Review: Don't Even Think About It by Sarah Mlynowski

Don't Even Think About It by Sarah Mlynowski
Publisher: Orchard Books
Publication date: 1st May 2014
My rating: 3.5 stars

This is the story of how we became freaks. It's how a group of I's became a we. When Class 10B got their flu shots, they expected some side effects. Maybe a sore arm. Maybe a headache. They definitely didn't expect to get telepathy. But suddenly they could hear what everyone was thinking. Their friends. Their teachers. Their parents. Now they all know that Tess has a crush on her best friend, Teddy. That Mackenzie cheated on Cooper. That Nurse Carmichael used to be a stripper. Some of them will thrive. Some of them will break. None of them will ever be the same.

Don’t Even Think About it, was a super surprising read. For me it had started off as if it was suitable for a much younger reading audience, but I’m glad that after seeing Mlynowski’s name on the book I decide to give it a go.

Classmates in class 10B were scheduled to get their flu shots like normal, however they didn’t expect to end up with telepathic skills, some students develop in a day or two, whereas others take much longer, but what is meant to be a really scary situation ends up bringing a whole class who never knew each other together. Don’t Even Think About it, was an unusual book to get into at first, as you don’t know who was actually telling the story, as I started to get to know the characters a bit more though things started settling down for me. Overall there were around over five different perspectives in this book. On top of this add all of the other opinions coming through the telepathy, it could sound slightly overwhelming. But this wasn’t the case at all once you get to know the characters. Of course as the story progressed I ended up finding a few favourites and did prefer reading what was going on in their life. (Tess and Oliver). But I didn’t mind reading about the characters when they were all together either, with so many different personalities, they were able to bring a lot of quirkiness and fun to whenever they hit a hurdle in their situation. And I loved it when they had to deal with so many situations with their new found ability, secrets were no longer secrets any more, they had to consider how they could continue to progress without giving away their ability and also develop some techniques of not getting totally overwhelmed with everyone’s thoughts. Some of these kids despite showing some classes didn’t talk to each other much, so it was fun seeing this ability break some bridges that had stood in the way before. Yes this ability wasn’t always peachy especially when what you were actually thinking about one of your friends everyone knew about in a matter of seconds including your friend. But I liked how most of these characters tried to be there for each other.

I also liked how this ability was able to give a lot of confidence to those who had been lacking before, but also a lot were able to realise that the person they thought they were meant to be with wasn’t actually the one. Some of the scenes could be heartbreaking at times (imagine you thinking the guy you like likes you back, but then you hear him pinning over someone else) but overall I think some of the relationships we ended up with were much better, (highlight to view spoiler) I was a huge fan of Tess and BJ.

Overall Don’t Even Think About it, was a super fun read, even though it’s not one of the books I would normally go for, the wide range of characters certainly made this book a worthwhile read.