The Upside of Unrequited

Overview

Becky Albertalli's "The Upside of Unrequited" centers on Molly Peskin-Suso, a seventeen-year-old who has weathered twenty-six crushes and never once acted on any of them. Fear of rejection keeps her cautious, a caution she attributes in part to living as a fat girl in a world quick to judge. When her twin sister Cassie falls for a new girl in town, the balance between the sisters shifts for the first time, leaving Molly to confront her own loneliness while Cassie is swept into new romance.

The novel follows Molly as she attempts to close the distance her sister's new relationship has opened, pursuing a potential first kiss with a boy connected to Cassie's girlfriend while trying to ignore her growing feelings for a coworker who doesn't fit her preconceived notion of who she should like. Albertalli builds the story around small, ordinary moments of adolescence: family dinners, awkward flirtation, and the quiet work of figuring out what you actually want versus what you think you're supposed to want.

Told with warmth and self-deprecating humor, the book keeps its focus tightly on Molly's interior life, using her twin relationship as the emotional anchor even as new people enter their world.

Sisterhood, Self-Image, and Coming of Age

Much of the novel's tension comes from the asymmetry between the twins: Cassie moves through romantic possibility with ease, while Molly's caution is inseparable from how she has learned to see her own body. Albertalli, known for centering queer and marginalized teen experiences in her earlier work, extends that focus here to include a fat protagonist whose romantic hesitation is treated as a serious and specific experience rather than a punchline or a problem to be solved by a makeover.

The book also broadens its cast to include several queer characters and relationships, situating Molly's straight romance within a wider social circle where sexuality and identity are treated as unremarkable facts of teenage life rather than plot twists. This ensemble approach, along with its attention to sisterhood as its own kind of enduring love story, has been read as part of a broader shift in YA fiction toward normalizing diverse identities within otherwise conventional romantic-comedy structures.

Why The Upside of Unrequited Has Been Challenged

Objections to this title recorded in this catalog, spanning 5 states and 17 districts, have centered on its treatment of sexuality and its inclusion of LGBTQ+ characters and relationships. Challengers have specifically pointed to depictions of teen romantic and physical intimacy, including references to sex and sexual content involving minors, as inappropriate for school-age readers. The book's frank handling of body image and its casual normalization of queer identities among its supporting cast have also drawn scrutiny from those who argue such material does not belong in school libraries or classrooms, reflecting a broader pattern of challenges directed at contemporary YA novels that address adolescent sexuality openly.