All the stars, no notes. Deb Caletti does not miss and this is an important and timely book that should be at the top of everyone's to-read list.

I requested this for consideration for Book Riot's All the Books podcast for its release date. After sampling several books out this week, I decided to go with a different book for my review.

Sixteen-year-old Ivy is shocked when the plus sign appears on the pregnancy test. She meant to spend the summer working to save up money for college and swooning over her boyfriend Lorenzo, but now she’s planning a road trip to her grandmother’s home to legally obtain an abortion. Despite the heaviness of what will happen at the end of the trip, Lorenzo is determined to make their “abortion road trip love story” a beautiful experience for Ivy, creating an enchanting path from Paris, Texas to Rome, Oregon. On their journey, Ivy finds herself a part of a secret community, a community built of women who have been silent about their own experiences.

Small town teen girl gets pregnant and seeks an abortion—on the surface, it doesn’t seem like it’s a new story. But Caletti finds a way to tell a beautifully tender love story that is surrounded by a call to action against those who want to take away the bodily autonomy of individuals with uteruses. It’s a story that pulled me in from the get go and pulled my heart in all different directions.

One of the things I loved most about this story was the women that Ivy meets along the way. Our society has this unspoken rule that we don’t talk about abortion or miscarriage or infertility—there is a certain stigma and shame associated with it. But as we follow Ivy’s journey from Texas to Oregon, we also get stories of other women who have had to make a difficult decision surrounding a pregnancy. Despite this being a work of fiction, Caletti has opened the door with this book to start bigger conversations and allow those who have been shamed into silence to share their stories.

It is beautiful to see the great support system that Ivy has around her (that a lot of teens don't have in her same situation). Her mother, brother, and boyfriend rally around her and immediately support her without an ounce of judgement or blame. They are the perfect example of the kind of people we should all 1) strive to be and 2) surround ourselves with. In a book that centers around an abortion, there are some tender moments that warmed my heart and restored some faith in humanity.

And listen, I know we all love the morally grey villain as a book boyfriend, but sweet Lorenzo absolutely stole my heart and I will fight anyone who says a bad word about him.

In a post-Roe world, this story is incredibly timely and unfortunately too easy to believe will happen. I hate to say it, but I can absolutely see this book being banned or challenged in all the places like Ivy’s hometown, though I will hold out hope that it will find its way to the teens that need it. As someone who has felt that exact shame and hidden from the stigma, I know exactly how isolating it can be and a story like this is just a little thing that can help you feel less alone.

And, of course, can’t leave out the important content warnings: abortion, sexual assault, parent with cancer, slut shaming, and homophobia. Take care of yourself while reading.

Disclaimer: I received an advanced copy of this book from the publisher for free and have voluntarily written this review.

I’m so glad this book exists and hope that it gets into the hands of kids who need it most. Ivy is a teenager in Texas who learns she’s pregnant right at the start of the book. She knows she isn’t ready to become a parent and it would dramatically change her life and she wants to wait and have kids when she’s ready. Unfortunately, she lives in Texas and it’s past 6 weeks when she learns. After discussing it with her mom, she decides to go to Oregon where her grandmother lives for an abortion.

Ivy and her boyfriend Lorenzo decide to make it a road trip and look to add some fun and adventure. Ivy learns along the way about other women who have also had abortions.

The audio narration is well done but the narrator speaks slowly and the player I was listening on only goes to 2x. I think this may have really impacted my reading experience because the story felt really slow - I decided to DNF but would still recommend this to people who are interested and most especially to teenagers who need to read this experience.

Thank you to the publisher, Netgalley and prh audio for the free ebook and audiobook.

Deb Caletti always writes timely stories that explore the nuances of being female. While she writes for a young adult audience, her themes cross age barriers and are meaningful for readers of all ages. In Plan A, she presents a story that could be ripped from the headlines and does so in a way that makes you ache for the suffering of every person with a uterus in this post-Roe era.

Plan A is a beautiful story. Ms. Caletti approaches her subject matter with care. Never too preachy, she lets her characters share pertinent facts. Where Ms. Caletti shines, however, is in showcasing her characters' emotional toil. Not only do we see firsthand the turmoil Ivy experiences, but we also get to see how Ivy's story impacts her family and her boyfriend.

Plan A is not an easy read, but it is so powerful. Ms. Caletti perfectly captures the fears, loneliness, doubt, and general shock of an unexpected pregnancy. She does so while exploring the idea of choice. Again, she never pontificates. Neither does she condemn others for their beliefs. Instead, she presents one girl's situation and experiences that will, hopefully, allow readers to understand and empathize. Plan A is one of those books I want everyone to read. It is a subject that only Ms. Caletti could tackle, and I'm glad she did.

great book and loved the mystery through out the book. I loved the characters and how they grew through all of their adventures. I enjoyed this book and this author and will check them out again add them to my reading pile.

I really wanted to love this book. The book started really slow and the topic was a HARD read. The teen abortion and pregnancy story is the reason I wanted to read this book. The story was good but it wasn't my favorite I really appreciated the topic being written about it is so hard to read what is often real life experiences for teens.

