Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing a free copy in exchange for an honest review. I really like this book!! I really love how our protagonist, Imogen undergoes her journey of discovering one’s identity and sexuality. I think it discusses on how sometimes we aren’t sure what’s our sexual identity or that it can change.

Yet another fab book from Albertalli!

Imogen, Obviously is a queer awakening book, bit it really shows that there is no ‘right’ way to be queer. I absolutely loved Imogen and her development, and I absolutely loved her and Tessa! Gretchen was a character that definitely had me being annoyed, but that shows that she was well written too!

Also one thing I have noticed that no one ever really mentions in their reviews of Becky Albertalli books is that there are always Jewish characters, and in this case Jewish main character. That representation is there and it is important.

This is a very heartwarming coming of age queer story, and it deals with many things including biphobia.

I really enjoyed Imogen, Obviously (obviously) and I am looking forward to the next book from Becky Albertalli! I am giving this book 4 stars.

Imogen is straight but she is a fantastic ally to the LGBTQ+ community of which her sister and both of her best friends belong to. Imogen goes along to the Pride Alliance meetings and keeps up with issues affecting queer people, so that she can be the support that her friends need her to be. So, when she visits Lili at college and meets Lili’s new queer friends, Imogen fits right in. However, Lili’s new friends think that Imogen is bisexual because Lili pretended that she and Imogen used to date. So no one knows that Imogen is definitely straight. She knows she is, so why does the beautiful, fascinating Tessa seem so intriguing? Imogen, Obviously a really cute story about discovering your sexuality may not be what you thought it was and the struggles that come with that. The romance is adorable and it felt so authentic and pure. It also explores toxic friendships and attitudes within the LGBTQ+ community, which is something that I’m not sure many YA queer books do. So, it definitely felt like an important, multi-layered, real story.

I will be coming back to this book when I am in the right head space: for now I was not able to finish it unfortunately.

oh boy. where do i even start on this one!

i have never read a book that interrogates sexuality quite like this one. and i don't mean interrogate in like a science-y way, i mean... looks at the full spectrum of sexuality and gives space to people who are figuring themselves out, whether that is happening at 12 or 25.

this book would have meant a LOT to me as a young adult, when i was going through a similar journey myself. asking myself questions like "am i queer ENOUGH" or "if i only like one girl surely that doesn't count" or "maybe i'm just thinking it to be cool and fit in". having a book like this, where not only are those questions asked but the answers are "you don't need to know!" would have absolutely changed the way i felt about myself and the confidence i had in my own queerness back then.

aside from that, this was just a fun book in general - imogen was a sweet main character to follow, and i loved seeing her relationship with tessa develop very organically. i also loved the little queer community - it is true that queer people find their pack! - and how all identities were represented, normalised and celebrated. it was interesting to see the biphobia talking points coming from a bisexual girl, and challenged by other queer people, though i appreciated the conversation and tough messaging around every queer experience being different. i do think it needs to be said (and, knowing what happened to becky, i'm not surprised she took this angle) that queer people cannot, by benefit of being queer, police other queer or even non-queer but questioning people. the queer experience is not universal and we need to do better at recognising that. gretchen pissed me off and i'm glad imogen didn't just forgive her outright!

anyway all that to say. i love loved it. thank you becky for writing what i imagine was a deeply personal and moving story.

Imogen, Obviously made me sob my heart out at 6am.

(The tears on the UK cover are mine).

I loved, loved, loved, loved this book so much. It was funny, romantic, and just so powerful. Imogen was an amazing protagonist, and I loved her and felt so protective over her. There were points where I just wanted to climb in to the book and hug her, to tell her that she was valid and loved and it was okay.

I really enjoyed (when I could read it through my tears) how this story played out. I loved the conversations behind had in this book, and how it represented the real life conversations that are happening (predominantly in online spaces, such as twitter). I think Albertalli balanced it well, and gave good exploration to the conversation that was well needed.

It's genuinely taken me nearly 3 months to put together a review, and this is it. I just . . . this book has engraved itself in to me and I'm still finding it hard to provide the words to accurately describe how much I loved it. So, this is what you get. A confession/profession of my overwhelming love for this book.

Thank you to HarperCollins UK, Children's, HarperCollinsChildren’sBooks for this e-arc in exchange for an honest review.

I received an Advance Reader Copy from the publisher, via NetGalley. This in no way impacted on my view.

After her best friend heads off to college, Imogen Scott has been in limbo until her own graduation, and she can join Lili on campus. Finally accepting an invitation to spend the weekend with Lili and her new friends, Imogen is nervous to meet those she has followed online. And when Lili drops the bombshell that her new friends think that Imogen and Lili used to be a thing, but are now best friends, Imogen doesn't know how she can pretend to be queer, when she the straightest girl going. Though the longer she spends with Tessa, the more Imogen starts to question everything she's ever thought about herself.

