Sana or Rachel's POV) where I genuinely thought I'd misread the chapter heading because out of nowhere it went from one of their POVs to the other girl's. No explanation; and it was very clear they'd switched because it went from, for example, "X noticed Y was glaring at her" to "Y could smell her fragrant shampoo" out of NOWHERE. This happened a couple of times and it's just frustrating because it took me out of the story and confused me. If you're going to GIVE chapters specific POVs then please stick to them. Next, and this is less of a big issue but it still bugged me. I can take fairly high levels of cheesy/cringe dialogue in romance because obviously, I expect it. However, this book almost felt like chunks of cringey dialogue from rom-coms was pasted in and it felt so unnatural and weird. It went from a light and sarcastic tone to them acting like the Titanic was about to sink and they had to save each other or they were doing a public show of their love. It was so strange and I genuinely think the author could've naturally added dialogue that would've had a good amount of cheese and cuteness instead of making me feel uncomfortable and making the characters do things that up until now it seemed like they'd never do.

And my final critique of the writing is how the author just DID NOT describe the movie which is basically what the WHOLE BOOK is centered on?? It's so weird because at the very beginning for like 2 sentences Rachel basically summarised it as a modern retelling of The Odyssey/ the Trojan War and then we get the basic description of them filming one scene of Sana in normal clothes in front of a locker. What?? I genuinely don't know how they're acting like this movie is so incredible and artistic and the author couldn't even be bothered to tell us a basic storyline, show us any more filming, or at least some of the edits they made to the script? Whenever they discussed the movie they vaguely described Sana's character, Helen, and how she'd pioneer the story or not do that. It was so weirdly and vaguely described that I have no idea what this movie is about or HOW they modernized it besides the basic knowledge I have of The Odyssey and the Trojan War, which might I add, not everyone might know that much about? She basically only gives the barest information about Helen and how she relates to the war but literally nothing else. Anyone who hasn't read The Odyssey or know much about Greek history would be so confused, and even though I know a bit about both I still have no idea what this movie looks like. It seems like such a bizarre idea but it could've been interesting to see! I suspect the author also didn't know how this movie would make sense (especially in a school setting??) so she conveniently just left any information about it out and managed to skirt around any moment an explanation was necessary. I might sound picky about this one but honestly, the movie is a VERY large part of the plot and a lot of it centers around the making of said movie. I think that we should've been given at least MINIMAL information about it or she should've chosen an easier story or more understandable setting for this movie. They described this movie as a piece of ~art~ but then basically say it's the Trojan war in high school if I'm even understanding THAT correctly? I'm not saying it couldn't be good but I would like to see it before they hype it up that much, honestly.

Overall, this book was enjoyable and I'm grateful for the rep, ship, and cute dialogue (most of the time), however even I, a person who is not a writer by any stretch of the definition, can see flaws in the plot, writing, and character consistencies which really took away from the story and I honestly can't call this book an amazing diverse book. I'm still sad about the fact this review turned out the way it is but what can I say? Don't judge a book by its cover

Tell Me How You Really Feel was an amazing f/f romance. The romance felt natural and not a book where gay characters are thrown in. I absolutely loved watching Sana and Rachel become friends and maybe something more later on.

The misunderstanding that started their relationship was real for a lot of queer people, being asked out as a joke. I loved all the diversity in this book, from Rachel being Hispanic and Jewish to Sana being Indian. I loved getting to see diverse queer people and how it interacts with other aspects of themselves. Rachel is also a poor girl going to a very expensive private school and we get to see how this messes with her perception and others. Many poor people get amazing scholarships or opportunities and yet they never feel like they truly belong or fit in. Living near or in poverty does a number on people's mental state and we don't get to see that a lot in YA. It's an important thing to highlight and realize.

We get to watch Sana become confident in what she wants and stand up for herself while Rachel learns how to be the director she really wants to be. This book deals with a lot of real-world issues with an adorable love story as the background.

*I received a complimentary copy of this book from Feiwel and Friends through NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.*

This is a difficult review to write and I really mulled it over for a few days before writing it because a lot of what I have to say sounds like a bad review. SO, to put this at the top, this is NOT a bad review. I liked it, I'm glad it exists, and I know a lot of people I would recommend it to. (whispers: but it could be better)

Sana and Rachel are fun characters to get to know and I loved having a gay romance where them being gay wasn't the point. They're both already out and there is low angst on that front. We deserve a fluffy gay romantic comedy, not just deep important coming of age stories. I also loved that Sana and Rachel are attracted to each other. It might sound silly, but it actually is rare for media aimed at LGBT teens to explore desire at all. And they need to know it isn't dirty or gross, and wlw girls aren't perpetuating the male gaze for desiring other girls etc. The fact that each of the girls think about being attracted to each other in the same way you would expect a hetero romance to is actually a big deal. There is a (tasteful, camera pans out the window) sex scene and that's awesome.