Thank you, this is just the book we need right now. Beautifully written to capture the feelings and truth around this experience across generations. I enjoyed every mile of this ride.

I really wanted to love Deb’s book, but it wasn’t for me. The pacing was too slow for me and I didn’t enjoy it as much as I thought I would, unfortunately.

This is a difficult book to rate. Not because it's not good - it's excellent! - but because the subject matter is so difficult, and knowing that this is real life for so many people right now makes it even harder. I'm fortunate that this situation will never affect me, but it's still pretty hard to read someone going through it.

Parts of this I thought were slow, but the story as a whole is amazing, full of new experiences and details and little moments that really shone. I love Ivy's younger brother and Lorenzo, but the rest of the cast is brilliant as well. I was never bored reading, I always wanted to find out more about what was going on.

We need to flood the shelves with books like this so that people will start discussing and arguing and maybe, just maybe, things will start to get better. I'm looking forward to trying to get this to as many people as possible.

This is such an important read and I am so glad it exists. Thank you for letting me read it and putting it into the world. Highly highly recommend

Ivy, the main character, doesn’t consider keeping the baby and the abortion itself is straightforward. Her boyfriend, Lorenzo, is from California and neither feel welcome in their small Texas town. The town turns on Ivy but it doesn’t seem too realistic – I live in a town about that size. Nevertheless, Lorenzo is a sweet and supportive guy (not the father of the baby – but that’s a whole other plot). The author has done an amazing job broaching this subject. The book does not advocate for abortion but instead brings forth the reality of being in Ivy’s shoes.

I enjoyed reading Ivy's focused, determined character, rightfully making her own decisions. I like how this story is quite different from the average teen pro-choice story in many ways.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for providing this eARC.

Plan A follows teen Ivy as she embarks on a cross-country road trip for an abortion following an assault.

Plan A is such a poignant novel for our current social moment, and I am so excited for teens to have access to this kind of book which so deftly and lovingly talks about the issues of abortion and women's rights. Deb Caletti does a wonderful job of representing a range of perspectives here, as well as highlighting the difficulties of this kind of choice and what both consent and genuine loving support look like. More than anything, this book highlights the life-changing impact, no matter your choices, of pregnancy and abortion, and of being a woman in the world we live in today.

The Queen of Teen drama is back with Plan A, a coming of age story about Ivy, a teen who has become pregnant and wants to get an abortion. The problem: she lives in Texas and they just passed the strictest abortion laws in the country. Ivy's boyfriend Ivy's boyfriend, along with her mom, develop a plan to not just get Ivy an abortion, but to travel the "world" without leaving the US. Will they make it to Oregon to Ivy's grandmothers to have the "A" or will their trip turn sour because of circumstances beyond their control?

Plan A is a poignant, yet needed novel at a time when things are changing for women and girls across the US. Deb Caletti writes Plan A with not only Ivy's story to tell, but the stories of the many women before her who have have had similar situations and seen their way through.

Book Review

Title: Plan A by Deb Caletti

Genre: Contemporary

Rating: 5 Stars

I read The Story of Every Living Thing last year by the same author and despite it having a slow start it ended up becoming one of the my favourite books of that month and ended up ranking pretty high in my favourite books of the year, so I was excited to see what her new book had in store for me. Essentially in this book we are following Ivy on a road trip across the country in order to legally obtain an abortion with her boyfriend along for the ride, determined to make the trip memorable for the right reasons.

The first thing I was really stuck by, in a good way, was how quickly Ivy made her decision. In many books I’ve read where characters get abortions or contemplate getting one, the decision is one that weighs heavy on them but this isn’t the case in reality for a lot of people and Ivy reflects that. She knows that the sensible and right thing to do for herself is to have an abortion but she lives somewhere where she can’t get one legally and has to travel in order to do so. Caletti also makes sure to drive the point home that abortions are completely normal and commonplace as we see in Ivy’s interacts with people that have had abortions or know people that have.

Ivy is also a really sympathetic person as she is clearly shown to be an ordinary girl from Texas, who wants to go to college and has dreams for her life outside of becoming a mother, showing us why her choice is the right one at this stage in her life. However, she is shown to be more open-minded than a lot of her family and feels like an outsider in her small town which is a sentiment that her boyfriend shares coming from California himself. They aren’t part of the old boys’ network, of the church community, they haven’t lived there for generations.

When we see the town turn on Ivy for her decision, they clearly don’t see her as one of their own and while a little over the top it does feel like something you can imagining happening in real life. Lorenzo, the boyfriend, was my favourite character because of how sweet and supportive he is over Ivy’s choice. While he isn’t responsible for the pregnancy and could very easily walk away from all the trouble, he decides to stick by Ivy, accompanying her on her journey and making memories together.

While the road trip itself and the abortion make up the bulk of the novel that isn’t the end as even after returning home, Ivy is harassed and bullied for her decision. She ends up losing her job, someone calls Child Protective Services and much more which stresses the pressures she is under even at such a young age. Honestly, while I want to believe that people aren’t like this in real life, I have witnesses similar events in my own country although they don’t go the extremes that we tend to see in the US.

