I was unfortunately very disappointed. The premise sounded really great and right up my alley. I sat down intentionally with enough time to read in one sitting, being super excited about the idea of this book. I like books that make me think about society and humanity critically or that simply play with "what-if" scenarios. Especially doomsday-scenarios. Unfortunately the way this book was executed made me want to DNF after only 3 pages. I gave it bit more of a shot but soon realized I was skimming to see if the writing gets any better. It does not.

This book really would have benefited from a few more rounds of editing. While I appreciate the attempt of a realistic 13 year old voice - you can write in a way that it sounds like a young voice without it sounding like it was written by a 13 year old writing fan-fiction. Mind you - I have read better fan-fiction by 13 year olds than this. The writing style is so clumsy and simple it felt a bit like reading a diary written by a 13 year old that is not necessarily aspiring to become a writer.

I can appreciate that the writer tries to write in a way that young adults would understand difficult topics such as censorship, and riots including police brutality, I think it is almost an insult towards young readers to think they would need to be delivered the message in this writing style to understand it.

The concept and the idea to teach young readers about having to use multiple sources of media and other great educational points that the book is trying to get across is really great - unfortunately the writing style makes it pretty much unreadable. A few more rounds of editing could probably resolve this.

This book was incredibly hard to read and I ultimately ended up DNFing and skimming the majority of it.

I have read better fan fiction. I think this author has a lot of potential, but needs to work more on this.

I would suggest continuing to edit this one and work on making the plot more dynamic (as right now, it feels as if there is no plot at all) and the characters more real (as they all feel two dimensional at this point) and re-release it.

Will not be recommending.

After trying to begin the book, I was unable to continue due to my lack of interest. I will try to pick it up again at a later date, and if I am able to continue reading, I will post a more detailed review here.

I am extremely sorry, but this was not what I thought it would be and it doesn't suit my reading preferences. Thank you very much for the free e-ARC.

this was a really good read, the characters were great and I really enjoyed reading this. I liked how topical it was and felt based in reality.

What happens when you're 13 years old, and your rights are slowly taken away? Meet our narrator, and the life she's living. Thought-provoking and almost too close to the world today, this one will definitely make you think.

I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Censored tells the story of a 13-year-old who witness her life changing overnight.

The book is set in a dystopic America, not so far from the reality, where the rise of protests leads to the control of people's opinion by the Government and everyone who disagrees with it will be marked as a terrorist and be arrested.

Once I started reading, I couldn't put the book down. I love the simple and raw way in which it dealt with delicate themes such as freedom of speech and oppression.

It completely shocked me to the core and I highly recommend it to anyone who's looking for a thought-provoking read.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for giving me the pleasure to read an early copy.

Told through the eyes of a 13 yr old girl this story tells the tale of an America that I wished didn’t exist. The author writes in a way that Allows the reader to easily step into the shoes of the main character.

An important tale of what happens when slowly your rights as a human are eroded. Ever important to read and understand this sort of thing in our day and age. Upsetting to read, but a quick read as it wasn’t that long.

I feel this is a commentary on what is happening right now throughout the world. Very upsetting and not a lot more that I can say.

Thank you to netgally and the publisher for giving me an e-arc of this book.

Overall I really liked the book. I don’t remember a lot of it since I read the book so long ago and I forgot to write a review.

The story was different than I expected, but that really didn’t matter to me. I enjoyed reading this book. It reads very quickly and is also very educational.

The book made me think about 1984. The concept was basically the same, but this book took it further which was a good thing. I actually had trouble putting the book down

I had a hard time getting through it, but I think it is truly intended for younger audiences (I'm in my thirties). While some YA definitely works across ages, this book really captures the voice of younger teens...in a way I didn't always want to relive lol. It does have some disturbing parallels to today's current events though.

