Gabi, a Girl in Pieces

What a stunning debut for teens! Girls of all ages and walks of life will appreciate this blunt and honest glimpse into the life of a teenage girl that is just trying hard to get by. It's hard for Gabi, on overweight girl with an overbearing Mexican mother, sullen brother, meth addicted father,

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pregnant best friend, and another one that's gay. Is it too much for life to be normal? She brilliantly narrates her "over-dramatic life" in this diary and fills it with poetry, letters, and daily observations. Trying to accept your family, navigate boys, feel good about yourself and your heritage, and figure out the future are just some of the things she touches on. It's laugh out loud funny and brutally insightful. A must read for teenage girls or really anyone. This book was just fantastic!

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RGG: Gut-wrenching, poignant, real issues of adolescence. But Gabi's voice, honest, sardonic, and thoughtful makes the traumatic palatable. A story that should be read by everyone who is a teenager and by everyone who has a teenager in their life. Reading Interest: YA.

Gabi Hernandez's diary of her senior year of high school relates all the anxieties she experiences on a near-daily basis with family, friends, boys, her future, body image, and more. Although she faces tough things in her life, Gabi's voice is consistently fresh, funny, and sassy. With great

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honesty and humor, Qunitero deftly captures the awkwardness, absurdity, and heartbreak of a teenage girl's life that will resonate strongly with so many readers.

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4.5 I loved this book SO MUCH. Strong female character. Realistic fiction emphasis on the real. Poetry. Issues dealt with in a straightforward manner (no euphemisms, I HATE euphemisms!)

Bonus for this book introducing me to "Loose Woman" by Sandra Cisneros, and Zoe Saldana in "Colombiana."

Amazing poetry, wonderful journal format, realistic even the hard parts.

Amazing poetry, wonderful journal format, realistic even the hard parts.

Amazing poetry, wonderful journal format, realistic even the hard parts.

Amazing poetry, wonderful journal format, realistic even the hard parts.

Love Gabi's voice, honest and saucy and so teen-friendly. She's a college-aspiring high school senior coping with best-friend drama, a traditional mother, boys and a meth-addicted dad. She also finds an affinity for poetry and expressing herself through it. This is "Catcher in the Rye" for

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Mexican-American girls but girls of all persuasions will find so much that resonates in Gabi's story. A must-read and game-changer! (Lib notes: fallout from a rape, abortion, mentions of drinking and drug use especially Gabi's dad.)

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Gabi is a senior in high school. She is a fat girl who likes food, boys and writing poetry.Her best friend is pregnant, her other friend has been thrown out of his house for being gay, her father is a meth addict.

Gabi has a lot on her plate for a high-school senior: one of her best friends is pregnant, the other just get kicked out of the house when he came out to his parents, Gabi's dad is on meth, her brother is getting into trouble, and her mom keeps reminding her that she could stand to lose a few

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pounds. Plus, she's got a crush on a guy, and she needs to find a way to pass Algebra II or she won't be able to get into Berkeley. Despite all this drama, Gabi retains her sense of humor and her zest for life as she navigates her senior year. This may sound like just another YA problem novel, but Gabi's distinctive and humorous voice keeps it from going too far over the edge. Readers will find themselves rooting for Gabi all the way -- I know I did!

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This is the story of a fat Hispanic girl growing up in California. She has more problems than positives in her life but she comes out on top.

The plot of the story was interesting, but the book was too preachy for me. There was definitely one point of view the author was trying to get across about women's and girl's rights, gay right's, etc. and the author was going to hit you over the head with that point of view. While the teenagers in

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the book were well developed, the adults were definitely not. They all appeared one sided. Alsol the main character seemed very immature for a high school senior about to go to college.

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Narrated in diary/journal form by the titular self-described “fat girl,” this charming YA novel chronicles almost every trial and tribulation you might imagine an insecure yet smart, young yet precocious, virginal yet curious high school senior could endure.

The characters and events themselves

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sound like stock fodder for generic YA: the gay friend, the pregnant best friend, the drug-addicted father, the inspirational English teacher, the frenemy who needs an abortion, the conservative, overbearing mother, an unexpected death, the rollercoaster that is dating, the birth control dilemma, prom night… In Quintero’s adept hands, however, these events—and Gabi’s heartfelt concern for her family and friends—ring through with authenticity.

Also resonating with truth is Gabi’s emerging sense of empowerment as she negotiates not only her maturation from adolescent girl to independent young woman but also her embrace of her bicultural identity as a Latina American. Highly recommended.

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This book reminded me so much of growing up and being able to relate to what Gabi when through and having friends who had similar experiences to her friends. Definitely would recommend this book!

A good YA story about body image, loving yourself and generational gaps between parents and kids.

I wish this book had been around when I was a teenager. It's both laugh out loud funny and also very, very real. Some stuff hit close to home, but throughout, Gabi is such a real, badass teenager. I was sad when the book ended. I just wanted to spend more time with Gabi!

I wish I had been able to read this in high school.

Oh, man, that was so achingly good. I look forward to reading more of Quintero's work in the future.

While this did remind me of Real Women Have Curves (without the corny bits) and...I dunno...a thing I'll discuss in a spoiler that I am not sure is a thing, I love Gabi so dang much. The tone felt so authentic, like I was reading my own journal from senior year of high school, and even though some

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of her problems stemmed from grappling with a Mexican cultural heritage, her struggles are so universal to so many women reaching adulthood. I wish I had read books like this--books that delve way into consent, rape culture, body positivity, and women's hormones and urges that are OK--throughout my teens and 20s. At the very least, I would have felt less alone and powerless. At best, I might not have put up with some awful situations I went through. Also, she loves Steinbeck, so yeah.

The situation I'm still mulling over is when Gabi beats up German for raping Cindy. On the one hand, the way that entire ordeal went--everything from how Cindy finally had the courage to say something even to her closest friends, how Gabi processed it, how the school dealt with it, how Cindy reacted to Gabi's actions--was absolutely believable and, in many ways, pretty positive in terms of setting an example for how girls in real life might handle a similar situation. I don't know what it would have been like to experience this as a teen, but as an adult, having unfortunately been in Cindy's shoes, part of me *wishes* some of my best girlfriends would have been so supportive, and part of me is so mad that German still gets off scot-free. Yes, it's totally real life--of course Cindy has every right to her feelings, and yeah, boys and men almost never face any real consequences for their actions--but I can't wait for the day when women don't have to carry the burden of shame and physical and emotional scars for being victims of rape...in novels and in the real world.

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