Review: Not Here to Be Liked by Michelle Quach

Emergency Contact meets Moxie in this cheeky and searing novel that unpacks just how complicated new love can get…when you fall for your enemy.

Eliza Quan is the perfect candidate for editor in chief of her school paper. That is, until ex-jock Len DiMartile decides on a whim to run against her. Suddenly her vast qualifications mean squat because inexperienced Len—who is tall, handsome, and male—just seems more like a leader.

When Eliza’s frustration spills out in a viral essay, she finds herself inspiring a feminist movement she never meant to start, caught between those who believe she’s a gender equality champion and others who think she’s simply crying misogyny.

Amid this growing tension, the school asks Eliza and Len to work side by side to demonstrate civility. But as they get to know one another, Eliza feels increasingly trapped by a horrifying realization—she just might be falling for the face of the patriarchy himself.

• Title: Not Here to Be Liked
• Author:  Michelle Quach
• Publisher: Harper Children’s
• Publication Date: September 14, 2021
• Genre: Contemporary, Romance
• Targeted Age Range: YA.
• Content Warnings: Racism, slut-shaming, sexism and misogyny, internalized misogyny, consumption of alcohol, public vandalism, bullying
• Rating: ★★★★★

I read Not Here to Be Liked about a week after the release date and it’s basically been living in my head rent-free ever since. Not Here to Be Liked is exactly the kind of contemporary YA story I love. A strong-willed and determined main character, a rivals to lovers plot line, strong female friendships, a diverse cast of characters, and nuanced discussions on feminism, race, and sexism with a nice dose of baseball and boba. This book drew me in from the first page, and as I’m already reading it again, I assume it’s one I’ll be revisiting many times.

High school junior Eliza Quan has been working toward becoming the editor in chief of her school paper, The Bugle, since she was a freshman. She has the experience, the credentials, and the ideas that make her the perfect candidate for the job. With no one running against her, she’s got the position on lock, that is, until new Bugle staffer and ex-baseball player Len DiMartle decides to run for the position. When the staffers vote for Len to be the next editor in chief instead of her, Eliza lets her frustrations spill out in an essay that she never intends for anyone else to see, but somehow, the essay goes viral. Now, the whole school is buzzing with discussions of feminism and sexism, and Eliza is at the center of it. When the principal insists that Eliza and Len work together on the paper, the two get to know each other better and realize that there might be more to the other than meets the eye.

I absolutely loved Michelle Quach’s writing. In a story that covers so many important and multifaceted topics, she’s able to approach each one with specificity and accessibility through her easy-flowing writing style. I flew through the book in practically no time at all because everything easily moved from one moment to the next. It captured my attention from the first page and kept me interested until the very end.

“A girl who seeks a leadership position must be smart, competent, hardworking, attractive, and, above all, nice. She must be all of those things in order to stand a chance against a male opponent, who frequently only has to be some of those things, and sometimes isn’t any of them. A guy who seeks a leadership position just has to try not to mess up too much. Girls get judged for their past; guys get judged for their potential”

While Eliza is seen as “unlikeable” I personally loved her. I have always found myself drawn to female characters that are seen as “unlikeable” (a post on that may be in the works…) and right from the beginning, I knew that I would love Eliza as well. Eliza is strong, determined, not afraid to stand up for what’s right, knows what she’s capable of, and doesn’t take crap from anyone. To some, those qualities in a woman are seen as “unlikable”, but personally, those are qualities that I admire and respect. Eliza goes through quite a journey of self-discovery throughout the book and I really liked seeing how she dealt with everything that was thrown her way. I also really appreciated how real she was. She was a very flawed character and for me, those flaws made her more relatable and interesting. I really respect her for not only calling out the sexism within her school but also not backing down even when she was getting verbally attacked by classmates online and when the principal clearly wanted her to drop the subject. It takes a lot of strength to do that, especially as a teenager, and I think she set a great example.

I really liked the dynamic that Eliza and Len had, and was absolutely rooting for them to get together. I liked how their relationship progressed from rivals to friends to lovers and think that it was done in a very smooth and natural way. Although, I will say that the romance was not at the forefront of my mind while reading the story. Similarly to the baseball and boba references, it was an extra thing in the book that made me enjoy it all the more.

“American feminism has a history of middle-class white women erasing POC voices. Black voices in particular, but Asian ones, too.”

I think that it’s so important that Not Here to Be Liked is a story about feminism, sexism, double standards, and internalized misogyny that is told from the lens of an Asian-American teen daughter of immigrants. While we’ve gotten a lot of YA books centered around these topics in the last few years, not many of them have been told by POC. While I am Asian-American, I’m not Chinese like Eliza and neither of my parents immigrated to the United States. So, even though there are aspects of Eliza’s experience that I can relate to, our experiences are not the same which made me even more excited to read about her thoughts and experiences.

This is definitely a character-driven story, and I think that the characters played off of each other really nicely. I really appreciated the diverse cast of characters that Quach assembled, and she did so without it feeling as though she was checking boxes on a diversity checklist. The diversity leant itself well to the discussions of patriarchal ideas, the feminism movement, and microaggressions because each of the characters had experienced or benefitted from these things in different ways. I also really appreciated how this book approaches internalized misogyny. It’s easy to believe that because you’re a feminist you’ve eliminated any sort of bias that you may have had, but the truth of the matter is that it isn’t as simple as that. You can be a feminist but still suffer from internalized misogyny because it’s so ingrained in our society. This is a lesson that Eliza and Winona (Eliza’s best friend) learn throughout the story as they grow closer to Serena, one of the most popular girls at their school. I think it’s really important that this topic was approached and that Eliza, and the audience, learn that there’s no one way to be a feminist.

Not Here to Be Liked is for sure one of my favorite books of 2021. It is filled with fully developed and realized characters, important discussions, and strong relationships both romantic and platonic. For anyone who is looking for a good contemporary read with a diverse cast, I say add this book to the top of your TBR!

Links for Not Here to Be Liked: Goodreads | TheStoryGraph | Bookshop | IndieBound