This was a very thought provoking read.
We are introduced to a 13yr old narrator, in which her name is never given. She is celebrating her bat-mitzvah and is beaming with joy.
She has no idea that her life will be drastically changed in the next weeks, mont and year.
Tha narrator wants to join a peaceful protest with her friends in support of teachers gettimg higher pay. She soon realizes nothing can be peacedul when police become violent towards them and the protestors in return retaliate.
She soon starts to realize that the media can turn stories into false narrative and cause and uproar with anyone having a different opinion than the government.
This was a great read and though provoking. It is something to think about in todays world.
Thank you netgalley for this advanced e-reader

I became interested in reading Caroline Bobick's novel "Censored" after seeing the cover and reading the synopsis, so I'm honoured to have received an e-book copy of the novel from Xpresso Book Tours via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

"Censored" is a middle-grade/YA novel that follows a 13-year-old girl and her family as they attempt to navigate their new reality after a series of peaceful protests in their hometown of Alexandria turn violent. The novel is a timely and important book, and it touches on a number of real-world issues, including freedom of speech and expression, police brutality, media bias, and fittingly, given the title, censorship.

As always with my reviews, I like to discuss the positive aspects of the novel first. The novel sensitively and respectfully handles tough issues, while also not sugar-coating them. It's also a very quick read (seeing as how it's only 211 pages) and as a whole, it's very thought-provoking.

My criticisms of this novel are that almost none of the characters in the novel have names. The narrator refers to herself as "I" and she refers to everyone in her family by their respective title (Older brother, Mom, Dad, Aunt, Cousin, Grandma, Grandpa, etc...). The only two people we are given names for are her two best friends, Sara and Margot, and after a while, the lack of names did begin to get on my nerves and impact my overall reading experience. I also felt like the ending was somewhat abrupt, in that I truly felt like there was more of this story to be told, but instead, it just stopped, and that was definitely frustrating for me as a reader.

Overall though, I did quite enjoy this book and I think it's definitely worth a read! If you're a fan of Cory Doctorow, this is definitely a book that you do NOT want to miss! For me, it's a 3.5 star read, and I sincerely thank both Xpresso Book Tours and NetGalley for the chance to read it!

I received an ARC of this book through NetGalley. It is an incredibly powerful story of a 13 year old girl in a time of immense political unrest. The story feels like it was written over the past three weeks because it mirrors the current horrors of our political and social worlds. It makes you wonder if this censorship has hit or if the momentum of the BLM has started to fade. Heartbreaking and left on the edge of no resolution. This story is terrifyingly real.

This read goes right along with what is happening in the world today! It would be a great book to read for a Jr. High or High School Social Studies or Government class to open up a discussion about the 1st -Amendment and the role of the government. We the People Teams would have a great debate on the topic!
I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

Well written. Includes all points of view, political opinions, and stages of laws and government. It covers the importance of understanding what your voting for, that every vote counts, and there are consequences; both good and bad to every decision made. It makes you think about what you really understand about the 1st Amendment and how the government works. I enjoyed reading this book! We had a great discussion at home with the ideas presented in this book. Thanks!

This raw and heart-breaking YA book is very relevant to the current situation regarding the protests that are going on across the world. It follows a teenage girl and her family as they deal with an unstable political situation and are eventually ostracized from society and forced to flee the country, having to start over in a place that has a completely different language and way of life.

The story begins with the teenage girl returning home from her bat-mitzvah to find out that teachers are holding protests across the city of Alexandria. This quickly escalates when more citizens become involved and the government start to intervene. The city soon turns into a warzone, unsafe for the girl and her family, and after her parents lose their jobs (just because the founder of the school they work at is linked to spreading anti-government information), they have to sell their house and move in with the grandparents. Unfortunately, the grandparents are ignorant and believe the government over the citizens of Alexandria and their own relatives – they think that their son (the narrator’s father) is a terrorist. After he is arrest for something minor, the mum and her two kids have to leave the country as authorities are searching for them.

The narrator, who doesn’t seem to be given a name, is easy to empathise with. At the start of the novel, she is just a regular teenager, who is purely concerned with boys and schoolwork and has a solid friendship group, until her life is changed forever. She is fascinated by the teacher protests that are happening in Alexandria and immediately wants to find out more about them. Much to her frustration, the government has become totalitarian, and her teachers forbid her from writing about politics in her essays. She’s also unable to share things about the protests and government on social media, and has to be careful about what she discusses with her friends. The government also use tear gas and pose a lockdown, which many people are experiencing right now.

While all this is going on in the wider world, the narrator is also dealing with her own personal problems. It seems that she has body dysmorphia and is obsessed with counting calories and exercising. She’s bullied at school and thinks it’s because of her body: after seeing a photo of herself, she says that she looks “so chubby” and “fat” (p.7). Her parents are unsurprisingly concerned at first, but they are too caught up in their own financial struggles and soon forget about it. Nevertheless, the narrator matures over the course of the novel and grows into a confident young woman who cares less about what other people think of her.

