Love is a Revolution | ARC Review

Synopsis

When Nala Robertson reluctantly agrees to attend an open mic night for her cousin-sister-friend Imani’s birthday, she finds herself falling in instant love with Tye Brown, the MC. He’s perfect, except . . . Tye is an activist and is spending the summer putting on events for the community when Nala would rather watch movies and try out the new seasonal flavors at the local creamery. In order to impress Tye, Nala tells a few tiny lies to have enough in common with him. As they spend more time together, sharing more of themselves, some of those lies get harder to keep up. As Nala falls deeper into keeping up her lies and into love, she’ll learn all the ways love is hard, and how self-love is revolutionary.

In Love Is a Revolution, plus size girls are beautiful and get the attention of the hot guys, the popular girl clique is not shallow but has strong convictions and substance, and the ultimate love story is not only about romance but about how to show radical love to the people in your life, including to yourself.

Review

This book gives a great look at love: loving yourself and loving those around you for who they are. Read this book if you’re a fan of Fat Chance, Charlie Vega and There’s Something About Sweetie.

First, I love all the lists in this book! Nala, the main character, makes lists for different situations and things she’s thinking about and they were always so funny. They’re also a good insight into what she’s thinking at any given moment.

This book also has great conflict. There’s conflict in the relationship between Nala and her love interest and there’s conflict in her family unit. As Nala struggles to figure out who she is and who she wants to be, she also finds that she’s been acting like someone else around everyone else. She’s dishonest in her interests and her life and it affects a lot of people she cares about. She must come to terms with who she really is and learn to love that person. This is somewhat of a catalyst for the conflict in her relationships with everyone.

Another thing I liked was the family situation she has. Nala lives with her Aunt and her family. She doesn’t live with a parent and I liked that this representation was given. There are many young people who can relate to this situation and perhaps don’t see it enough in the books they read. I’m glad they’re able to see it here.

Overall, I enjoyed this book but didn’t love it. I couldn’t quite put my finger on why I didn’t love it, but once I figure it out, I’ll add it here to my review. In the end, however, I was glad I read this book.

Disclaimer: I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Rating

To check out my other reviews, click here. Or to check out more books by Renée Watson, go to her Goodreads profile or her website.