I simply loved this book! It was everything I was expecting from Becky, and kept me on the edge of my seat the entire way though. Imogen was the sweetest, and there were so many times I wanted to give her a hug, particularly as she started to reminisce and question her own sexuality. She had two best friends, Lili and Gretchen, and Lili was a doll, and Gretchen was awful. We all hate her, right? She completely steamrolled Imogen, and invalidated her thoughts and feelings all of the time. I still feel like she deserved worse than she got, but the ending of the book was good enough for me - at least Imogen was happy. Imogen and Tessa were so sweet together, and I loved their message threads so much. It all felt so real, and the way they went from new friends, to tentative flirting, and then the culmination of it all, was perfect! Such a great book, which I will definitely be recommending to my students!

Imogen, Obviously just wasn't for me, unfortunately. I have read and loved Albertalli's work before, and I was incredibly excited to read a new release, but it just missed the mark for me.

I love the subtleties of LGBTQ+ fiction, but this book felt like being slapped over the head on every page. Imogen was irritating and repetitive, her inner monologue was incredibly frustrating and I couldn't stand to read about her fears of appearing gay for one m0re sentence. I understand that this book is incredibly important to Albertalli, and I respect that, I just wish she had leaned more into the nuances and finer points instead of always opting for stereotypes - something she was trying to fight against.

I hated how every character was a typical gay stereotype. The point of the book, to me, and what I was expecting, was the dismissal of these stereotypes, the breaking down of the discrimination and showing that being part of the LGBTQ+ community is natural - as it is, and shouldn't be the thing that defines you. That is the story that I believe Albertalli set out to write. And yet, every character made their queerness their personality. Imogen spent far too much time wondering if wearing flannel made her appear gay, etc. Every character seemed to be defined by their sexuality and nothing more, representing characters this way further adds fuel to harmful stereotypes in real life, I could lift several applicable quotes from the text, lines I couldn't believe were in a book written by an author who stated her intentions were to show that sexuality could not be inferred from appearances, but I think other reviews have covered that quite nicely.

This book had the typical cute, fluffy romantic moments you would expect from a novel in this genre, but unfortunately those were overshadowed by the harmful stereotypes and clashing messages portrayed in its pages.

I would like to thank NetGalley and HarperCollins for my ARC of this book. Unfortunately, it wasn't for me.

Becky Albertalli is my "go-to" author when it comes to YA LGBTQ+ books because I never feel sad after reading them. She has a heartwarming quality of showing the difficulties of being part of the community but equally celebrating everything about it.

The same can be said for Imogen, Obviously. It is a story about figuring things out but doing it in your own time and space whilst knowing others will have opinions and throw contentious arguments your way.

Our protagonist, Imogen, is an ally. A strong one. She champions her LGBTQ+ friends and goes out of her way to be au fait with the ever expanding rainbow. However, when she starts to question her own sexuality she finds that others don't extend her the same courtesy that she has done.

Ultimately, it is a book about finding yourself and learning that you can not please everybody.

A great read, especially for those currently questioning their sexuality.

Imogen, Obviously by Becky Albertalli is available now.

For more information regarding Becky Albertalli (@beckyalbertalli) please visit www.beckyalbertalli.com.

For more information regarding Harper Collins (@HarperCollinsUK) please visit their Twitter page.

📚 r e v i e w 📚
imogen obviously, becky albertalli
it’s pride month 🌈 so of course i needed a queer romance to finish off the month, enter one of the most heartfelt lgbtqa stories i’ve ever read.
this is becky albertalli’s most personal book yet, every sentence feels like an exposition of the soul but wrapped up in a cute romance with a relatable protagonist. meet imogen and her gay awakening after spending years as the token straight friend and world’s greatest ally - this book opens up a lot of conversations i frequently have with myself about identity and acceptance all without being taxing or preachy.
if you want a cute romance with substance that you can easily demolish in one sitting while enjoying the sunshine, grab this!
plus it featured the uni experience i wish i’d had and great bi, ace, gay, nb, pan and even himbo rep.
thank you becky albertalli for this story and thank you @netgalley
for the early copy.
imogen, obviously is out now 🏳️‍🌈

Thank you to the publisher via Netgalley for the eARC in exchange for a fair and honest review.

I think Becky Albertalli is overdue her flowers from the YA community. Since Simon, she's pivoted mainly to sapphic romances, but still can't seem to stop catching heat for writing queer stories as a "straight" author. And yet, here we are, Albertalli is not straight. Who could have seen this coming?