Although Censored is an insightful novel, the book is clearly aimed at a much younger audience. The narrator is very juvenile and a large proportion of the book is set in school, focusing on her class assignments and crushes on the boys in her school. The writing style of Censored is quite chatty and childish – I think it would’ve been better in a diary format. The book is very short (with only 211 pages) and the ending is quite abrupt, but I guess that leaves room for a sequel.

Despite its faults, Censored is a thought-provoking novel that raises numerous questions about free speech, conspiracy theories, and the role of media. The narrator wonders why people protest, why they government acts violently in response (won’t it “just lead to more chaos and anger?”, p.22), and why we need freedom of speech. Censored also highlights how the media isn’t always accurate and it’s important to read several sources before forming an opinion on current events and politics. Censored is timely and would appeal to pre-teens and young teenagers who are interested in politics.


Also posted on my blog :)

I really liked the premise of this book and, in light, of what the world is going through currently, it gave a good perspective of what could happen if events spiral out of control. However, I felt was disappointed in the writing of this book. After the initial fight over teacher wages (which could be used to spark conversations in classrooms), I was unsure of what sparked subsequent protesting. I was also let deflated at the end of the story because I wanted to know what happened to the family. Maybe some sort of epilogue could have solved this problem. While, I can see using parts of this book in the classroom, I am not sure I would use all of it, due to the incomplete writing style.

Although I was highly intrigued by the premise and description of this book, it was ultimately a disappointing read that I would not recommend to others. While I appreciate that the book attempts to explain some difficult topics to young adult readers, such as censorship, media bias, protesting/riots, and police brutality (an especially timely topic), it is poorly written and maintains a vague and somewhat unrealistic plot.

The citizens of Alexandria are engaged in protests that have been stretching on for months; while the initial cause was teacher wages, it snowballs when the police respond to the protestors with tear gas and other forms of brutality. More people join in the protests, but it is unclear what exactly they are now protesting; presumably, they are protesting police brutality and for the right to protest peacefully, but it's all somewhat unclear. The unnamed narrator mostly just states that they are protesting and leaves it at that. Things continue to escalate in Alexandria; the government attempts to regain control of the citizens with curfews and social media restrictions, and even arrests individuals for speaking out, effectively rendering many others silent. Some parts are realistic; the narrator observes that certain news outlets present biased accounts that skew and misinform readers. Her father tells her that it is important to get news from a variety of sources and viewpoints so that she can draw her own conclusions and opinions. Other parts feel like more of a stretch; for instance, there is so much pepper spray used on a daily basis that the narrator is forced to stay inside for months at a time.

Although the book is based on true, current events from the around the globe, the writing style is so lacking in craft and descriptive details that it reads more like a diary listing events than a piece of literature. It's a great concept, but unfortunately, it's better in theory than in execution.

Pretty well-written book. Interesting to try to learn about what's going on from a young girl's POV and also to hear her opinions on what's happening in her city. Very relatable to the riots that are happening right now.

This review contains spoilers.

This was a DNF for me. I reached about halfway through this book before I had to read the end, to see if this had a happy ending because this book was extremely upsetting, frustrating and depressing. Sad to say, it did not have a good ending and so I am glad I didn’t finish it.

I started this book annoyed that it seemed very much a pre-teen book that had somehow slotted itself into the teen/Ya genre. Reading more, I could see how the topics it dealt with pushed it there, but I still found the writing very difficult to read, in the sense that it sometimes it really, really felt like a 13 year old was writing this, but then an adult was going through the introspection.

Perhaps the timing of reading this book doesn’t help, considering the state of the world currently. I don’t mind if books have hardships and struggles, as long as there are moments of light and hope. Those moments the book tried to convey weren’t enough for me.

I’m giving it 2 stars instead of 1 because I can’t tell how much my feelings about the book stem from the current situation.

I feel like this book was just slapped together based on real life events happening right now. While I cant say for sure that it was written within the last few weeks, it sure does read like it. And I dont mean just the story itself. The writing almost seems like a rough draft. There's no real emotion, and the narrator is very one dimensional. She describes every event as " x,Y,Z happened. I felt this way. This happened. I needed to learn more. ".