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Get these characters out of my life!!! I can't even with these people. I should've listened to my friends who said this was not a great book-- it's really really not a great book.

Playing right along the lines of high school drama, this tale takes a step into the disturbing direction and leads down a chilling path.

Rafi is amazed at how perfect the high school's cutest Senior couple is, and she holds nothing but the highest regard for both of them. Determined to bask in their glory every moment she can, she finds ways to weave into their lives and become friends. First, she joins yearbook and makes sure that she's in charge of all Senior photos. Then, she joins the same clubs. With each opportunity, more doors are open to her, and soon, she's right there with them...at least, until the two love-birds part. It's more than Rafi can stand, and she's going to do anything to keep them together.

This book fulfills the title completely. It's creepy, but not completely in the way I expected. Everything plays from Rafi's point of view. The reader dives deep into her head, watches the high school couple through her eyes, and is exposed to her every thought. It's clear right away that she's obsessive in a very unhealthy way. She knows it, embraces it, and follows her urges with full heart and no apologies. It is creepy to get to know Rafi and unsettling to watch her grow closer to the pair, move by move. Her thoughts are well laid, and her plan logical, even as it sends discomfort into overdrive. And worse, yet, there are times where it's hard not to feel sorry for her and wish they could become good friends. It's a tight weaving and well done.

Unlike many thrillers, violence isn't the main drive, but rather, the psychology...which isn't any less dark. Rafi's true intentions are also never hidden, and what surprised me, is that this tendency isn't even unknown to some around her. Here's where I do wish there had been a bit more, since is missing history surrounding a friend and an earlier teacher.

Thriller fans, who love diving into high school drama, are going to want to take a peek at this one, since it does fulfill the promise its title makes. This one is creepy. I received a complimentary copy and found this to be a chilling read.

I enjoyed the writing style and the drama but not much else.

All of This is True is an exquisitely complicated story about 4 high school students who meet and befriend their favorite author. A dream come true right? Until they become the main characters of said author’s next book!

The whole novel is told through transcripts of video interviews, news articles, released text messages, and the author’s manuscript to divulge to the reader what might have gone down between these high schoolers and the author. This makes for a bit of a mystery read, you experience the story as if you were an interested party researching the story yourself via the internet. You never *truly* get a traditional book POV, instead you see and read public information. What’s true? That’s up to you!

Switching between the character’s ‘real’ names and book within the book names as a little confusing a first but was easy enough to latch on to. I love that you get the most insight into the characters through the author’s manuscript, which is not necessarily what happened or what the characters were actually thinking. So your thoughts on all of the events going on are heavily influenced, and the ending needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

This will keep you on your toes and questioning everything you’re told- All of This is True was such a uniquely creative read and I would recommend it to everyone!

I picked this one up, then almost set it down after a few pages. I didn’t like the writing and could tell right away that at least one of the characters was going to rub me the wrong way, but I had just seen the title on a list with many books that I had enjoyed, so I kept reading. It never shocked me like the cover blurb promises, but it ended up being decent with a nice twist.

I'm feeling... extremely conflicted about this book. I honestly don't quite know how I was meant to take a certain plotline? It wasn't... as obviously called out as I would have liked? But at the same time I don't *think* the book was condoning it?

I don't know.

I'm going to need to think on this one for a bit.

Review ( rating) coming soon if I can ever sort my thoughts out.

Three best friends are big fans of Fatima Ro, the author of their favorite book "The Drowning." When the author herself befriends them and invites them to hang out at her house, it is beyond a dream come true for them. But it turns out that perhaps Fatima was using them and their confidences to write her next YA bestseller, which leads to the severe beating of their new friend Jonah who himself has a secret to hide. The documentary style of TV interviews, book excerpts, texts, emails and magazine articles all toss out the pieces of an intriguing mystery. The reader is compelled to follow along and put the pieces together. Did Fatima take advantage of the girls? What was Jonah's secret? Which of the girls' perspectives was the closest to the truth? Great candidate for beach reading although given that Fatima's "The Drowning" was such a lauded book, the excerpts from her "The Absolution of Brady Stevenson" come off somewhat weak. Or maybe that's the point: Fatima had run out of ideas and used the girls to write her next book.½

Woo boy, what an absolute disappointment book this was. When this was first announced, I sort of lost my shit. Seriously, a book about fanatical YA fans being used by an author was pretty much right up my alley... especially with all the seedy things that are actually happening in KidLit and YA. I was a little concerned about the multi-POVs and the formatting (interviews/emails/texts) because all of those things are really hard to pull off correctly. And I suppose I had every right to be concerned because the author butchered what should have been an amazing book.

All of the characters sound, act, and feel the same. I enjoy multi-POVs where I can recognize the character's voice without having to be explicitly told who it is... that's how you write good, fleshed out characters. Even with the title heading of who was speaking above every chapter, I really couldn't keep the four girls straight.

*****SPOILERS*****
I was really concerned that the author tried to force us to have sympathy for someone who sexually assaulted a younger student. How it kept coming up that he "wasn't a bad person"... but honestly, he was.

“‘What’s more powerful than words?’ Thora had asked the four of them once. They couldn’t come up with an answer.”

I don’t really know how I feel about this book but I almost think that’s the point? All of This is True is one big unreliable story about friendship, boundaries, and truth and it was pure entertainment. We follow 4 teens who befriend a YA author and their lives become more complicated than they could have possibly imagined.

Things I Liked
I really loved the mixed media format that was used to tell the story. There are interviews, emails, newspaper excerpts, book excerpts that all create this vivid picture of Fatima Ro and the friendship that developed between her and Miri, Penny, Soleil, and Jonah. And I loved how the excerpts from Fatima’s book was woven into the story to show what was happening.

I also love that this story is so personal for the characters and that makes everything they’re saying unreliable. It’s impossible for their perspective to not be biased and that made the reading experience fun for me, because I could see what my views were and who they aligned with. Even though there are 3 main POVs- Miri, Penny, and Soleil - they all have distinct personalities that came across and were easy to differentiate.

This premise is just so captivating and creepy and just everything you want to read about in a dramatic contemporary story. It really explored the boundaries that are pushed and broken when we develop friendship with people you look up too.

Things I Didn’t Like
I’m not going to lie, the story was a bit confusing at times. I think mostly because I didn’t have all of the information (or it was biased) - but again that’s the point so I can’t really fault it, but it did keep me removed from the story at time.

There were some characters that I just didn’t connect with. I found Penny to be super annoying and I just didn't like her at all. I also didn’t really care for Jonah, we don’t get his POV in the story really, but he is a central character. He mostly just felt kinda removed from it all. Which again, probably works great for the story, but not exactly what I was looking for.

All of This is True was an truly unique read that so easy to devour. I like that I don’t know whose side I’m on and that I wanted to keep reading, but I just wasn’t as invested as I wanted to be. But I still think it’s definitely worth checking out if you’re in the mood to be captivated by a story.

I received a copy of the book as a part of the blog tour hosted by Alice from @ArcticBooks