by Jen Moyers (@jen.loves.books)
Thanks to Partner NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the digital ARC of Emma Lord’s You Have a Match in exchange for an honest review. I’m also thrilled to have read this with @lovearctually! The book will be published on Tuesday, January 12.
I missed out on Emma Lord’s first book, Tweet Cute, but I’m definitely going to read it now. I could not have loved this second book, You Have a Match, more. It is such a brilliant YA read, dealing with friendships and romance and parental expectations and grief and identity, all wrapped up in a brilliant narrative that I found myself unable to put down.
As a sign of support, Abby agrees to sign up for a DNA test with her best friend Leo. Leo and his sister were adopted from the Philippines when they were tiny, and he has questions about his biological parents and his heritage. Abby expects that she will be there for Leo in case he discovers something unexpected. What she DOESN’T expect is that she’ll have her own discovery . . . she has a sister.
Abby, who’s the oldest of four children, is skeptical at first, but once she accepts that she has an older sister (Savannah, or Savvy), she can’t figure out what possibly could have happened with her parents.
Enter: Major Teen Angst. Or just Angst in general (because who wouldn’t be feeling that?!).
Abby is a previously successful student whose grades have plummeted since her beloved grandfather died. She has two best friends, Leo and Connie, although that friendship has become complicated after a B.E.I. (Big Embarrassing Incident) between her and Leo (clarity about that Incident is peeled back in layers through the novel). Her parents are trying to figure out how to help her, and so they decide to send her to a camp . . . that has an SAT-prep focus. It also just happens to be the camp where Leo and Savvy have been counselors together for years.
I’ll spare you any more spoilers, but there’s a fun, Parent Trap element that emerges as we see Abby and Savvy start to know each other and try to unravel the truth behind their pasts.
This is such a rich, well-told story, and I found Abby—and the secondary characters—to be strong, nuanced, realistic individuals. I just absolutely loved this book.
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This sounds like so much fun! Definitely going to have to check it out. I've always felt like DNA tests have the potential for raising more questions than they answer, so it's cool to see that explored in a YA book!