All of This is True by Lygia Day Peñaflor is a novel about three high school students (Penny, Miri, Soleil) who befriend a celebrity author (Fathima Ro) out of their zeal for her first release. With clubs for fellow YA obsessed readers and heavy debate on the content of Ro’s novel, the basis of the novel is familiar ground for your average YA reader. However, what makes this novel stand out is the author’s masterful use of form in presenting her plot. Although the characters, from the very beginning of the novel, seem to be discussing trivial high school drama, the fact that this information is given through interviews with journalists, published insider journal entries, text messages and emails imply of a more suspenseful gist to the novel. I just loved how engaging the form of the novel is.

The writing is polymorphous in form, using metafictional narrator that presents the reader with a debatable summary of its events journal entries, newspaper articles, emails, text messages and prose excerpts. From the first chapter, the presentation of the plot is highly suspenseful and engaging as the use of multiple forms of writing also adds to amalgam of perspective that the reader is supplied with. Each form of information is rooted in a different character, which, in the case of specific sections of the writing (the excerpts of Ro’s novel), works wonderfully to add to the tension and suspense surmounting in the plot (more on this in the next section).

The author’s mode of storytelling, complex in its plethora of forms, is perfect for the kind of person who likes to question and debate with the reading material as they delve into the writing. I imagine this is not a novel for escapism, being more suitable for the reader’s constant analytical intervention (this is just how I believe the novel’s complexity would be done justice, because Peñaflor does SUCH an amazing job in creating gaps and logical breaks that the reader can question).

• Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng
• Burn for Burn series by Jenny Han

I am going to approach this section of the review according to the characters’ significance in my reading experience. The three main high school characters, that form much of the dialogue in the story, are grouped under one section because — to me — they each share an equally meaningful (and yet also limited) impact to the story, whereas the author character (Ro) seems to have an almost omniscient presence in the story.

I loved this character so much! My precious, precious gem of a find! While the narcissistic celebrity trope isn’t exactly rare — the fact that Ro is an author makes her slightly more interesting but again, she is a character that makes perfect sense to the story. She isn’t a figure that is enigmatic in any way and the author does not garnish her with more glamour than she does. A concise, three dimensional character who services the plot in the exact way that one might expect a concise, three dimensional character to be able to do.

However, it is how Ro is presented as a character that makes her positioning in the narrative such a game-changer. While the three high school students Ro befriends offer biased perspectives about her (one of intense hate, one of almost fanatic love and the other being somewhat in the middle), Ro’s point of view is never featured in the novel. It is only through the excerpts of her novels that we are able to interpret her motives as a character and given the fact that Ro holds a morally ambiguous place in the story, the race to gather details in order to come to a conclusion about her adds to the novel’s gripping pace (it’s a page-turner; I was done in three days even when I had a ton of other work to get to).

Also, (prepare for spoilers), the most interesting part about her character

<spoiler>

is the fact that she seems to hold a conflicting stance about herself. While most of her actions imply that she is an egocentric figure, who grooms minors for her own entertainment, the novel does not pertain if she is actually aware of this herself. While her silence during the climactic action point of the novel suggests that she is in denial of her own toxicity (this is amplified when the novel includes how she reaps the benefits of an unfortunate situation in the novel), the prose excerpts of her novel suggest otherwise.

As for Thora, she sat cross-legged on her living room floor. From a box labeled From a box labeled “Book Two” she handed out copies of a working manuscript

(found towards the end of the novel, where it is confirmed that “Thora” writes about the lives of the students she meddles with, often shifting the plot when she is not satisfies with them).

This is reinforced by statements by the other characters that implies she is using them for her own benefit.

She got frustrated with us when we were boring because we weren’t adding to her plot.

Penny

Furthermore, the fact that Ro has included an author figure in her fictional reflection of the events of the novel emphasizes she is aware of the moral ambiguity of her own actions.

Brady realized that it was Dr. Nihati, not Thora, who was the wise woman in his life. He should have listened to her.

Jonah written as “Brady”

In multiple parts of the writing, Ro is aware that she using the other characters as props for her writing. When her own novel features her as a morally grey antagonist to the morally conscious teenagers that drive her plot, she amounts for a very interesting character in the novel.

</spoiler>

<spoiler>

All three of these characters are used by Fathima Ro. Their reactions are heated, but largely varied in response to the mistreatment they suffer. I want you to enjoy the novel as much as I did so I am not disclosing any details, just some juicy hints of why I love this novel so much (it has so much insightful questions).

You made me feel that I owed you. You squeezed my guts out—my energy, my time, my thoughts, my emotions, my experiences. And for what? To see how much I was willing to give you..

Soleil

I’d say, if you knew these kids the way you claim to have known them, then you should’ve realized that when they admire you there’s a responsibility in that.

A teacher from the students’ school

</spoiler>

(4.8 stars)

Given the amount of adrenaline involved in the body of the work, I was a bit unsatisfied with the ending. However, if one was to consider the fact that the book must come to a conclusive finish, despite how emotionally invested you might be in the hate and drama spiraling throughout the text, the ending of the novel seems to be a fairly logical and realistic take on the characters and their decisions. I was going to rate this a full five stars, but since this is the last book I read, and I’m still a bit at awe over the sheer skill and writing I’ve just experienced, I think that rating would be a bit on the biased side. A brain screw that deeply involves definition of morality and how it applies to young adults, I find this book one of the best reads I’ve had this year.