If I Was Your Girl by Meredith Russo (review)

After attempting suicide a few years ago, Amanda has fully transitioned from male to female, and after enduring a beating at her old high school, she has decided to make a fresh start by moving from Georgia to Tennessee to live with her father and attend high school as a senior. Here she meets a stalwart group of girls who welcome her into their circle, as well as a closeted bisexual girl, Bee, who befriends her. She also meets Grant, a boy whom she soon finds herself in love with despite her desire to just keep her head down, finish high school, and avoid drama until she can move to a northern city. The love and friendship stories, though somewhat clichéd, work well here, but Amanda’s conversations with Bee read like infomercials chock full of questionable statistics, and the climax trots out every shopworn trope of LGBTQ+ lit: a rejected Bee gets wasted at prom and publicly outs Amanda, violence ensues, and Amanda’s father kicks her out. The aftermath, however, holds a few pleasant surprises, including a repentant father, a tentative but still interested Grant, and the girl group more than willing to defend Amanda against a would-be rapist and welcome her back into their fold. These surprises save the story in more ways than one; while the book is unarguably purposive and makes heavy weather of Southern, religious, and homophobic stereotypes, it features parents and teen girl characters that are compassionate, loyal, and more than a little badass when someone tries to hurt someone they love.