I love a Crystal Maldonado, but this one was just okay for me.

I could not connect with the characters and I just did not care about this story. I feel like the language and the communication was older than the characters were, and it felt like a ya that was trying to be older.

I did like this, but it isn’t my favorite Crystal Maldonado.

Chloe was an absolute delight. She is fat, bisexual, Latinx, has ADHD, and doesn’t always make the right choice in the moment. In other words, she is real, she is an emotional mess, and she is scared and unsure of what her future will look like. But above all, I love her determination to get the trio back to what it was and ability to never give up, even when things got hard. She took matters into her own hands, when on a road trip of a lifetime, and gained the independence and confidence she needed to enter the world as an almost adult. I also appreciated that she was able to call Ramona and Sienna out on their shit and be able to own up to her own mistakes. I definitely related to her struggle with letting go of the past/ her childhood and fearing growing up and leaving certain people or things behind.

I was totally expecting Chloe to be more interested in Sienna than Ramona but was pleasantly surprised by her choice not to pursue that route. Sienna has that typically fun, happy, personality and seems to get along with just about everyone. While Ramona is a bit more moody, mysterious, and unpredictable. But I loved the fact that Ramona was a secret softie, her passion for wanting to be a tattoo artist, and how she truly began to break out of her shell around Chloe. I didn’t really care for Sienna’s storyline regarding finding her real father, but I know it gives her more depth. I would have loved to get to know Ramona more and wish the book was a bit longer so that we could have had more time with Chloe and Ramona as a couple. On the same note I wanted more of the details as to their developed feelings for one another and not the closed door romance that was given, especially in regards to the heated airstream scene… I did however really enjoy the friendship dynamic between the three of them and how they were able to challenge and balance each other out.

The side characters were really great too. Loved the fact that Chloe's cousin Diego was a secret drag queen and that Chloe’s Papi and step mom were both hilarious and overprotective. Whit seemed like a cool character, but other than the fact that she was going to the concert, we didn't get to know her very much, so again maybe that part of the storyline could have been left out. The representation was steller, between Chloe and her fully fleshed out ADHD, Sienna being pansexual, Ramona a lesbian, Diego being gay, and the Latinx community. Being an art person myself, I really enjoyed how both Chloe and Ramona explored art in different ways and that they had something in common to bond over. I know friendship was definitely the leading theme in this story, but I wish there had been a tad more romance and chemistry leading up to the reveal of Chloe and Ramona. I do appreciate how some of the tougher topics were portrayed such as grief, divorce, heartbreak, dealing with change, and letting go of the past. Even though there wasn't a whole lot of conflict, suspense, complexity, or romance, overall I did enjoy the fast paced lighthearted story and the characters.

The overall idea of this work is really appealing to me. It tells a coming-of-age story about early adulthood rather than a full-fledged romance; the romance feels more like a spice than a main topic. The characters are similarly endearing, depicting the difficulties of clinging on to the past while attempting to move on to a better future. As a result, it is an excellent narrative for readers who are brokenhearted or who want to ponder how to rebuild a broken friendship.

Despite the fact that I was unable to finish the book, I will not give it a bad review based solely on its premise. I'm not sure where things go wrong for me; is it the vibe? Is it the writing style? That limits its ability to offer a terrific slice-of-life story at an incredible speed. Maybe someday I'll give this book another opportunity, but for now, I'll have to pass it forward.

I am still recommending it to those who want to read cozy books or have read Maldonado's novels before.

Thank you NetGalley and Holiday House for an ARC of this book. All opinions are honest and my own.

There are a lot of great “coming of age” books… but Crystal Maldonado’s are always the best. She is the queen of this genre and we should all just bow down to her.

I’ve had an excerpt of her book ‘No Filter and Other Lies’ saved on my phone (in my favorites album) since I read it in September 2022. Her writing, and her characters resonate with me in a way that few other books do.

This book was no exception.

The characters are well rounded and lovable… and you can’t help but root for them.

This road trip setting in this book is great because it keeps propelling the story forward.