Most of my problems seem like first time author problems (I believe this is the author's second novel) and editing problems. There are passages and stray lines that feel out of place in the type of novel this is, ones about LA as a place and its beauty and routes to get places and the weather. Perhaps it says something about Rachel as her character to know her long winded route home and that she likes to crank the heat and open her window (and I am there wondering if some of her money troubles might have to do with the way she seems to waste gas) but any character building could definitely be done in a simpler and more seamless way. There are so many lines that scream "So clever! Look at this metaphor! It's so good!" and I think a good editor would help the author 'kill those darlings' as it were and make it a stronger narrative. We have viewpoints from both Sana and Rachel , but there are a few stray lines where we are suddenly in Sana's mom's head for a moment and it shouldn't be. That's not really how viewpoints work. Admittedly, I am reading an Advanced Reader Copy and there are 4 months until the release date so some of this could be fixed, but I don't really think they will be. There were some typos and stuff that I'm sure will be fixed, copyediting, but something as complicated as tidying up viewpoints and trimming the unnecessary fat? I doubt it.

If the overly purple prose about the weather and landscape was limited to the Rachel sections, perhaps I could see it as a character choice, that Rachel is so movies focused that she sees everything the way a cinematographer would, but it isn't. There are a lot of things about the novel that felt like a movie and it wasn't clear to me what was meant to be Rachel's voice and what was maybe the hope that the book would become optioned? You know that scene in Perks of Being a Wallflower where they go through the tunnel into Pittsburgh? That's what I felt this book kept trying to do, but with LA. A lot of scenes were almost cliche and felt like references to other coming of age books/movies (sneaking in to karaoke, driving around late to get froyo) but never directly enough to actually be a reference. I can't get too mad because gay kids (and specifically sapphic kids) deserve these cliches too, they don't belong to the straights, sapphic teens deserve their own Perks of Being a Wallflower moments.

I prefer when authors are sparing about pop culture references that can date the novel or provide some characterization that probably wasn't intended. Rachel loving Sofia Coppola and hating Tarantino works and makes sense (the movie Marie Antoinette being almost as old as Rachel made ME feel really old, but that's a me problem)but there were a few other things that didn't do as well. The one that bugged me was the use of Overwatch. It is established that Sana plays video games because she wants to be a surgeon and games help hand eye coordination. But it seemed to me as a reader that the author was trying to use the game and who they main (tend to play as) as a shorthand for characterization and it only works if you are familiar with the game. First of all, for 17-18 year olds, would they be playing Overwatch? Or would they be playing Fortnite? My age, sure. College age even. But high school? Then, descriptions of the characters they play as are sparse, leaving this shorthand to only work if you know who Tracer is and what her powers are (and maybe that she is canonically a lesbian, so even in game Diesel seems to collect lesbian friends wherever he is). I would have accepted it if there was a quick line that Sana likes to play as Pharah because she can play as an Egyptian woman as a hero unlike so many games where the hero shoots at middle eastern people or something like that. Instead, we get a line about rockets. So by adding more detail instead of saying they played some video games, I'm pulled out of the story wondering if kids play Overwatch these days and if someone who doesn't know the game would get nothing but confusion out of the passage. I love the Wreckless Eric song used in the karaoke scene, but specifying a song (and not a mainstream one) makes me think there will be some plot or character significance and I don't think there was, other than a slight emphasis on the fact that Rachel has brown skin.

The adults were complex and none were clear villains or heroes, which I liked. They were just people. I also liked how little of the movie they make we "saw" in the text, because it's the worst when the text praises something as amazing or funny or meaningful and then we actually see/hear/read it and are nonplused (Roger singing "Your Eyes" in Rent, anyone?). The ending scene wraps everything up quickly, but mostly the way a movie would, so it is forgivable.

I am really glad this book is being published and it will be out there for a more lighthearted choice in LGBT romance, I like that the leads are two women of color, I like that they are portrayed on the cover! Accurately! I am just disappointed that this could be even better with some appropriate trimming down and editing. When I write fanfiction, I know it is really frustrating to write out a clever turn of phrase and think "This is good! It's so clever, it's so good!" and then have to erase it when editing, it does usually make the work stronger. As a reader, I don't want to be thinking about someone writing the story, i just want to believe in the story.

This book was received as an ARC from Macmillan Children's Publishing Group in exchange for an honest review. Opinions and thoughts expressed in this review are completely my own.

I was so excited to read this book because it was soley different from all that I have read in teen romance. I love both backgrounds of Sana and Rachel and how they told their story from different viewpoints back and forth. While reading this book I could not help but want for this book to become a movie. This was very similar to Call Me By Your Name and how all relationships can lead to struggles no matter the circumstances. This book clearly reflects that everyone deserves to be happy in their relationships and when you discover who you truly are, it's the greatest gift in the world.

We will consider adding this title to our YFiction collection at our library. That is why we give this book 5 stars.

Although this book is clearly going to be popular due to its diversity, themes, and plot, I cannot recommend it publically because I believe it is lifting characters, dialogue, and entire scenes from the show “Gilmore Girls.” Very disappointing.

This was super cute! I love me some enemies-to-lovers romance. Sweet cute wlw romance. Definitely recommend!

Cute, fun, and sweet enemies-to-friends-to-lovers, which is an all-time favorite trope of mine. This is a solid fast read!