MALL GOTH

 

I cannot remember the exact year this is set in, but definitely early 2000s. I remember a reference to Evanescence's "Going Under," which was 2003. 

It wasn't that far off from me being a mall goth in the late 90s. Like malls are still very relevant places in this time, too. 

This was a very nostalgic read, even though it's nothing like my life. I wasn't goth in high school. I would have been a rivethead, if I'd known that word at the time. I got into goth more in early 1997. (I'm still a music-based subculture hybrid. I call myself a metalrivetgoth, because I enjoy all the music.) 

So Liv is a 15-year-old goth who just moved to a new place. She's an out bisexual, which was unheard of in my day. I imagine things weren't really that different only a few years later, especially in high school. She's navigating making new friends and hoping they'll be more comfortable with her than people in her old school. She does fairly well pretty quickly, but also catches the attention of her English teacher. 

This is filled with drama on many levels. Liv's friends with a couple guys, one has a girlfriend that doesn't like her right away, the other has a crush on a girl who works in the video game store and Liv also thinks she's cute. She's struggling with her father never being home and then with her parents getting divorced. The friend with the girlfriend is sending all kinds of mixed signals. She's found a job at the mall, but she's the mascot for an AU version of Build-a-Bear and she hates it. And the thing with the teacher is...well, you can see where that's going. 

I love all the little nostalgic Easter eggs the most. The story is mostly well-written, though it felt like it could have gone on much longer and been more detailed. Like one couple got interested in each other completely off-screen and I wanted more details there. The drama problems were on their way to being wrapped up, but some of that would occur off-screen. Overall, I liked it enough to want it to be much longer. If you were growing up goth back in those days, this is a fun read.