Author: Sarah Enni
Format: Paperback
Publication: February 2019
Rating: 4 Stars
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YOUR SECRET’S SAFE … UNTIL IT’S NOT
Ivy is the shy artist type and keeps a low profile—so low that she’s practically invisible to everyone at Belfry High School except for her best friend, Harold. As sophomore year begins, Harold takes up a hundred activities, leaving Ivy on her own. Luckily she’s found a distraction: the new anonymous art-sharing app, VEIL.
Soon Ivy realizes that one of her classmates is the VEIL user who needs new paintbrushes … and another is the one visiting the hospital every week … and another is the one dealing with their parents’ messy divorce. While she’s too scared to put her own creations on the app, Ivy thinks of an even better way to contribute—by making gifts for the artists she’s discovered. The acts of kindness give her such a rush that, when Ivy suspects Harold is keeping a secret, she decides to go all in. Forget gifts—Ivy wants to throw Harold a major party.
But when all those good intentions thrust her into the spotlight, Ivy’s carefully curated world is thrown into chaos. Now she has to find the courage to come out of the shadows—about her art, her secrets, and her mistakes—or risk losing everything and everyone she loves the most.
Ivy is the shy artist type and keeps a low profile—so low that she’s practically invisible to everyone at Belfry High School except for her best friend, Harold. As sophomore year begins, Harold takes up a hundred activities, leaving Ivy on her own. Luckily she’s found a distraction: the new anonymous art-sharing app, VEIL.
Soon Ivy realizes that one of her classmates is the VEIL user who needs new paintbrushes … and another is the one visiting the hospital every week … and another is the one dealing with their parents’ messy divorce. While she’s too scared to put her own creations on the app, Ivy thinks of an even better way to contribute—by making gifts for the artists she’s discovered. The acts of kindness give her such a rush that, when Ivy suspects Harold is keeping a secret, she decides to go all in. Forget gifts—Ivy wants to throw Harold a major party.
But when all those good intentions thrust her into the spotlight, Ivy’s carefully curated world is thrown into chaos. Now she has to find the courage to come out of the shadows—about her art, her secrets, and her mistakes—or risk losing everything and everyone she loves the most.
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Ivy is a young high school artist who starts looking at Veil, an anonymous art sharing app. Even though she is an artist herself, she is too scared to share her stuff on Veil. Throughout the summer and beginning of the school year, she finds out who some of the users are and sends them gifts.
Ive also has a crush on Harold, but gets a very, very wrong idea about him, and because of that wrong idea - she goes months without telling him how she really feels.
So, without giving too much away: Here is what I think of this book
* Ivy is way too timid and scared! She needs to open up and realize that she can and should be brave and share her art as well - especially if she wants to call herself an artist.
*Ivy makes a lot of mistakes in this book. There is something I need to say about one of those mistakes. She makes an assumption that someone she cares about is gay. So, she then outs this person to a whole bunch of people. Let's just break that down for a minute. First of all, don't make assumptions about people just because they are accepting of gay people. There is nothing wrong with being gay. However, unless someone tells you they are gay, don't just assume. Sometimes an ally is just an ally.
Second of all - if someone does come out to you and tell you they are gay, you do not ever, ever get to share that information with other people. I cannot stress this enough: It is never ever okay to out a gay person. Coming out is deeply personal, and something that should only be done by the person when they are ready. Gay people get to decide when they come out. Gay people get to decide who they come out to. It is not up to anyone else to share that deeply personal information!
Moving on:
*I wish there had been more Harold in this book. In most of the book, he was just a mentioned character instead of an active seen character. And I really loved him - so I really wanted him to be seen more instead of just talked about! I think, aside from the art teacher, Harold was my favorite character.
* I like that Ivy has such an incredible art teacher who really pushes her to be active in her own art instead of just worrying about other people's art.
* This story is well written - everything that happens in the book just seems to fit. Even when I get mad as heck at Ivy, whatever happened in the story FIT!
* The characters in this book are well developed and distinct - and they have layers. They are not all just one-dimensional. They learn stuff about themselves and others throughout the book as well, which I think is important.
Overall, I liked this book. I highly recommend it for readers.
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I won a copy of this book as an ARC on the twitter. It is set to be published in February 2019, so when it comes out - go read it, okay?!
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