I read multiple books at a time, picking up whichever suits my particular mood when I have a chance to read. White Ivy made me put down everything else.

It's difficult to explain White Ivy, because the layers -- having to do with class, race, gender, heritage both cultural and familial -- are so deeply intertwined you could.write an encyclopedia's worth of literary interpretation on the novel and still not be bored. If that sounds boring, that's only because I lack the formidable authorial powers of Susie Yang. You could not be bored reading this book. Ivy is an anti-hero, the narrative subversive. Crushed under a variety of family myths and familial oppression, she's driven by the combination of a desperate longing for material wealth and a certainty in her own lowness to lead a double life. Paranoia and guilt seep from the underhanded one to the bright, false one she hungers for but cannot make true. The repercussions of family rot, rotting outward, turn up in her and her counterpart, the infuriatingly good and opaque Gideon, her high school crush-turned-fiance, for whom she lusts symbolically.

When the pace suddenly changes from slow coming-of-age story to thriller in the final act, we see that Ivy has never been wrong about herself -- yet she finds a way to triumph, and we can't help being in awe. Utterly delectable. Top 3 fiction releases of 2020!