I am Princess X; Cherie Priest

"Best friends, big fans, a mysterious webcomic, and a long-lost girl collide in this riveting novel, perfect for fans of both Cory Doctorow and Sarah Dessen; illustrated throughout with comics.
Once upon a time, two best friends created a princess together. Libby drew the pictures, May wrote the tales, and their heroine, Princess X, slayed all the dragons and scaled all the mountains their imaginations could conjure.
Once upon a few years later, Libby was in the car with her mom, driving across the Ballard Bridge on a rainy night. When the car went over the side, Libby passed away, and Princess X died with her.
Once upon a now: May is sixteen and lonely, wandering the streets of Seattle, when she sees a sticker slapped in a corner window.
Princess X?
When May looks around, she sees the Princess everywhere: Stickers. Patches. Graffiti. There's an entire underground culture, focused around a webcomic at IAmPrincessX.com. The more May explores the webcomic, the more she sees disturbing similarities between Libby's story and Princess X online. And that means that only one person could have started this phenomenon---her best friend, Libby, who lives."

Title: I Am Princess X
Author: Cherie Priest
Genre: Young Adult, Mystery
Publication Date: May 26th 2015
Rating 4 out of 5
Favorite Character: May
Least Favorite Character: Needles
Where to read: In a Cafe sipping on some hot chocolate

Hello Fellow Readers,

Honestly I am a bit annoyed, I had this review already typed and ready to go for my Friday post then suddenly I boot up the surface and realize, its gone. No review ready to go, I have nothing to post and while yes I could have done something easy and quick, but that is not how I roll!

Anyway let's do this review

Libby and May's friendship was something I dreamed of having as a child, I still wish I was able to become such good friends with someone that if something happened to them that well I would still be reminded of them no matter what. It was heartbreaking to think of Libby's passing in the book and how everything May went through, how she also lost Princess X, the story and drawing that May and Libby created together, that very same week.

Suddenly years later it just appears again, causing May to get pulled along in search of someone who she thought was lost forever, but is this Libby? Or is this someone who has taken their precious character and now has creative control? The story itself while you would think is far fetched actually isn't and Priest is an author who keeps you turning each page wanted to find out more, leaves you hoping (alongside May) that we could solve this mystery and have closure.

It's been a while since I've read a book that has so many up to date references that it was slightly refreshing to read. Usually so much pop culture in a book has me rolling my eyes, but more of these are said in passing or taken as a everyday thing. Priest's writing didn't feel forced, but organic and had the story flow really well.

One of the things I loved was the lack of romance, this was a mystery and friendship book and Priest did not try to force two characters into something that would have stuck out like a sore thumb, and would have been obvious that it was added for the purpose of just having a romance. I like that she leaves it to your imagination if you wanted two characters (which surprisingly I did) to develop romantic feelings.

There were two things that stopped me from giving this review a full 5. One was that it took a little while before May actually started to get anywhere in her investigation, I would have liked her to start things up a bit sooner and maybe add a bit more action into some of the elements. While it was not devoid of any action, there were a couple of scenes that were really action packed and had me continue reading (despite my bed time), but I felt there could have been more. Another thing was the ending, while it wrapped up the current story it still left me feeling like I didn't have enough closure, what will happen to these characters? I need to know if everything would be okay!!! I don't think Priest will be writing a sequel, it would be hard to picture what it could be about. For Priest's first YA book I think she did a really good job.