Jamie is committed to the cause but too socially anxious to actively campaign, until he suddenly and miraculously gets partnered up to go door-to-door with Maya, the beautiful daughter of a family friend. Together, the two get progressively more invested in the political cause, and in each other, learning that their voices really can make a difference.

This book is so heartwarming and sweet that I was genuinely grinning for half of the time I was reading. Maya and Jamie are such believable, likeable characters that I could probably have read an entire book about just their everyday lives. Any drama that they went through didn’t feel like it was unnecessarily added, but like it was something that would genuinely happen to two teenagers in the present day as well, which really helped to make me forget- multiple times- that these characters weren’t real people.

A large and very important part of this book is its depiction of social issues and I thought that this difficult topic was handled well. In the cast of characters, there are various homosexual teenagers, as well as Muslim and Jewish protagonists, and the depiction of struggles that these characters face were heartbreakingly believable. I was really impressed that both the portrayal of these individuals and the issues that they face are dealt with so sensitively and carefully throughout the book, and it genuinely unnerved me how easily their struggles could be real.

It’s impossible to talk about this book without discussing its political themes and I must say that it is not, in any way, attempting to be subtle about its own agenda. This wasn’t an issue for me as I appreciated the strongly Democratic feeling throughout the story and loved its insistence on the importance of voting. I was, however, surprised by just how obvious the digs were at real Republican politicians.

Honestly, this book was just an easy and refreshing YA romance with the added bonus of a strong, important message for young, influenceable readers. I have never read a book for teenagers with such a strong message about encouraging social change and I cannot stress enough how much I wish I’d read this when I was a teenager. You definitely do not have to be fully invested in politics already to read and appreciate this story and I really think that, if you read it, you’ll find yourself wanting to learn about things you didn’t even consider before.

If you’d like to read this book (you should!), you can buy it here.

RATING: 5/5

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