Five Things I Adored About Minor Dramas and Other Catastrophes:

1.) The juicy insider setting. I love glimpses of other worlds in general; behind the scenes at a total hothouse of a school full of crazy parents, and you’ve just sprinkled catnip on my Fancy Feast.

2.) The there’s-a-reason-she’s-too-good-to-be-true main protagonist. There are plenty of characters and POVs here, but the primary one, a teacher determined to give her privileged students an ability to see beyond their bubble, seems at first to be almost too goody-two-shoes perfect—until you realize why she is who she is and why she takes it so far.

3.) The sympathy for everyone. Some people are right in this book. Others are not right, by which it’s possible I mean batshit crazy—but they are not without their reasons, and those reasons make them interesting and engaging and bring out at least a little empathy.

4.) The über-satisfying crashing resolution. I love it when a plot comes to fruition, people.

5.) All the points of view have an emotional arc. I’m not always crazy about swapping from POV to POV, especially when it’s being done for purely plot reasons, to tell us readers stuff we need to know—but here, there’s an emotional reason as well as a plot reason that we’re in everyone’s head.

Fans of The Gifted School, Small Admissions, Early Decision—this one’s for you for sure. #Pleasedon’tletmebethatparent #Ijustwanttoreadaboutthem