My rating: 4.75 stars

Angie Thomas has got that midas touch when it comes to writing because this was gold.

I absolutely loved The Hate U Give when I first read it and I ended up loving On The Come Up (OTCU) even more. 

OTCU is about 16 year old Bri whose dream is to be a rapper. Bri’s family is barely getting by: her dad was murdered when she was little, her mom recently lost her job, and her brother, Trey, had to drop out of college to help with the bills. More than anything, Bri wants to make it big as a rapper so that she can help her family – she feels useless not being able to help her mom and feels guilty that Trey had to abandon school to look after her. 

After an unprovoked altercation with one of the security guards at her highschool, Bri lets out her emotions and frustrations by writing a rap song. When the video is put on the internet her words are misunderstood and taken out of context; all of sudden Bri finds herself in the middle of a controversy. 

There is so much to love about this story. I found myself bopping my head along to Bri’s verses as if I could actually hear her rapping.

The writing, the humour, the focus on family and friendships, the vivid portrayal of systemic racism and prejudice…

This is honestly a 5 star read and the only reason I’m giving this a 4.75 rating (and it hurts me to do this) is because there were way too many Black Panther references. Bri is a nerd. She and her friends are obsessed with Black Panther, so every other chapter they were pretty much doing this:

I honestly have nothing against Black Panther (I loved it when it came out) but I’m just tired of hearing “wakanda forever” in general.  

100% recommend adding this to your reading list if you haven’t read it already! Just like Thomas’s first book, this one is also being made into a movie so I’m excited to see the music and dynamic characters in this story come to life!