Overall, I thought this was an insightful and respectful look into US abortion culture at the moment and what happens to people who actively seek out an abortion in other states when it is not permitted in their own. It really focused hard on the human elements, from Ivy’s reasoning for the decision to both the positive and negative reactions she gets because of her decision. I also felt that given what has been happening in America over the last few years more books like this are needed and Caletti isn’t afraid to tackle to more taboo topics in these modern times. Highly Recommended!

Plan A tells the story of Ivy, a sixteen-year-old girl living in a conservative town in Texas. After being sexually assaulted she finds herself pregnant, saying "I didn't know I could get pregnant that way". With the help of an incredibly understanding and supportive boyfriend and her mom and brother's support, Ivy and Lorenzo organize a cross country trip "world" trip to Oregon where her mom's family lives and has arranged for an abortion. She just has to make it the last few days before school lets out, a task easier said than done. When word leaks out that she's pregnant, both she and Lorenzo are attacked and bullied, she more so than he. When they're finally able to escape town for their trip the trouble back home follows them, and Ivy learns that her circumstances are far more common than she could have imagined.

This is such a powerful book and really we need more like it in the world. Not only does it cover the challenging subject of abortion, but it touches on a subject we don't often think about with sex ed, at least in my blue state. "I didn't even know I could get pregnant that way" is not a phrase we hear as often these days. It reminded me, once again, how lucky I am to have had decent sex ed in school and how not all states have that. Health class is not a fun class for students or teachers alike, it's awkward and uncomfortable for everyone. But it is so so important. I'm not saying she could have avoided her circumstances with the knowledge, but she might not have been so blindsided. One of the things I really enjoyed was her discovery along the journey of so many women who shared their stories, whether they had an abortion, a miscarriage, or followed through with a pregnancy. I loved her Aunt's work on family history and can't help wondering how on earth she got all that information on some of the ancestors. One in four. One in four women will have an abortion. I'm sure I know people who have had one, but have no idea because even in my blue state, it's a taboo subject.

Now. Is this book super realistic? Yes and no. Not many teens would have had the ability to go all the way across the country for the procedure. She was extremely lucky in that regard. Especially knowing that she traveled through multiple states that support abortion, including my home state. It would have been slightly more realistic for her to visit a state closer to home. And on another note, how many families would have been as supportive as hers? Probably more than I expected, especially when thinking about Texas. And would the town really have turned on her the way that it did? Absolutely, kids can be cruel, but would all those adults have really been that interested? I start to doubt that and then I think about my experiences with some churches and... yeah, with a subject like this one, I can absolutely believe that many adults would be interested and more.

Deb Caletti has been one of my favorite authors since I discovered The Nature of Jade over ten years ago in my high school library and I'm so excited to see this book out of her. And even more excited that I was honored with an ARC. I did find a couple of areas a little wordy and skimmed through some pages because there was just so much there. But overall I really enjoyed this book and I hope it reaches the hands of those people who need it.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the author via NetGalley & Random House Children in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you Random House Children's for providing this book for review consideration via NetGalley. All opinions are my own. Ivy is a high school student trying to do well in school and help out her mom and brother in small town Texas. When she discovers she is pregnant after an assault, there are few choices for her in Texas. Her family arranges for her to travel to her grandmother’s house across the country to have an abortion. Along the way Ivy learns that she has more in common with many women than she realized and that some people will turn their backs on you no matter what kind of history you have with them. The author takes a controversial topic and writes a story giving realistic faces to the present and past of abortion care in the U.S. Navigation of regulations and laws in present day America for a woman to access health care was explored in a practical way, for example, who could get in trouble for helping Ivy. The main character is likable and her growth throughout the story make Plan A an engaging, timely, and heartfelt read.

This is yet another powerful novel from Caletti in which she challenges her reader, teen or adult, to see both sides of the complex abortion issue. In Plan A, she is sensitive to as many perspectives as I can think of in a captivating road-trip story full of emotional challenges which are counterbalanced by youthful desire to explore with hopes of finding joy in the midst of a stressful time. The main character’s awakening to the complexity of the lives and secrets of adults brings her to further understanding others as well as her own path forward. Caletti gives us yet another important book that reflects the dialogues and conflicts of today’s society for older teens to dive into as they engage in their own reflections on their beliefs and how to hear those on the other side of the issues.

Thank you to Netgalley and Randomhouse Children’s, Labyrinth Road, and the author for early access to this well-crafted novel.

This topic means a lot to me and I’m so happy to read a book that FINALLY portrays a teen abortion as NOT something she’s not ready for, that’s it’s agonizing, terrible, abhorrent. Our main character is ready, firm, prepared, and doesn’t regret it. This books purpose seeming to show that abortion is more common place than people like to believe. That it has always been here and always SHOULD be. The town turning on her was quite intense and I think more of a metaphor for how quick people are to turn on something they don’t believe in even if it’s to someone who did the best they could. Absolutely amazing read.