I love when we get diverse representation!
This book was quite amazing. The main character Jessie was likeable and fun to read about and her story was very well written. I enjoyed everything about the book and the romance was just adorable. Looking forward to reading more from Jackie Khalileh!

The funnest, cutest YA high school read that I was hoping it would be! The characters were amazing and I saw so much of myself in the main character. Couldn’t have asked for anything more from this!

This was a great read and I thoroughly enjoyed it! I'm not usually a fan of love triangles, but I actually liked this one (and my ship won so really how could I complain?). Jessie was an amazing main character, she felt well fleshed out and I liked reading about how she went through these new experiences and she navigated a new environment, it was pretty relatable. I also liked the love interests and the way they interacted with Jessie. The friendship aspect of the book was also great, it really shows how complicated friendships can be at that age and while I feel like it could have been explored more, I still liked what we got. It also has a family aspect, particularly the relationship between Jessie and her sister, but also between her parents and her brother. The story itself feels really comforting in a way, I'm not sure, but it felt familiar and sweet. There’s a LOT of drama and I was honestly living for it, the teenage experience is dramatic (not mine, but still lmao). Overall, a fun story, perfect for young readers.

This was such a cute story that it made me want to buy the book (when I get around to doing so). I loved all the characters and couldn't put the book down. People might say the characters were immature, but I mean, hi... they're 15 years old! I know a lot of adults who are more immature than teenagers. In any case, this was a very good book and one I'd recommend, and buy for my library!

I absolutely loved this book!! I couldn’t put it down.
I just loved all the characters. I highly recommend this book.

I had such hope for this book. It's my first-ever hardover ARC from Penguin Teen.
I was so excited and with that super-cute cover, I wanted to love the story.
The first two chapters were good and I emphathized with the main character, Jessie.
But it wasn't long before I didn't like her much.
The autistic portrayal was understated, unlike all the high school drama which got to be too much.
I couldn't stand the main character's double standards. It got annoying very fast.
I would have liked Jessie better if she had held on to her integrity.
Instead of the emotional, meaningful story I'd expected, this story turned out to be all about high school teen dating angst and the typical bad boy drama.

Jessie was diagnosed as autistic just before she started high school. Her therapist suggested she create a list of goals to help her navigate her diagnosis. In creating the list, she tries to hide her diagnosis along with experiencing some things that normal teenagers experience. Her situation becomes more than she can handle navigating her new diagnosis, a new school, new friends, and new experiences. It's an interesting coming-of-age story mixed in with understanding an autism diagnosis.

I loved this book! It was such a fun read and I was hanging out to every word! Were Jessie and her friends a little immature? Yeah but so are most 15 year olds. I had so much fun and my only criteria would be I wanted more of Griffin and his development! (Can we get a fluffy story please)

We love to see Palestinians thriving! This was my first book of Palestinian rep and I loved every second of this loud Arab family

4 Stars

Something More is a fun and genuine story that captures the authentic and often times messy high school experience. Khalileh manages to portray through Jessie how teens aren’t perfect. She explores themes of fitting in and self-love through Jessie’s journey to navigate her diagnosis of autism and the messy nature of high school. I’m not the biggest fan of love triangles, but each love interest is developed beyond their basic characterizations creating a cute romance. The love triangle exemplifies how the person you think you need or want might not actually be that person but someone else entirely. Once again, similar to The Luis Ortega Survival Club, it was so great to see more Autism representation in young adult stories.

I feel 15 again, and that is exactly what you want from a YA novel. All the feelings are so clear and accurate. Both the joy, the pinning, even the awkwardness of being a teenager is beautifully written. The awkwardness is so well written that I felt it as if it was happening to me.

Khalilieh created a YA masterpiece with this one.

As an autistic girl, the existence of this book means a lot to me. We rarely get to see autistic people in books, let alone autistic girls who aren't white, and I loved that aspect of this book. I felt very seen by the representation and it's clear the author is writing from lived experiences, which made it so touching. I also loved reading about a fifteen year old who gets to be flawed and cringy (because, let's face it, all of us are at that age).

