Thank you so much to net galley for giving me a copy of this book. I was so excited when I saw the title, cover and description! I fell In love with this book and would recommend it highly!

Don’t let the cover fool ya, folks! I’m a PUDDLE.

I’m beyond the point of be surprised by YA novels, because for the past year or so they’ve just been *chef’s kiss* and here’s yet another one!

This one definitely had a bit more romance in it than expected, but I’m a romance reader so I just reveled in its adorableness. ANYWHO! These characters were great. The writing? I LOVED. This story tackled a lot of different somethings and I thought they were handled so well. Let’s not even talk about how deep in my feelings I got, because damn. Did not expect to lay there with my headphones in, in a puddle of tears.

While this book does have its flaws (what book doesn’t?), the characters ultimately stole the show and my heart. I can’t wait to keep reading more from this author!

A journal that helps Quinn processes her emotions anywhere from microagressions to, friendship, the who I would like to kiss lists, to uhm fantasies 👀 I really appreciated the discussion of a Black girl navigating white spaces and having to address her own biases. The who took the journal I kinda guessed but thats neither here nor there. Carter is really likeable to. An easish quick read

This was a great read. I featured it as Book of the Day on all my social media platforms, and I’ll include it in my monthly roundup of news releases for my Black Fiction Addiction blog.

This book definitely gives me “A” vibes in the beginning if you’ve ever watched the show Pretty Little Liars. The difference is that although Quinn is forced to face the truths she wrote in her journal, it also takes her on a journey into become more fearless, living in the moment, and understanding who she is and existing in her blackness. Along the way, she forms and rebuilds friendships she wouldn’t have if her journal hadn’t been taken, and finds a love that challenges her in every way.

So cute! Just what I needed to read right now. I could totally identify with Quinn since I was a huge journal writer in high school and would have been mortified if someone found them, read them, and shared them. It is perfectly told, genuine, and refreshing compared to so much I have read lately.

I was granted complimentary access to Excuse Me While I Ugly Cry via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you to whoever approved me! My thoughts are my own and my review is honest. Note: I was approved slightly after publication day and I was approved for the robo-voice audio ARC. I acknowledge that I cannot and should not comment on narration as this was not a live narrator, but I would like to say that so far HarperCollins audio ARCs with this voice have been very well done!

Excuse Me While I Ugly Cry is the story of high school senior Quinn and the events that unfold when a classmate with vindictive motives gets ahold of her journal. Quinn's blackmailer gives her an ultimatum: complete everything on the to-do list in her journal, one item per day without fail, or contents of the journal will be released to the entire student body. Naturally this would be disastrous for any teenager, but Quinn is harbouring deep secrets. She didn't get in to the school her parents think she did. She drove the getaway car when a friend vandalized a photography display at school. She's ready to starting facing the racism she's put up with until now and doesn't know how to shed racist frieds tactfully.

Although a lot of the plot was predictable (I figured out who had the journal and why quite early on and predicted how the romantic possibilities would work out by the half way point,) it still feels done in a very fresh way, and it has so much more to say than the books before it. This book tackles overt racism as well as microaggressions. It tackles internalized racism coming from BIPOC people, too. It tackles socioeconomic inequality intersected with racial issues. This book also explores family troubles, failing health of a grandparent, and coming to terms with the loss of one's childhood. This is very much a coming of age story, but not in an "I'm so ready for this, let's crush it!" sort of way. Quinn's coming of age moment is a process of grief and letting go.

This is a great book to read for anyone who finds themself not fitting the stereotypes they feel they should. It's a great book for anyone who is struggling to let go of the things holding them back from embracing the next season of their life. This is also, true to its genre and category, a great book for older teens on the precipice of post secondary school or career training and the frightening, exciting, all-too-big reality of being about the join the real world.

