Gabi, A Girl in Pieces by Isabel Quintero

Title: Gabi, A Girl in Pieces
By: Isabel Quintero
Published: 2015
Call #: YA Fiction Quint.I

Gabi Hernandez just wants to be the perfect definition of a “good” girl, you know smart but not too smart, attractive to the opposite sex but chaste, agreeable and of course skinny. Day after day, Gabi hilariously and honestly writes in her diary about her friend Cindy who becomes a teenage mom, Sebastian who is kicked out of his house after coming out to his parents, her meth addicted father who can’t seem to conqueror his demons, college applications, her love/hate relationship with her mother and FOOD. Gabi finds solace in both food and poetry as she has this internal struggle of whether to comply with her mother’s Mexican traditional notions of femininity or her own thoughts of self-acceptance, self-love and female liberation.

Gabi is just a girl who is trying to figure it out in an environment that always leaves her in a constant state of doubt and confusion. Gabi, a girl in pieces is a book that will leave your emotional state in a state of flux as one minute you’re laughing and in the next minute you’re in tears. Quintero’s relatable and beautifully written depiction of a girl who comes to term with the fact that nothing is perfect, is a must read.

(Liz, the loft)

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