This story is perfect for young adult readers, but also millennials (it reminds me just a smidge of the 2002 Britney Spears movie ‘Crossroads’).

There is also some great representation in here!

-Plus size main character
-ADHD representation
-Latine representation (Puerto Rican and Argentinian)
-sapphic romance (bi, pansexual, and lesbian representation)

AND a CUTE cover to boot!

Add this (and any other Crystal Maldonado books) to your TBR today!

PUB DATE: May 13, 2025

SUGGESTED SNACK PAIRING: mushroom tacos with roasted corn salsa

“On tonight's menu: seared mushroom tacos with charred- corn salsa, plus some rice and grilled zucchini, yellow squash, and red bell peppers.”

Triggers: abandonment, alcohol use

Review will be posted on my Instagram closer to pub date!

Great read for young adults!

18 y.o., Chloe Torres is gifted with a once in a lifetime opportunity to see the boy band she was obsessed with in middle school. Only problem is she has no one to go with to said concert. After a chance encounter with her old crush, Sienna and near run-in with her old BFF, Ramona, the only two who were as obsessed with said boy band, Chloe decides to invite them on an impromptu road trip to complete the bucket list they created when they were all still friends.

Taking a few detours along the way, the girls manage to repair their fractured relationship and make it even stronger.

I thought this was a beautiful coming of age story that deals really well with the emotions one can feel when transitioning from the comfort and familiarity of youth to the unknown of pending adulthood.

i love u sapphics, i love u coming of age fiction, i love u pr!!! what a fun little book — my first by crystal maldonado but certainly enjoyable enough that i would love to read more. the romance is more of a side plot from the main story which was a little disappointing because i thought this was a romance, but this was a beautiful exploration of queer joy, friendship, and family!

OK, so, way better than Crossroads! Haha. Maldonado does cute teenagers very well. The voices ring true, the characters are believable and fun to get to know, and the story was well-paced and fun. The bucket list structure moved the plot along nicely. Enjoyed the representation and the content, and will definitely be recommending to teenagers in my library!

A fun, queer, coming-of-age story!

I really enjoyed this one. This is a YA story, and it definitely reads like one, as is described. It met the expectations it set!

This book has 3 queer friends who drifted apart reunite for a road trip full of fun stops. I think this was a beautiful story on friendship and how meaningful it can be to work to keep your friends in your life.

I also really appreciated Chloe being conflicted with all the changes happening in her life and growing up. I think this can be really important representation for young adults transitioning into college or adult life overall.

Thank you to NetGalley for the eARC!

I really enjoyed this one! The low but feeling big stakes felt very real, and the friendship group full of past and present crushes really worked for me. Plus, I love a road trip!

This book has some really strong 2000s to early 2010s vibes paired with queer Gen Z energy and I live for it! It's a very fun, stress-free book because there's no huge conflict but it also perfectly captures all of the internal doubts that arise when you're freshly graduated from high school and faced with the fact that, wow, okay, you're entering a new stage of life now and everyone seems to have their path figured out except you.

Chloe has ADHD and this factors a lot in why she feels she isn't ready to leave the safety of what's familiar behind. Her doubts are so relatable and it's so endearing to see the people around her showing so much understanding and care towards her while also encouraging her to trust herself more. Ramona especially was so thoughtful in all of her actions, she can take the award for kindest partner in fiction!

I loved the friendships in this book, between the trio but also between Chloe and Diego and their other friends. It was just full of love, joy and cheering each other on. I also loved Chloe's family so much. The dialogue in this is also super lively, it just flows and doesn't get boring, and as someone who isn't a fan of dialogue taking a central part in a novel, I found that impressive.

I was grinning from ear to ear during my read because this book is so joyful and I was pretty sure it would end up being a favorite. The only thing that disappointed me a little is that the book doesn't have a lot of depth going on. It shows each character dealing with some difficult aspects of life, especially Sienna, but there isn't much development to that, and towards the end I found myself wishing there'd been more to the story.