This book is a great read for any student getting ready to go to college. Quinn describes the reality of what it feels like during this transitional time and how nerve wracking it can be. Along the way we also meet her old friends and her new friends and deal with underlying racism. Goffney provided an eye-opening experience of subtle racism and its effects. Excuse Me While I Ugly Cry is a strong debut from Joya Goffney!

This was so quirky and beautiful and ah! I loved the romance more than life itself. Honestly, in the beginning, I was not sure if I'd like it but I was sold on it by the third chapter! It's just so sweet!

Let's be honest: I don't exactly love this book, though I do like it more than I expected. The love story element is exactly what we expect. Quinn and Carter hate each other but that hatred is built on assumptions and is covering up attraction. Having to work together forces them to face their true feelings, etcetera etcetera. The mystery of the blackmailer is pretty straightforward as well. And I found Quinn to be not entirely sympathetic. She's pretty self-centered and her lies are stressful (not to mention hard to believe - how was she going to explain away her fake acceptance letter?). Two things make me give this book a second thought. 1) The resolution isn't all smooth and happily ever after. It's a way forward, the notion that once you face the things that have troubled you there is a potential for things to get better. 2) There are bigger issues addressed. Race and financial privilege are interwoven into the plot. They don't get a lot of page space but they are essential elements that affect the love story and the character's friendships.

I really liked the premise of this book: an obsessive list-maker/journal-er's journal is lost, and now someone is slowly releasing her innermost thoughts and blackmailing her into completing a bucket list. However, this is also my biggest nightmare! I thought the story had good pacing and I was compelled to hear it out to the end.

Quinn, the 17 year old protagonists, has recently lost her diary, and she is kind of freaking out about it. The bad news: whoever has it in their possession has started blackmailing her. The good news: she finally has to face her fears; some of which have been plaguing her for quite some time. This romantic comedy deals with issues surrounding authenticity; and, touches on experiences unique to youth of color in a "post-racial" society.

Wow! This book explored the intersectionality of race and class in a fun and charming manner. Then, I find out that this is Goffney debut novel. I definitely look forward to reading more of her work (hopefully in the very near) future.

Personally, I found this story to be boring. It didn't keep my attention so I just couldn't listen to it all.

I really enjoyed Excuse Me While I Ugly Cry. Being a person of colour myself (Indian), I really connected to some of the things that Quinn was going through. Particularly the "Oreo" comments. Just like Quinn, when I was younger I didn't understand what that meant, but once I understood I wanted things to change. Quinn goes on a journey of self discovery and most importantly learning how to stand up for herself. It can be hard to call out people for their outward racism, but it something that needs to be done.

I love a little enemies to lovers. I wish there had been a little more tension between Quinn and Carter about the missing notebook. However, I adored them coming together and Carter (and friends, but mostly Carter) helping Quinn complete things off of her list.

Excuse me while I Ugly Cry

4 stars

Quinn writes everything in her journal in the form of lists. She lies to everyone including herself but in that journal, she can admit the truth. One day during a school project it gets switched with Carter. All of her secrets are in there, if it gets in the wrong hands everyone will learn the truth.. she and Carter aren’t on the best of terms. She thinks Carter is stuck up and she thinks Carter thinks she is spoiled. Carter is one of the few black kids in the school. All of Quinn’s friends are white. Carter loses the journal
And Quinn gets a message that she must do the things on her list or her secrets will be revealed.
The book follows her on her journey to accomplish the task to keep the truth from
Being revealed. She works along with Carter and his friend Olivia. This book includes discussions about race, self-discovery, love, friendship, and family. I loved seeing all of those issues thru Quinn’s eyes as she finds herself. I loved the emended to friends aspect. I enjoyed the side characters also Olivia and Carter’s sister Emoni. I would recommend this book to my friends.

8 stars

I really enjoyed this book! It covers a wide range of topics relevant to a high schooler today; bullying, race, social class, friendship/relationship drama and the stress of graduating. Each chapter started with one of the MC lists from her missing journal. I found those to be a great intro to each chapter and they made me want to know how they would connect to the chapter. I thought the romance was sweet. They dealt with the inevitable conflict in a realistic way. I could have used one more chapter or an epilogue; I want to know what else happens!

