Full joint review at Smart Bitches, Trashy Books 
 Courtney Milan is well-known (and, on this site, much adored) for her Victorian romances. Trade Me is Milan's first contemporary and once the Bitches finished knocking each other over on the way to an ARC, we commenced to raving about the book on email and now we are raving publicly because this book is pretty darn sublime. 
 The basic sum up of the plot is this - Blake and Tina are two college students. Blake is rich; Tina is poor. When Tina tells Blake that he can't handle her life, he proposes that they swap lives for three months. Pretty soon they are collaborating on projects, meeting each other's parents, and falling madly in love. 
 The plot is actually fairly complicated but that's it in a nutshell. 
 Carrie: What a fantastic book. I don't know where to even start with the raving. The dialogue is so good that I have to resist the temptation to just quote the whole book. 
 Also allow me a moment to say that I love the character of Maria. The reveal that she is transgender is done so well. It is clear that being transgender has caused her considerable difficulties, but it's not a plot point. She just is who she is, and she's fully accepted, and she's the heroine of the next book which makes me scream with happiness. 
 Redheadedgirl: I think the main theme of this book is "We become the people that would have saved our parents." I know that's true for me, and Tina has become, literally, the person to save her family, while Blake is trying to figure out how to be the person who would have avoided his father's mistake. The problem is, you never have all the information that made your parents who they are, and there are plenty of ways for our children to become the people who would have saved us.