Ten Things I Hate About me by Randa Abdel-Fattah

Jamilah Towfeek hides her Lebanese-Muslim background from the other kids at her Australian school "to avoid people assuming I fly planes into buildings as a hobby." She dyes her hair blonde, wears blue contacts and stands by when popular kids make racist remarks. Passing as "Jamie" is fraught with difficulties: she can't invite friends to her house, lies to cover up her widower dad's strict rules and reveals her true self only to an anonymous boy she meets online (her e-mail address is "Ten_Things_I_Hate_About_Me"). Tensions at home and school culminate when the band she plays in at her madrassa (Islamic school) is hired to perform at her 10th-grade formal. Abdel-Fattah (Does My Head Look Big in This?) follows a predictable pattern and uses familiar devices, such as the understanding teacher ("If [your friends] don't know the real you, then you've already lost them"). On the other hand, the author brings a welcome sense of humor to Jamilah's insights about her culture, and she is equally adept at more delicate scenes, for example, Jamilah's father recounting memories of Jamilah's mother. For all the defining details, Jamilah is a character teens will readily relate to. Ages 12–up. (Jan.)
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My blog is a little different from the rest, because I am allowing myself to abandon books. Unfortunately this is the first book i chose to abandon.

Ten Things I Hate About me was a story from the point of view from a Lebanese Muslim who has two different lives. Jamilah lives in Australia, where people are surprisingly racist towards minorities! They taunt, and exclude Muslims from groups and parties. So in order to go to those parties and FIT in, Jamilah turns into Jamie and dyes her hair blond and gets blue eyed contacts. Jamilah's mom died and ever since then her father, who drives a taxi even though he has a PhD, because of racial tensions, raises Jamilah, her older brother and older sister. This causes the dad to be all strict on everybody because he wants to make everybody (his friends) think that he is doing a good job raising his children without their mother.

The characters were interesting, but it seemed like every time Jamilah got close to one of her friends, it kind of fell apart, thanks to her father's rules about not partying and also because she is too ashamed to bring her friends home.

I stopped reading the story a little after she e-mailed the stranger who I'm pretty sure turns out to be "goldfish." I stopped reading because I felt as if the character was repeating her problems over and over and over... after i while i yelled, "I GET IT!!"

I was really excited about reading this book, but when i finally sat down and read it, it was nothing special, it was actually boring! I bet in the end Jamilah finally does get to meet or see the mystery boy, doesn't go out with the jerk, whose name i forgot, and is allowed to go to a party. I hope this author starts to change her style in books because it seems like she is stuck on one topic.

Ten Things I Hate About me is NOT WORTH READING (according to me)

Stars: 1.5 out of 5 stars

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