Adultolescence

‘ i’ll ruin your day without rhyme or reason.’ – Gabbie Hanna

Gabbie Hanna’s poetry anthology is the only Youtuber book I’ve actually wanted to read because it starts to turn Youtubers away from the new idea of being social influencers to the older mentality of them being creators.

‘Adultolescence’ contains a wide variety of both fictional and autobiographical poems from Hanna that, much like her videos, have relatable and entertaining narratives such as the poems of ‘Philosophy’, ‘Stunted’ and ‘Lonely’. Coupled with these poems she includes an unique feature of illustrations that accompany nearly every poem showing Hanna’s artistic side as well. The pictures are drawn monochromatically which allows the reader to indulge in their own creative journey.

Amongst these well thought out poems are many less impressive ones that Hanna admits herself are just ‘fillers’. Also, her childlike idea that poems are expected to rhyme at times takes away from the story being told and for me reduced ‘Smile’ to two uninteresting pages despite its potential. Along with this was the stylistic choice of no capital letters and at times no apostrophes which I suppose were to make it look like text speak. Though initially opposed to her choice I accepted it as a stylistic choice and in keeping with her character as a social media star. The problem I found with this was that this choice wasn’t consistent as an apostrophe was used for ‘i’ll’ but not for ‘dont’.

Ultimately, I am glad that Gabbie’s book was my first Youtuber purchase due to the creative concept of the book alone. Although I could’ve done without a few poems I applaud the attempt and will continue to support the work of the newly rebranded Gabbie Hanna.