Imogen, Obviously is a clear response to the online pile on Albertalli received for writing queer stories when she herself was not yet out. Imogen is straight, or so she thinks, but just about everyone in her life isn't, from her friends Gretchen and Lili to her sister Edith. Imogen has gay taste in movies, gay taste in music, and likes to come to the school's LGBTQ+ club as an ally. One weekend, she finally makes a trip to visit Lili at her college of choice, where she meets Lili's friends. There's a catch though, Lili has told them all that she and Imogen used to date.

This sees Imogen trapped in a spiral of guilt. Already self conscious about the space she takes up in queer spaces and worried about the 'appropriation' of queer culture, Imogen is freaked out by the position she has been put in. When she starts to develop feelings for the flirtatious Tessa, things start to get complicated.

This book is attempting something that I think is very difficult and very brave - delving into the nuances of appropriation, queerbaiting, and representation. It also confronts the reality of the anxieties that some young people are being subject to thanks to an overly protective and complicated discourse that polices behaviour in the name of supposed inclusivity. Imogen finds herself using what are, from an adult perspective, incredibly arbitrary measures of queerness - the way she sits, the cars people drive, whether or not the movies she likes are gay-movies-for-straight people. All very silly, yet intensely relatable for anyone who has ever felt that their performance of their sexuality isn't something innate or instinctive.

There is one particularly affecting passage in which Imogen's friend Gretchen compares her crush on Tessa to other straight girls' love of Ruby Rose, a talking point from a few years ago that still stings to read about as someone who was in a similar moment of personal turmoil when all of that was kicking off in 2015. Gretchen is a particularly compelling character, because for all that her beliefs are problematic and /extremely/ online, the reader still feels for her as someone who clearly feels the need to be defensive of her identity. Still, the book is very clear on the fact that suffering is not and should not be considered a prerequisite to queerness.

This is another great YA book from Albertalli - I'm sure the kids will love it - just zeitgeisty enough to be fun without feeling like it's going to veer into the cringe super speedily. The only thing I would change is perhaps shortening or omitting some of the long passages of text message exchanges between the chapters - they ruined the flow a little for me, making the book feel a little bloated.

Becky Albertalli smashes it out of the park once again! I adored Imogen - she was an incredible main character, she felt so genuinely real, with so many layers to her, I could have read from her perspective for hundreds more pages. It's honestly just such a comforting story - discovering yourself in safe spaces, with old and new friends, it was just lovely to read about. Becky Albertalli just has such a talent for writing characters that feel like you could actually be friends with, who you can't help but love. You can really feel how much of herself the author put into this story - it was very raw and honest and emotional, and it must have been so hard for her to write, you can't help but applaud her for that, especially after everything that happened in the past. This book is definitely going to be so comforting and helpful to so many people, it was really wonderful.

I wish books like this were published in Poland when I was growing up. I wish people felt free to be whoever they want to be without a fear of judgement, repercussions or worse. I wish that people were more accepting. I wish that everyone had such loving friends like Imogen. I wish that everyone was able to trust themselves when thinking about theirs feelings. Imogen, obviously not the is a book to help you with all those wishes,
Many thanks to Netgalley And The publisher for the proof of the book.

4.5 stars

i loved this book sooo much!! i read it in two sittings and i knew from the beginning that it was going to be great! i hated gretchen so much and it’s actually sad to thing that some people are really like that.. i found out that the story is inspired by the authors experience and it’s really sad to see that this is imogen’s thinking (literally i thought i was the one who overthinks the most).. also it’s important to notice that queerness does not have to be “girly” all look/dress a certain way.. things like that in books bother me some times but i guess it’s understood that some people do think like that although it’s not the case!

This book is so joyously adorable, I can't even.

Imogen is visiting her best friend Lili at college for the weekend. Lili reveals she lied to her new queer friends that Imogen is her ex girlfriend, which is tricky when Imogen is straight. It starts the unraveling of Imogen and how the neat boxes she fills might not be quite so neat.

The writing style is so easy to read, I loved the pace and sailed through it. I like the short time period it spans over and the text conversations sprinkled throughout were a nice touch.

I related to so much of this book, as a bisexual woman myself. I felt like all of the characters had moments where I was like 'it me!!!'. I think Lili was my favourite character, she's pantastic. (No apologies for that pun)

So many teen readers needs this book, it dispells the ideas of queerness and any so called requirements to be queer. Even as an older reader I appreciated it, I still know a few Gretchen types too. Highly recommend!

-thanks to NetGalley for the proof!-

Becky Albertalli is an author who I’ve come to rely on for an amazing YA novel. So, when I saw that she was releasing Imogen, Obviously of course I was excited to give it a read. Safe to say, I loved it.

