despite never watching icarly, i imprinted onto jennette mccurdy because her book i'm glad my mom died literally changed my life. just like i'm glad my mom died, the title and book cover of her first fiction book is intentionally controversial, but it honestly works against half his age. this is actually a story about a "mature for her age" girl getting taken advantage of by a pathetic loser english teacher. it's not a titillating age gap love affair story, but it's also not a #metoo type of book either. it's mainly about how the main character matures through making sense of the complicated emotions she goes through in the relationship. low-hanging fruit, but common criticisms of half his age on goodreads are that it's a cheap shock value book and the main character is unrealistically unstable, but i'm willing to bet if you're a lit.salon user you probably wouldn't think so.
jennette is genuinely a great writer, her prose is simple and flows naturally. she lets the tension between what the main character thinks is happening and what's really happening speak for itself. the main character is poor, but in a way that doesn't feel pandering, and the ways her and her mother try to deal with their emptiness with sex, junk food, and shopping addictions were thoughtfully written.
the only flaws this book has are that the protagonist's name is waldo, and that everything gets wrapped up in a very tight emotionally intelligent bow for an 18 year old girl. however, this book was probably cathartic for jennette to write and given the trajectory of the relationship, the ending mostly feels earned.
to be honest, i am not sure who this book is for, except for other girls who imprinted onto jennette mccurdy lol. this is being marketed as a "female rage" book but it doesn't quite fit what's going on in this book, and i feel like mccurdy is too self-aware for that kind of thing. anyways it's kind of nice for a book to come out that doesn't easily feel like it can be slotted into whatever categories exist for contemporary books for women.
if you like stuff like ottessa moshfegh you would probably get something out of this. no good pirated copies exist of this book as of early march 2026, so i purchased it at full price from walmart because it's reserved for over a year at my local libraries (!). a full-price blind buy that i don't regret is as good of an endorsement as i can give a book. if you can get your hands on it, it's a quick albeit stomach-churning read.