She’s So Money by Cherry Cheva | Rating: ★★★★★

"…but hey, starting over is what college is for. It didn’t matter that I had nothing left here. I’d just leave. Forget everything. Start again. Right?" / "He was just having fun," Camden said. "Maybe you’ve heard of it?" "Heard of it. Enjoy it. At the moment, not having it." I turned to go.

Rewind to my sophomore year of high school, aka the first year I began to write book reviews. One day I decided to ask for donations of books for my school, as I went to an alternative school and the head teacher there is an absolute angel. Through the years, it was obvious the bookshelf in one of our classrooms wasn’t growing, so I figured I’d surprise my teacher and classmates with some new books.

Cherry Cheva was one of the first authors to offer a book to donate and thus began my lovefest with She’s So Money. After a week or two of it sitting on the shelf in our classroom, unread simply because no one was doing reading assignments until the end of the semester, I picked it up and began reading it on my breaks between classes and lunch. First, I fell in love with the colourful cover. Shallow, yes? Well — who cares, really. If something gets you reading, it gets you reading.

(I loved it so much, I soon bought my own copy and one for my best friend.)


Secondly, I fell in love with the main character, Maya. She’s funny, relatable and extremely intelligent. There’s something so humorous about her narrative you simply cannot put the novel down. Maya begins tutoring and the classmate she begins with is the very attractive and very popular Camden King.

(Fans of the snarky, kind-of-bad-boy will fall head over heels for Camden!)

Maya and Camden’s interactions are what draws you further into the story. There’s a smart and dry humour in nearly every interaction between the two and the chemistry is just undeniable. They are quite the pair, even when they’re, well, not.

After a racist, difficult angry customer at her families restaurant causes some serious problems and leaves a lingering possibility that her family may lose their restaurant. "You think? Do your people not understand English, sweetie?" (Ugh, gross.) Maya is forced to hide the threat from her family, as she was left in charge that night, and find a means to pay for a fine herself. Enter Camden’s master plan — begin to do homework for their classmates but charge them a nice little fine.

Soon, Camden and Maya become closer and their business is thriving. Things come to an abrupt pause when word gets out, Camden and Maya’s newly friended classmates seemingly abandon her, and Maya loses her best friend. She is forced to make a decision that could very well ruin her entire future. Things seem to become more and more tricky by the minute, but each move seems to be more humorous by the minute without getting overly cheesy.

She’s So Money is written so smoothly, it’s hard to find any flaws in it and is the ultimate novel to read when you’re having a bad day and could use light reading or a laugh. Cheva’s writing is very good throughout the book and you can definitely tell she’s written for Family Guy in the past.