Despite that though, I find myself thinking about this book very fondly because it gave me something that I rarely had in youth: fun, cheesy (in a very good way) media about teenagers on a road trip with a fat, bisexual, neurodivergent, Latina main character who embraces and loves each of those parts of herself, surrounded by a cast of characters that is also Latine and very queer. As someone who loves that kind of media, it means so much to me to be able to recognize parts of myself here because it feels so comforting.

So, if you used to love (or still do) teen movies of the 2000s but never really saw yourself in them because it often only had straight, white, thin, neurotypical people, I'll highly recommend this. I think it's also a great read for those who enjoy stories about friendship, growing up and trying to enjoy all the little things in life.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the e-ARC.

⭐️⭐️⭐️✨✨ 3.75 stars for cuteness

Thank you to NetGalley, Holiday House, and Crystal Maldonado for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Chloe Torres has just graduated high school and she's struggling with the idea of leaving the comfort of her family home and moving away to go to RISD for college. She can't quite let go of the past, and the two best friends that got away: Ramona and Sienna.
When Chloe's father buys her three VIP tickets to the reunion concert of the girls' favourite band, Intonation, Chloe decides to reunite with Ramona and Sienna for a cross-country road trip to get to the concert and complete the bucket-list the girls made together before their group grew apart. If she can just get Ramona and Sienna to agree to join her eight days of fun she knows she can reignite the friendship she isn't ready to let go of.

One of my favourite things about Get Real, Chloe Torres is the representation. Chloe herself if bisexual, Latinx, fat, and on the ADHD spectrum. Four elements we don't often see much of in young adult fiction, but especially not together. I was particularly impressed with the ADHD representation throughout the book. As a woman who was diagnosed in her late twenties it was really refreshing to see a female character who was diagnosed during her school years and who found a way to thrive. The support from Chloe's family and friends was also lovely to read about. There are a lot of characters I've read about who certainly present as being on the ADHD spectrum, but they're not diagnosed and they're often villainised. That certainly wasn't the case in this book. Chloe's supported by everyone around her. And finally someone else gets what it's like to have a brain that "feels like it's full of bees."

Another of my favourite things about this book was that it shows the importance of boy bands to young women, and especially queer women. The Simpsons was on the money with Non-Threatening Boys magazine—boy bands give queer women and girls male figures to idolise while dealing with (or, for some of us, completely ignoring) often confusing feelings for other girls. They also give us countless songs about loving women to sing along to. Win win.
As a fellow lesbian I really related to Ramona who has no interest in men whatsoever, except for Intonation. I've felt the same about One Direction and BTS over the years. I have no time for men in general, but so help me I will scream when I see specific men in concert. I'm sure a lot of lesbians can relate.

While this book isn't perfect—I could've done without the Whit plot, and the whole thing with Sienna's bio-Dad felt a bit out of place at times—I think that it showcases a really realistic friendship breakdown, and a joyful reunion between women at such a pivotal point in their lives. I think this book could be really meaningful to readers who are at the age where they're leaving high school and starting higher education, or moving away from the homes they grew up in. I know it really could've helped me to process my feelings back then.

If you're looking for a sweet sapphic romance, lots of good representation, plenty of laughs, and a nostalgia hit then Get Real, Chloe Torres could be just the book for you!

This book was fully adorable. The unique writing style takes a moment to latch onto, but I truly felt connected to and enjoyed these characters and their story. It was very low stakes, heartfelt, and just an overall lovely journey. I felt I was in the passenger seat the entire time on this road trip, and seeing three best friends find their way back to each other was truly lovely. A few confusing moments with the writing style, but mostly I enjoyed the unique voice this was written in. Quite an uplifting, delightful queer story.

I enjoyed this novel a lot. Huge YA vibes. There was coming-of-age and life lessons and relationships in flux. There were fun scenes and great dialogue. Good communication, and (thankfully not too much!) bad communication. I think this is a great little novel and for the right audience it would be a very good read.

A lot of the plotline went a little too convenient and easy for me, but at the same time I can absolutely not say that it was unrealistic. If you’re looking for low-conflict conflicts, this novel can deliver for you. I am not upset with how it chose to take the storyline, I was initially concerned it would be overly-dramatic and filled with unrealistic angst, so I am happy that it didn’t go that route.

