Review: You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson

You Should See Me in a Crown is a book I am sure you have already heard about everywhere; it is getting all the hype and recognition it deserves! The book is about Liz Lightly, a queer black high school senior who has to run for prom queen to get a scholarship to go to her dream college. It is an over the top romp through activities leading up to prom, friendships, and a very cute romance.

I really enjoyed lots of things about this book! Liz is an excellent main character, the character voice is so strong and well crafted, and I loved the journey she went through throughout this book. The romantic lead, Mack, is really excellent. She is the skater girl of your dreams who is both adorably frazzled and the coolest person ever. I did kinda wanted the book to have a bit more of the romance in it than it had, but the story had many threads, and I understand why the romance was not more heavily featured.

I also had slight issues with this book's pacing, it is very fast-paced, and I really would have liked more breathing room. We hopped from dramatic event to dramatic event so quickly I couldn't really take stock of the current state of things or really think about the added stakes. This is probably what prevented me from crying while reading, which is my favorite thing to do while reading. I also didn't love the location-specific app, it is always hard to not try to frame a fake app within what is currently used, and I was just slightly disconnected as to why they weren't all just on insta or twitter. I don't think the story would have changed much if these teens were just using twitter. And tiny personal gripe, I don't like books that aren't really about fame where famous people pop in. It just pulls me out of the story especially if it happens well into a story.

The last thing that I didn't connect with was I felt like the arguments with Liz's friends (not saying who because spoilers) were both resolved very quickly. One of them, I wanted it to take longer and have more of an explanation (and an actual apology).

Back to things I enjoyed! I ended up liking the pop culture references a lot. Leah Johnson and I are the same age, and that really made the references hit me perfectly. I did feel like some of them might have been slightly old school for a book set in 2020, but I would need to confirm with some teens. I am oft on the fence about lots of pop culture references in a book, but here they all hit with me.

One excellent thing about this book was the way it dealt with both anti-blackness and homophobia. It was an excellent presentation and was one of the book's parts that felt grounded while so much other stuff was so heightened. I also liked the discussion of sickle cell. I don't think I had ever read a book where a character dealt with this illness; I had only ever encountered it in nonfiction or real life.

I did think the character development and the plot were great. The story is fast-paced, and the characters have clear paths and pretty well-presented lessons. I really look forward to reading future books by Leah Johnson.

I would recommend this book to anyone who likes YA contemporary; it is fun and fast, and you will most lily have a very good time reading it! I gave this book 4 stars on Goodreads and The StoryGraph.