Common Sense Media Review
By Barbara Saunders
,
based on child development research. How do we rate?
Teen explores identities in brave novel in verse.
Parents Need to Know
Why Age 14+?
Any Positive Content?
Where to Read
Parent and Kid Reviews
What's the Story?
When EVERY BODY LOOKING begins, Ada, a Black teen from a Nigerian immigrant family, is celebrating her graduation from high school. Ada is bound for Howard University. She looks forward to breaking free from the family dynamic that includes a verbally abusive mother, meddling aunt, and strict, very religious father. She's also excited to find her place in a larger community than the high school where she didn't fit in with either the majority White students or the typical Black American students. At college, Ada pursues her love for dance and explores her emerging sexuality in relationships with both men and women. To come into her own, she must face and heal from her painful past, including sexual assault at a very young age.
Is It Any Good?
Moving and hopeful, this book has the potential to support a reader's substantive thinking about topics like divorce, sex, education, religion, and more. In Every Body Looking, debut novelist Candice Iloh skillfully and economically uses verse to communicate the main character's changing emotional states. For example, Ada uses clipped lines like stutters when recounting a hard conversation with her mother, and a page-long unpunctuated line when describing a moment of ecstasy while dancing. Ada's life is complicated. She's coping with divorced parents, sexual abuse, adjusting to the United States as an immigrant, protecting herself from an exploitative boyfriend, and gingerly considering her attraction to other women. Regardless of these specific issues, she faces the challenge all young people do when they leave home for the first time: finding out who she is beyond the parameters of the family.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about how Every Body Looking is written in verse. Why do you think the author made that choice? How did it affect your reading experience?
Ada is often torn between what she wants to do and what's expected of her. Have you ever made a decision that was right for you and disappointed someone else?
What thoughts do you have about graduating high school and leaving home? What's excites you? What scares you?
Book Details
- Author :
- Genre : Contemporary Fiction
- Topics : School ( High School , Middle School )
- Book type : Fiction
- Publisher : Dutton Books for Young Readers
- Publication date : September 22, 2020
- Publisher's recommended age(s) : 14 - 18
- Number of pages : 416
- Available on : Paperback, Audiobook (unabridged), Hardback, Apple Books
- Award : ALA Best and Notable Books
- Last updated : September 29, 2025
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