This was an incredibly easy and fast read and I enjoyed it. I recommend that you give it a go if it sounds like something you think you might enjoy.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing a free ARC. This honest review was left voluntarily.

Soft DNF for me at the moment due to not being in a YA mood. (The downfalls of a mood-reader!)

I do enjoy the girl’s relationships and am enjoying the diversity in the novel,

This was a very solid 4 stars.

You already know I love a good road-trip romance and this hit all the marks for me. Chloe and her former friends Sienna and Ramona haven't spoken in over 4 years. The 3 girls grew up together and formed the "crappy parents support group" for each other and in middle school they bonded over the mutual love for a major boy band. For Chloe's 18th birthday, her dad and step-mom get her tickets to the boy band's show in Las Vegas, but Chloe doesn't have anyone to go with her due to work and family obligations. After running into both Sienna and Ramona within 24 hours of each other, Chloe decides the universe is giving her a sign to try and mend the rift in their friendship before the 3 girls go off to college in a couple of months. She (miraculously) convinces both girls to go with her and the 3 of them embark on a road trip from New England to Las Vegas and they attempt to fulfill their pre-college bucket list (written in middle school) along the way.

I loved all of the road trip shenanigans (although my type-A brain probably couldn't handle all the detours and stops irl) from visiting the zoo on a whim to skinning dipping in the pool the trip truly seemed like a blast and an excellent last hurrah for young adults about to start college. The book was very coming of age/nostalgia vibes throughout and it just made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

I thought the characters were developed and written extremely well and I absolutely loved the diverse representations. Chloe's ADHD was well written as well.
-Latina female main characters
-bisexual, pansexual, gay, and lesbian representation
-positive plus-sized representation
-ADHD representation

I think the only thing keeping it from a full 5 stars is that throughout the book some plot points could have been wrapped up just a bit more or elaborated on. Example: after visiting Sienna's bio dad, she cries about him being crappy and having a whole other family and then it's just really not mentioned ever again. That is to say, I feel like the main focus of the book was the developing romance between Chloe and Ramona and everything else was just kind of filler that wasn't always 100% fleshed out. I still very much enjoyed it and thought it was a good read!

Thank you to NetGalley and the Publisher for the advanced e-book, all thoughts are my own.

This is a solid book and it gave me the exact feeling I wanted--nostalgic, light-hearted, fun, but with some weight. The characters are well-crafted and the roadtrip is a lot of fun. That being said, there are some elements that kind of took away from my experience. Namely, there's quite a bit of info-dumping in here, and I think a lot of the emotion and reflection is a little on-the-nose. I know that a lot of adult readers adjust their expectations for YA books because we're not the target audience, but I think this thinking can do a disservice to actual teen readers... Of course I think content should be age appropriate, but I don't think things need to be dumbed down quite as much as they were here. I would've appreciated some more nuance is all. I'm still a fan of Crystal Maldonado's and will definitely read her next work.

This story hits home for a small city girl from Massachusetts. “Get Teal, Chloe Torres” tells the story of female friendships, second chance at love, and how to openly live with your heart on your sleeve. This book made me cry with joy and laugh as Chloe, Ramona, and Sienna reunite after years being estranged. I think this will connect with people who are going through a lot of changes in their life. I think this is my new comfort book to go back to. The sapphic romance and queer representation in Maldonado’s books always brings a smile to my face. This romcom should be on everyone’s TBR!

Super fun and cute road trip story about three friends who fell apart and are now coming together for a trip to hopefully repair their friendship and for two of them a bit more than that. I really enjoyed this one, definitely a summer-y read full of heart and lessons on speaking your truth, hearing out those you care about, and occasionally when to give second chances.

This book wasn’t for me. I found it very repetitive. I didn’t really care for the overall story. I also feel like this was a little childish.

As a 39 year old female who still loves Backstreet Boys since she was 10 and got to see them live a few years back for the first time I highly recommend this book to my fellow boy band lovers. The characters are complex and the trip to go see their favorite boy band is a fantastic experience to be a part of as it took me back to youth!