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Timari Claybourne

Ms. Williams-Arnold

Honors English 10

9 June 2019

Gabi, A Girl in Pieces

Gabi, A girl in pieces is a strong insight on a common teenage girl’s life who is

experiencing the struggles of most teenagers today. Included in this insight are problems such as

finding your own sexuality, defying the wishes of your parents’ image of you, having your

parent as a drug attic, going through your 1st relationship as a woman, and much more. It takes

you on a wild ride.

Gabi is a Mexican American 17-year-old girl, her story takes place during her senior year

of high school. Like everyone else, she too is excited to go back and start anew during this

brand-new school year, but before she can even start, she is already running into unwanted

trouble and turmoil in her life. Her best friend gets pregnant. Leading to said friend (Cindy)

being judged by almost everyone she comes across and only can be consoled by Gabi and Her

other friend Sebastian. Also close to the same time Cindy got pregnant, Sebastian decides to

come out that he is gay, and did I mention Gabi is extremely overweight. Now keep in mind, the

Mexican American community does not take kindly to people who are “different” than the

majority of the people in the community. For her 2 best friends who are already defying

themselves from everyone else, Gabi is the only one that can truly be 100% there for them with

her support.
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On top of this, Gabi has to worry about her own self. This includes activities such as

keeping track of her college applications, finding time for new relationships and hobbies, and

dealing with her father who is unfortunately a drug attic.

The author, Isabela Quintero, creates this immersive world for people of all ages to get

sucked into. Her book manages to capture the essence of life during this new age of technology

and different nontraditional ideas. Gabi often finds herself questioning the traditions and norms

of the community she lives in. One prevalent example includes Gabi’s weight as opposed to her

Aunt Bertha. Gabi is often criticized about her weight by her Aunt Bertha and no one bats an

eye, but as soon as Gabi says something about Bertha sleeping with married men, she

immediately becomes the bad guy in the situation. In this instance Quintero skillfully shows the

inconsistencies within the communities and people Gabi lives around.

Quintero somehow portrays the hypocrisy of society excellently in the book through her

characterization, vocabulary used by certain characters, and use of literary devices to get across

how one may be feeling, or the ideas that they currently express through the book. As proof,

Quintero uses poetry as a way for Gabi to evolve as a character during the events of the story.

She uses poetry to express herself in many ways and evolve her thought process by comparing

poetry (and the way she writes it) to real life situations. When Gabi writes her poetry about real

life and when she does she is able to draw conclusions about current situations and grow as a

person. The book is not perfect though; for instance, Quintero could do a lot better by fleshing

out more character interactions and adding a short character arc for somewhat important

characters. I feel as if some characters were there only to fit into a role that was very unneeded

and never ended up with a resolution. An example of this is Gabi’s mom. Throughout the entire

story she criticizes Gabi and compares her to other children, but we never find out why. Even
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Gabi’s aunt (who played a much less significant role within the story) acknowledged how much

of a hypocrite she was and changed her ways, but with Gabi’s mother we get no resolution other

than “I love you and am scared you are leaving for college.” I don’t believe that counts as a

strong ending to her story as it does not correctly justify the bad (and good) actions her mom has

done towards Gabi.

This book is a must read for anyone who would enjoy a great drama and would like to

experience the hardships of being a teenager (these might be exaggerated a bit though). It

connects the reader through Gabi’s point of view and enables them to be able to relate to Gabi on

a personal level to experience everything that she is going through. 8.5/10