However, I didn't enjoy SOMETHING MORE as much as I hoped I would. There were some moments I could not see past, like misogynistic scenes that are never addressed and even some comments from the love interest that were addressed but just ruined it for me.

I see a lot of potential in this author and will definitely keep picking up her books! This one was nice, but ultimately not the favorite I hoped it would be.

A young adult/middle grade coming of age story focusing on a young arab-american teen who has just learned that she has autism. This book was very cute and I appreciated that the story, while heavily focused on the aspect of Jessie's inner turmoil with her autism, also did well with balancing unrelated life struggles and the struggles of her sharing her new information and family and friends reactions and willingness or struggle to learn/understand. Has some rather stereotypical coming of age plot lines but I loved adorable Griffin and Jessie and how she learned from her choices and initial naivete as the plot goes on an she opens herself up to more.

Thank you to penguin teen Canada and netgalley for giving me this e-arc for an honest review.

3.75/5

I’ll admit, there were some parts of the book where my attention started to slip a little, but overall I really liked it.

“Something more” follows fifteen year old Jessie as she starts high school and has to get accustomed to a lot of new things, including her recent Autism diagnosis.

I think this book is really important to have for young Autistic people, especially girls, who dont often get to see themselves in a positive light in media.

This book follows Jessie as she has new experiences, learns, and grows to like herself and not be ashamed of who she is. This book does a really good job explaining the concept of masking as Jessie copes and learns to unmask and better express herself.

My only thing is that Jessie, and most of her other classmates, didn't really act like High schoolers, The characters seemed younger then they really were, but that might just be due to personal experiences of high school .

Overall, its good representation and its pretty cute, I think its worth the read.

Often times we leave the real life to indulge in fiction. But with Something More, even fiction seems genuine. It was such a great joy to read this book. It was my first time reading a book that had a lead female character like Jessie. She is absolutely unforgettable.
A fantastic fun read.

I love reading a good YA book. This book starts off with Jessie, a young Palestinian-Canadian girl, learning to balance getting diagnosed with autism as well as starting high school. I read this book months ago yet I still think about it. Its plot is unique and unforgettable. Jessie is one of my favorite MC's atm. She keeps it real. There is a love triangle (which personally I don't mind if I can tell who the mc is gonna end up with and in this case. the person who I was rooting for ended up being endgame so im happy)

anyways, go read this !!!!

I’ve been waiting for this book for so long! An exceptional book!! And so so needed. This is definitely a book that I wish had been around when I was a young teenager who had never read a Palestinian main character before. Also the writing is so brilliant!! Definitely looking forward to more of this author’s writing.

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the arc! I really enjoyed this one. It fits perfectly into that veryyyy empty younger YA space and I know a lot of readers will love it! It's also the first book I've ever read with Palestinian-Canadian rep, which was super super cool. Overall a very sweet story with important representation that will appeal to lots of readers looking to start in the YA section but aren't ready for older YA just yet.

This book was so good. I haven’t been into YA books in a while but this one was amazing! It was so captivating I couldn’t put it down. I loved watching Jessie navigate highschool life which is so difficult being neurodivergent or not! Watching her grow up and really find her place and what not. Can’t recommend this book enough.

I really like the diverse rep that exists in YA today. It used to be the same stories and over and over so I am so thankful for books and authors that help expand our lens of the world. Also CANADA rep - which is super rare. I look forward to reading more from Jackie Khalilieh in the future.

Thank you to netgalley and the publishers for providing me with an arc for an honest review!

Having just been diagnosed with autism before the start of high school, Jessie has decided to keep her diagnosis to herself. She finds a friend group (though not all of them are great friends, or great people for that matter), a crush, and ends up in a love triangle.

I thought this book was very well written and incredibly relatable. I easily became attached to certain characters and loved when one of the characters was booted from the friend group due to poor decision making. The friendship developments progressed throughout the book and it was wonderful to see Jessie grow as the year went on.

Thank you NetGalley and Penguin Random House Canada, Tundra Books for the eARC!