The Year I Stopped Trying by Katie Heaney | e-ARC Review + Playlist | TBR & Beyond Book Tour

Hello everyone, and welcome back to the blog. Today is my stop in the “The Year I Stopped Trying” Tour and I have a review as well as some playlist for you guys!

DISCLAIMER: A review copy of this book has been sent to me in exchange for an honest review. This review copy has in no way influenced my rating of this book.

And now without further ado, let’s start with this post!

Synopsis:
Booksmart meets The Perks of Being a Wallflower in this novel of overachieving, existential crises, growing up, and coming out, from the author of Girl Crushed and Never Have I Ever.
Mary is having an existential crisis. She’s a good student, she never gets in trouble, and she is searching for the meaning of life. She always thought she’d find it in a perfect score on the SATs. But by junior year, Mary isn’t so sure anymore.
The first time, it’s an accident. She forgets to do a history assignment. She even crosses history essay off in her pristine planner. And then: Nothing happens. She doesn’t burst into flames, the world doesn’t end, the teacher doesn’t even pull her aside after class.
So she asks herself: Why am I trying so hard? What if I stop?
With her signature wit and heaps of dark humor, Katie Heaney delivers a stunning YA novel the sprints full-force into the big questions our teen years beg–and adeptly unravels their web.

Title – The Year I Stopped Trying
Author – Katie Heaney
Publishing date – November 16th, 2021
Genre – Young Adult Contemporary

Mary is kind of an overachiever. She has good grades, never gets in trouble, always listens to her parents and looks for the meaning of life. Until she accidentally forgets to hand in homework. The worst of all is that she gets away without punishment, while any other student would have had to do some additional work. Then it hits her, why did she try so hard in the past? How about she just stops now? Because in the end, there are no consequences for bad behaviour? Or will there be some after a while?

I absolutely adored “The Year I Stopped Trying” and felt like some parts Mary had to endure were snippets of my life as a high school student. This is why I could totally relate with our main character, and it’s also one of the main reasons I loved this book so much.

The short chapters were amazing, and it made it so much easy for me to continue reading the book during my breaks at work, which was immensely helpful. This is my first book written by Heaney, and it will certainly not be my last, as I enjoyed her writing a lot.

I liked it how the author tackled the rebellion of our dear Mary and how she’s grown during the story.

This is a book I can recommend without any doubts! You will enjoy this one, and maybe you’ll also be able to identify yourself with Mary

Favorite quotes:

1. “After fory-seven mintues of agony and anxiety, my heart rate up and my head woozy and hot, it was over? I wasn’t relieved; I was furious.”
2. “Next to this he’s drawn a little smiley face, and if I had to pinpoint a trigger that set this whole thing off, I’d choose that stupid, smug, patronizing little smiley face. That smiley face thought it had me all figured out. Oh yeah? I thought. Watch me.”
3. “That’s just what school is. You’re not original for hating homework.”
4. “It annoys me to know I’m absorbing material I don’t need and need and don’t want without my consent. Just by being here, in this classroom, for fifty-two minutes a day, I am learning something, whether I want to or not.”
5. “I don’t know who I am without grades and rules. What if there isn’t anything else?”
6. “But it is still early, and I’m still learning.”
7. “Everything smells like dust and old paper,[…]”

Book Links:

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/57178190-the-year-i-stopped-trying

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0593118294/ref=x_gr_bb_amazon?ie=UTF8&tag=x_gr_bb_amazon_ca-20&linkCode=as2&camp=15121&creative=330641

Barnes and Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-year-i-stopped-trying-katie-heaney/1138843359?ean=9780593118283

Book Depository: https://www.bookdepository.com/Year-I-Stopped-Trying-Katie-Heaney/9780593118283?ref=grid-view&qid=1633722810609&sr=1-1

Indigo: https://www.chapters.indigo.ca/en-ca/books/the-year-i-stopped-trying/9780593118283-item.html?ikwid=the+year+i+stopped+trying&ikwsec=Home&ikwidx=0#algoliaQueryId=571a7c5bbde119d5030f4d560cc8ec18

IndieBound: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9780593118283

Katie Heaney is a freelance writer and was most recently a senior editor at BuzzFeed. Her writing has appeared in Cosmopolitan, Vulture, The Hairpin, The Awl, and Pacific Standard, among other places. She is the author of a memoir, Never Have I Ever, and the novel, Dear Emma. She lives in Brooklyn.

Author Links:

Website: https://www.katieheaney.com/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/KTHeaney

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/katieheaney/

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6860774.Katie_Heaney