3 STARS

Quinn keeps a journal of everything. Is that a good decision? Hmmm. Her journal is stolen and she's blackmailed into facing her greatest fears in public.

To me, this felt like something that's already been done before. ("Read it and Weep," "To All the Boys" series...) It didn't work for me. The romance wasn't that great, and I felt like I couldn't connect. This book seemed cheesy and predictable - which I believe some other reviewers are saying as well.

I listened to the audiobook that Netgalley provided, but the voice was synthetic and it made it more difficult to follow along with the story and connect. That said, this audiobook didn't work for me.

Thank you to Netgalley and to Harper Teen for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinions.

#OwnVoices authors have long advocated for BIPOC taking on the tropes that the book community has explored again and again with majority white characters. One trope that I’m finding enjoyable in recent reads is awful protagonists – from A Song of Wraith and Ruin’s Karina, to The Black Kids’ Ashley, and Excuse Me While I Ugly Cry’s Quinn. Each Black girl is a mess of emotion and self-absorbed motivations that lead toward their own downfalls and possible redemptions – all in ways that are supremely entertaining.

In Excuse Me While I Ugly Cry, Quinn is a rich, Black senior in her last semester of high school trying hard not to be exposed as a liar. She’s lied to her parents and everyone at school about getting into Columbia University, about being okay with the blithe racism she gets from her white peers from her private school in Austin, Texas, and about how she truly feels about the boy next door. In fact, ten chapters into the book you understand Quinn’s many flaws: she has awful taste in movies, is so self-centered that it leads to constant distraction, and has a bad habit of writing extremely personal lists in an unprotected journal.

Yet, there is something endearing about Quinn’s perspective in her awfulness. She does not aim to be a crappy person but her insecurities and the methods she’s learned to get through the different social worlds that she navigates keep her from confronting the issues that put her flaws into the spotlight. When she is blackmailed into facing her many secrets (which are truly regrets), by a mysterious cyberbully, she learns that she’s more capable of standing up to the people that she’s built a wall against.

Joya Goffney has crafted a novel that examines the ways that we learn to protect ourselves as teenagers, the ways we hide all the vulnerabilities we would hate having used against us, by showing the ramifications of this exact event in Quinn’s life. We see that what we loathe about ourselves does not make us irredeemable, especially when at a point in our lives where defining who we are based on who we would like to be seems necessary.

This is a dynamic that I find myself facing in more ways than one over and over again as an adult. Reading about it in YA reminds me that all of the stereotypically, selfish traits that are cast onto teenagers by adults often truly reflect the fears we always carry about gaining maturity and self-judgment. Quinn’s journey reminds me that it’s not so bad, not so bad.

It was fun to read and it could be a cool teen movie, but still it felt flat to me. I like the idea of this book… a girl that writes many lists and her journal gets lost and she gets blackmail and in order to not reveal her secrets she must complete her “to do list”. I was really excited about her doing a couple challenges but the fact that most of the book felt going at a fast speed and then going really slow was such a let down. I love her awakening of her own self and how she does grow as a character and self confidence.
Also at first the list was cool but then having one or more per chapter was kind of annoying. I never connected neither with Quinn or Carter, I kind of like way more Olivia as a character. And I also think that small part about Matt was kind of irrelevant.
This book for me was a solid 3 stars… I like it but I didn’t love it. It was a fun and fast read but still I think it missed many good points and wanted to focus on others that weren’t that important for the main story in my opinion.

This book struck me as a bit cheesy - but I still really enjoyed it! The premise was so interesting, and I appreciate the way that the book explores racism and being Black in a PWI. The blackmail felt like a bit much to me, and the plot was a bit over-the-top, but I liked Quinn and her exploration of the world.