BOOK REVIEW: NOTEWORTHY BY RILEY REDGATE

Thank you to ABRAMS Kids for providing me with an e-ARC of this (through NetGalley) in exchange for an honest review!!



OMG Y'ALL. THIS WAS SO GOOD. LIKE ONE-OF-THE-BEST-CONTEMPORARIES-I'VE-EVER-READ GOOD.

Noteworthy starts with this line:

“Monday Morning was the worst possible time to have an existential crisis, I decided on a Monday morning, while having an existential crisis.”

Ok but how can you not be 10000% SOLD on a book that starts like this???

Noteworthy just managed to get so much so right: character voices, character development, character dynamics, representation, writing style—THE WHOLE SHEBANG. I will get to all that shortly, but I think by far the most standout feature of this book is Jordan's voice. It just blew me away, and as much of a platitude as that is, I truly mean it. It's at once hilarious and somber, brazen and insecure, grounded and emotional. The word that keeps coming back to me to describe it is AUTHENTIC. Frankly, I'm not really sure that I can tell you exactly what I mean by "authentic." It's a hazy word that's very much subjectively used and understood. For me, it's more of a I'll know it when I see it kinda thing. And what I saw when I read this book was authenticity, plain and simple. There is no other word I can think of that encapsulates Jordan's voice as much as authentic.

While we're on the subject of Jordan's voice, I think another thing that will (hopefully) strike many readers when they read this book is just how relatable Jordan feels. Again, a very subjective word. I'm always wary when people throw around a word like "relatable" because what's relatable to you might not necessarily be relatable to me, or anyone else. However, I think many—if not every—readers will be able to see at least a small part of themselves in Jordan. Personally, it's been so long since I've connected so strongly to a main character.

So many passages from Noteworthy had me internally screaming YES YES YEEEEESSSSS—a feeling I think my girl Meryl Streep here understands perfectly.


↑ This was basically me when I read these passages:

“Femininity had always felt inaccessible to me—my best attempt at it had always been putting on makeup and pretending to be more patient and graceful than I actually was, mostly for my mom's sake. Sometimes in middle school, feeling awkward had become my default. Because I wasn't patient. I wasn't graceful. I was prematurely tall, I wasn't skinny, I wasn't pretty, and I didn't care about any of it as much as I was supposed to. Square peg, meet round hole.”

“Kensington, probably because it was an arts school, was such an overwhelmingly liberal place when it came to social issues—I couldn't imagine what it would be like to have that sort of opinion around campus. Or anywhere, really. It was a strange thing to have an opinion on somebody else's existence.”

“There is no world where 'you're wrong' is an acceptable answer to 'this hurts.'”

“It was downright depressing, the lengths it took to feel special when you wrote yourself out on paper. All As? Who cared? That was the standard here. Some shows, some activities? Big deal. How were you changing the world?
Sometimes, when I wasn't too busy, I wondered why we had to change the world so early.”

Honestly, I could just go on and on and on. The words speak for themselves.

I think Jordan's brilliance as a character is indicative of not only how well Redgate has written her, but of her writing abilities more broadly. Redgate just gets it; I don't know how else to put it. She writes characters that feel so damn real, not to mention SO GLORIOUSLY TEENAGE-RY (that may or may not be a word I made up for my convenience). There are a lot of gems in the YA genre—Noteworthy being one of them—but there are also some YA books that get teenage voices horribly wrong, like cringe-worthy levels of wrong (*MUST RESIST URGE TO THROW SHADE*). But the tight-knit, ridiculously lovable squad that Redgate introduces us to in this book is just perfect. (Some might even say Pitch perfect...ha get it because it's a book about a capella and singing and...I'll just escort myself out.) By the end of the book this group of characters just felt like family.


(my face reading books that attempt to recreate teenage voices but fail miserably)


(my face reading Noteworthy because Redgate nailed it with recreating teenage voices)

When I say I loved all the characters, I mean I loved all the characters. There is not an undeveloped or flat character in sight in this book. All of them have their quirks and mannerisms and distinct personalities and experiences and it was all just wONDERFUL. The Sharpshooter guys reminded me so much of my own squad of friends and how comfortable and dumb and happy we are around each other. And don't get me started with the group texts. There were a lot of laughs uttered by yours truly while reading those texts.

Speaking of laughing, this book is sorta funny. And by "sorta funny" I mean VERY FUNNY. Redgate really knows how to achieve that delicate balance between being serious and light-hearted. Noteworthy is not serious enough to be a Sad Book, but it's also not fluffy enough to be a Happy-Go-Lucky Book either. Like I said, it strikes a perfect balance between the two. 

Onto the representation. Lemme give you The Rep Rundown for Noteworthy: 
- Jordan is Chinese-American and bi, and the representation for both of those is ownvoices (YES!). Her family is also poor and her dad is paraplegic, and those are experiences that Jordan reflects on a lot throughout the book. 
- There is a Japanese-American character, a black character, a Sikh character, a dyslexic character, and a character with anxiety. (I think I've covered them all but I might've missed some.) One thing I'll mention is that while a lot of the representation was explicit, some of it was kinda vague. I didn't even know some characters were POCs until I read others' reviews.
- Since Jordan cross-dresses in order to get into the Sharpshooters, an all-male a capella group, there's also a lot of talk about trans experiences and how they differ from Jordan's experiences.
- Plus so much amazing discussion about gender roles and fitting in and not fitting in and how all of that takes its toll on a person.
- Basically, there's A LOT OF REP IN THIS BOOK, and it made me really happy to see that. Redgate obviously put a lot of effort into respectfully representing these identities, and I think all of that really comes through in her book.
(- okay this isn't representation but I just had to mention that one of the characters has a man bun!!!! man buns are very rare to find in a book ok!!)

Okay, bear with me here. Last point I promise. I wanna talk about one more thing: the writing style. I don't think it's ethereal or beautiful or stunning, and I don't think it's a fault that it isn't, because those kinds of styles are not what this book needed. Instead, Redgate's style is stripped down, but never plain, emotive, but never saccharine. Like most things in this book, it strikes a perfect balance between being straightforward, comedic, reflective, and heart-warming.

Oohhh and also all the songs featured in this book are actual songs that Riley Redgate wrote!!! How cool is that?? As if we needed more proof that Redgate poured her heart and soul into this book. You can find the songs here. They're really good. 

I know I've said this before but I'll say it again: Riley Redgate gets it. And I think Noteworthy is the biggest testament to that. I wholeheartedly loved this book in all its endearing warmth and camaraderie. I can tell you now that you will want to read Noteworthy when it comes out (ON MAY 2ND!! VERY SOON!!). Give it a chance, because I really don't think you'll be disappointed.