Review: Tell Me Three Things (by Julie Buxbaum)

My Rating:  4 stars

I haven't been much of a YA reader for many years already — so long in fact that I can actually count the number of YA novels I've read over the past decade on one hand.  The reason I don't regularly read YA isn't because I have anything against the genre of course — rather, it has more to do with the fact that, after reaching a certain age and already having a certain amount of life experiences as well as insights under my belt, I sometimes find it hard to relate to the themes and characters often explored in books from the genre.  There are different reasons why I read and indeed, the way I experience a book each time will not be the same, however one thing that I look for each time I read is being able to connect to the story and/or the characters in some way.   Given everything that has been going on recently, both in the world and personally in my own life, that connection has become increasingly important in helping me better understand and make sense of things.  With all that said, one of the things I've noticed with my own reading experiences in recent years is that this connection to a story or characters or (in the case of non-fiction books) subject matter, more often than not, can happen unexpectedly – and sometimes without me even realizing it until afterwards when I'm sitting down to write a review and start reflecting on what I read.  This is exactly what happened with author Julie Buxbaum's Tell Me Three Things, her YA debut novel from 2016.  

To be very honest, this is not a book that I probably would've picked up on my own – the main reason I chose to read it is because it is one of the recommended books in my book club's summer reading guide, plus friends who've read it seemed to enjoy it (also my library hold for the book happened to come through).   It turns out that I ended up enjoying this one more than I thought I would.  Sure, the premise is simple, the plot is not tremendously exciting, and much of the story as well as the ending are super predictable – but that's fine because I wasn't expecting a complicated read and instead wanted something light and fun, which this book definitely delivered.  What worked for me the most with this book though were the characters, especially the main protagonist of the story, Jessie.  Even though I'm not a teenager and I finished school eons ago, I still absolutely connected with Jessie and the emotions she went through navigating the strange new environment she suddenly found herself in after moving across the country – new family, new house, new school, new friends etc.  Part of why I connected so strongly with Jessie though is because she reminded me so much of how I used to be in high school – bookish, quiet, solitary, not having many friends, not being much of a talker because I'm terrified of saying the wrong things and so would much rather "write" what I wanted to say than verbally say it, etc.  It felt nostalgic (and perhaps a bit surreal) to re-visit that period of my life through the eyes of a character whose personality hewed so closely to my own – an experience that doesn't come around often, that's for sure!

Overall, I found this to be a delightful read – funny, sweet, light-hearted, poignant and sentimental where it needed to be but not overly so.  Also, I loved the structure of the story, with the text messages between Jessie and "Somebody-Nobody" and also with her other friends interspersed so seamlessly throughout.  This type of structure can be risky depending on how it's done, yet Julie Buxbaum pulled it off so beautifully here.  It's been a long time since I've had so much fun reading a book, but more significantly, it provided a much-needed respite during this trying time.  Glad I got the chance to read this one and definitely recommended!