Imogen has never missed a Pride Alliance meeting and has got the World’s Greatest Ally title down. When she goes to visit her best friend Lili, at college who is thriving, graduated and newly-out and with a cool new squad of queer college friends, no one knows that Imogen is a raging heterosexual, not event Lili’s best friend, Tessa. The more time Imogen spends with Tessa, the more she starts to wonder if her truth was ever all that straight to begin with.

I adore Imogen. She is so thoughtful and kind to all of those around her even when she is struggling with her own sexuality. I love watching her grow and learn who she is throughout the book and I know outside of this story she will grow even more.

The romance in this story is also adorable. I love seeing the chemistry between Imogen and Tessa and how their feelings for each other grew throughout the book. The hilarious moment that happen between these two were my favourite part of the book.

I love the friendship group we get to meet in this book. Each of the group brings something so different to the story and watching them be together and so accepting of one another was so refreshing and wholesome. I’d like more friendship groups like this in books, please.

I do feel that this book will become dated quite quickly, unfortunately. It has a lot of current pop-culture references in it that in a few years, will be outdated. That being said, it didn’t take away from my enjoyment of the book.

You can see how personal this story is to Becky Albertalli, especially with the author’s note at the start of the book. It has Becky Albertalli’s signature writing style and I’m already excited for another book by her in the future!

Overall, Imogen, Obviously is a wonderful YA book with a realistic, honest and authentic approach to a girl finding her identity. I would highly recommend giving this one a read!

Everything I love about a Becky Albertalli book: LGBTQ+ characters, emotional rollercoaster, fantastic friendships, discourse to make you think and a huge dollop of hope and happiness!

I adored Imogen from the very beginning. The best friend you could wish for and the greatest ally to her queer friends… until she starts to wonder is she only an ally? This book took us on a real emotional rollercoaster as Imogen peels back her own layers, faces self-doubt and doubt from (some) peers but ultimately sees her accept herself and celebrate who she is.

Tess is adorable. Lili is wholesome. Edith is the best little sister. Gretchen I found difficult but also understand that her character was likely designed to create the conflict needed in the book.

This book talked to me on such a deep level and I loved it completely. The author’s note at the beginning is a must read.

Thank you to Harper Collins UK, Becky Albertalli and NetGalley for my early review copy in exchange of a fair and honest review.

“*How weirdly does a person have to sit to count as bisexual?”*

Achingly sweet and intensely relatable, this book is so vulnerable and imperfect and basically I have no notes. Buuut here are some things I loved about Imogen, Obviously.

Imogen is curious, kind, self-aware to a fault and always adapting to make others more comfortable. She hasn’t granted herself the space to fathom that she could be anything other than the best, most vigilant ally to her queer loved ones.

Within her queer friend group, there is a great depiction of a friend who perpetuates biphobia in the name of ‘protecting’ (gatekeeping) queer spaces. The nuanced, ongoing conversations about heteronormativity and queer media are countered and challenged by this antagonistic friend, making them all the more insightful. Albertalli portrays these discussions in a realistic way, giving readers useful vocabulary and hopefully some confidence. The teen characters’ dialogue is very natural, with just enough slang and references to trends to make their ages completely believable.

Spoiler! Imogen is bisexual, and continuing to conform to an idea of herself that she had no hand in creating suddenly becomes suffocating. This conflict was so compelling; the urgency to shed an ill-fitting identity like a wool coat in the sweltering heat. Coupled with debilitating doubt and fear due to internalised biphobia you didn’t realise was your entire inner monologue?! Girl, relatable.

While the catalyst for Imogen’s revelation was falling for Tessa, we see her accepting her sexuality as an intrinsic part of her by re-contextualising her memories without the burden of heteronormativity.

Just a f*cking fantastic queer coming-of age story that I loved with my whole queer heart. Thank you ever so much to the publisher for this e-arc!

I LOVE LOVE LOVED this book! Becky Albertalli has done it again, I always enjoy her books but this one was, for me personally, above and beyond. The representation is spot on and the story is just perfection. I could not put this down.

I absolutely loved this book! I haven’t read a novel in one go in a while, but I couldn’t put Imogen, Obviously down. The writing pulled me in immediately and the entire story flowed from there. Imogen was such a strong main character, so relatable and sweet, and her journey was heart-warming to follow. The relationships between characters were well-done and nuanced—such a good squad of friends. And don’t get me started on the romance—so swoon worthy! Imogen, Obviously both tackles big issues and provides fluff. It made me smile, tear up and laugh. Definitely a 5 stars read for me.
Thanks to Netgalley and HarperCollins Children’s for the copy!