Final Draft
I was just browsing in my public library a week or two ago for a new book to read and stumbled across this book. The cover caught my eye so I thought I'd give it a chance.
Final Draft by Riley Redgate is about Laila Piedra, a senior in high school, who loves reading and writing sci-fi stories. Her creative writing teacher gives her the highest praise and is one of her most faithful readers. But just a few months before graduation he is in an accident that prevents him from teaching the rest of the year. His replacement is a Pulitzer Prize winning author who is extremely critical and hard to impress.
Laila finds herself obsessed with gaining the woman's approval. This means pushing herself out of her comfort zone and she finds herself becoming more and more unstable. But will it improve her writing? Is risking her relationships, her plans, everything, worth pleasing her mentor? How can she thrive in her writing and in life as she looks to the future after high school.
Riley Redgate is actually a pen name! Rioghnach Robinson is the author of these books. While she was raised in North Carolina, she is half-Irish and half-Chinese which sounds like an amazing combination to me! She wanted to keep her real initials and find something gender neutral which I love. I like when she said that just like her, her characters are "in the middle of a spectrum rather than out at the ends." Laila is half Ecuadorian and bisexual so she is a perfect example of this.
I thought it was an interesting coincidence that I recently read Samira Ahmed's Internment in which the main character is also named Layla. It got me thinking about these two strong female characters. You can read my review of this book here and compare them yourself.
As an English teacher and someone who has dabbled in creative writing, I thought this book was fascinating as a look into the writing process. Laila writes several drafts and different versions of her story that we get a glimpse of. She talks about sharing her writing with others and some of the struggles of coming up with ideas and getting them on paper. I enjoyed reading another writer's perspective on this.
Laila does have an interesting arc as a character. The story didn't exactly end up how I thought it would. I think that the epiphany Laila comes to is a good, healthy one but like I said, not what I expected.
I recommend this book for realistic fiction lovers, anyone looking for a well-written biracial or bisexual character, and there are some short passages for those who love a good bit of sci-fi.
Laila finds herself obsessed with gaining the woman's approval. This means pushing herself out of her comfort zone and she finds herself becoming more and more unstable. But will it improve her writing? Is risking her relationships, her plans, everything, worth pleasing her mentor? How can she thrive in her writing and in life as she looks to the future after high school.
Riley Redgate is actually a pen name! Rioghnach Robinson is the author of these books. While she was raised in North Carolina, she is half-Irish and half-Chinese which sounds like an amazing combination to me! She wanted to keep her real initials and find something gender neutral which I love. I like when she said that just like her, her characters are "in the middle of a spectrum rather than out at the ends." Laila is half Ecuadorian and bisexual so she is a perfect example of this.
I thought it was an interesting coincidence that I recently read Samira Ahmed's Internment in which the main character is also named Layla. It got me thinking about these two strong female characters. You can read my review of this book here and compare them yourself.
As an English teacher and someone who has dabbled in creative writing, I thought this book was fascinating as a look into the writing process. Laila writes several drafts and different versions of her story that we get a glimpse of. She talks about sharing her writing with others and some of the struggles of coming up with ideas and getting them on paper. I enjoyed reading another writer's perspective on this.
Laila does have an interesting arc as a character. The story didn't exactly end up how I thought it would. I think that the epiphany Laila comes to is a good, healthy one but like I said, not what I expected.
I recommend this book for realistic fiction lovers, anyone looking for a well-written biracial or bisexual character, and there are some short passages for those who love a good bit of sci-fi.
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