wow wow WOW!!!!!

• in the summer of 1996, hannah & sam (bffs & secret gfs), drive cross-country to san francisco, looking for a fresh start after graduating high school. struggling with being queer in the 90s (& the demands of hannah’s devout orthodox jewish mother), san francisco seems like the perfect place to build a life together. but when the pair realizes san fran is more expensive than they anticipated, the two turn to stripping at a local club, where hannah meets chris, an older butch lesbian willing to pay for hannah’s company. suddenly, their lives start heading in different directions, and paired with family tragedy back home, can the two forge a life together despite their differences?
• this book was a love song to growing up queer & not knowing your place, of finding who you are through your experiences, and how everything shapes who you are. hannah’s sense of loss (& eventually the feeling of finding herself) was so beautifully written.
• this was a book i wish i read when i was 18 & figuring it all out. highly highly recommend!

I enjoyed this one. It had the feeling of classic 90s films like Reality Bites and Empire Records. Parts of the story felt like the author took the easy way out and I do wish there were some real consequences for actions.

I enjoyed the happy ending but it also felt simple and resolved too easily. Still worth a read.

Thanks to NetGallery and the Publisher for this arc in exchange for my honest review.

Girls Girls Girls hooked me in so fast. What an incredible debut! I savoured every word, all richly emotional and beautiful. The writing style is incredibly gripping.
I love the characters and their depth of humanness, especially Hannah of course, Bubbe, Billie, and April. I feel like I was transported back to my young childhood in the 90s when she was describing her childhood. And it was beautiful to get a glimpse into queer culture of that decade in San Francisco. How beautiful to read about dykes surviving and coming of age.
One quote that stuck so hard with me: “But we know about us, and we can love us, and we will write about us, even if it’s just in our journals or on the back of a sweatshirt. Maybe when you aren’t alone in your queerness, queerness is thicker than water.”
I will recommend this to everyone!!!