Moxie

Author: Jennifer Mathieu

Publisher: Hodder and Stoughton

Year: Sep 2017

Pages: 340

Genre: Young Adult

Reading Time: 4 - 8 Aug
Binding: Uncorrected Proof Copy

Goodreads

Blurb:
 Vivian Carter is fed up. Fed up with a school administration at her small-town Texas high school that thinks the football team can do no wrong. Fed up with sexist dress codes, hallway harassment, and gross comments from guys during class. But most of all, Viv Carter is fed up with always following the rules.
 Viv's mum was a tough-as-nails, punk rock Riot Grrrl in the '90s, and now Viv takes a page from her mother's past and creates a feminist zine that she distributes anonymously to her classmates. She's just blowing off steam, but other girls respond. As Viv forges friendships with other young women across the divides of cliques and popularity rankings, she realises that what she has started is nothing short of a girl revolution.

Review:
 I loved this book, I haven't read what I would label a strictly feminist book until now. I won a copy of this arc at YALC and am so glad that I got it otherwise this book wouldn't have gotten on my radar for my TBR. It's the kind of book I skim over when I see it. The pink, the contemporary setting. Blech!
 Way to stomp on my stereotyping, Jennifer Mathieu!
 I only recently left school and wish that Moxie was around then. The setting is entirely believable because for the most part, it's relatable. There were slight differences for me having gone to school in
the UK. The footballers were just my school's sporty lot that didn't have much else going for them. The PE teachers let them get away with everything and other teachers didn't bother because the students clearly didn't care. The 'make me a sandwich' comments were used at my school but bullying was such an issue for everyone we never really thought about it. We had uniform, but stupid things like nail polish, natural hair colours, bras not visible through our white blouses and only one set of earrings was only ever a problem for the girls. Yet the stage where boys walked around with their trousers halfway down their asses went mostly unnoticed. All of these school experiences helped me connect and empathise with the girls in  Moxie.
 I struggled for a while over whether Viv was inspirational or not. She's a small town girl who doesn't step out of her comfort zone and keeps quiet. Her anger and resentment isn't expressed until she publishes the first Moxie zine. She keeps quiet about her involvement in Moxie, which makes her inspirational for me. I'm not a quiet person once you get to know me, say something I disagree with and I'll call you out. Viv kept quiet for a selfless reason until a very Wild Child moment. The lack of a face behind the Moxie zine inspires others and makes the other girls in the school feel as though anyone can do it. Leading to good and bad consequences as you'd expect of any kind of revolutionary movement.
 Viv got on my nerves in one small respect which is an achievement, believe me. I pick holes in contemporary female characters a lot as I think of who I can relate them to and why I didn't like them. A bad habit. Viv uses the word 'zine' and wants to insist everyone else do so when talk about the Moxie 'zines'. Irritated me to no end. I genuinely had to look this word up, I knew it was short for magazines but I had to make sure. At the time I'm writing this I'm finding out it actually is also usually self-published by one or very few people and reproduced via photocopiers. So technically, she's right and I just thought it was some retro word she was picking up from her mum.
 The other female characters in Moxie cover a large range for a smallish book. You have the inspirational woman in Viv's mum. You have a beaten down feminist, a girl who thinks feminism is some kind of cult and girls just too nervous about standing up for themselves. Though this is based in a small town in Texas there are girls of many races and a few of different sexualities. Don't get me wrong, the range could always be greater but the point it makes gets across.
 There has been a little debate over a character called Seth but I thought he was believable more than anything. He's a guy that tries to understand and help feminist movements and he gets a bit idolised in the beginning. To be honest, when he didn't understand and Viv got angry I thought she was bang out of order. As a guy, it's shown he simply can't understand how the odds are stacked against girls. It's also shown that he's willing to listen and learn so he can better understand and support the females in this book. He highly contrasts the males that are causing the problems at this school but again, I think that draws parallels with the real world, especially in school.
 The first line on the proof cover is 'A MANUAL ON HOW TO START A FEMINIST REVOLUTION' and I couldn't agree more. This book shows that whatever action is taken doesn't have to be big. It reminds you revolutions start small and grow. I really can see this as a hidden instruction manual for some and see these actions working in schools. It's excellent.
 I can't see any woman or girl that went to a school not feeling rallied by the end of Moxie. That's how I felt, rallied, alone in my bedroom reading this I felt ready to go out and fight because someone out there would join me. Not literally fight, I'm too small for that but my nails do gain me some points. I wanted to go back to my school and set things right, I wanted to be in a room full of people feeling the same, I wanted to DO SOMETHING! That's a first and I certainly hope it won't be the last.

Editing Emma

Author: Chloe Seager
Publisher: HQ (Harper Collins)
Year: Aug 2017
Pages: 328
ISBN: 9780008220976
Genre: Young Adult Contemporary
Reading Time: 1 - 4 Aug
Binding: Signed Paperback
Goodreads

Blurb:

 When Emma Nash is ghosted by love of her life Leon Naylor, she does what any girl would do - spends the summer avoiding all human contact, surrounded by the Chewit wrappers he left behind.

 Seeing Leon suddenly 'in a relationship' on Facebook, however, spurs Emma into action. She vows to use the internet for good (instead of stalking Leon's social media), chronicling her adventures on her new Editing Emma blog.

 But life online doesn't always run smoothly.

 From finding her mum's Tinder profile, to getting catfished and accidentally telling the entire world why Leon Naylor is worth no girl's virginity . . . Surely nothing else could go wrong?

Review:

 This is totally not the kind of book I would usually pick up, but it was signed and an exclusive early release at discounted price for YALC so I went for it! Who can say no to a signed bargain?
 A lot of people are comparing this to Louise Rennison's books which is understandable. It's the same kind of humour, plot and intended audience. Here I should point out I own three books of the Confessions of Georgia Nicholson series and I don't remember finishing any of them, maybe only the first. I enjoyed the humour, laughed my head of when I watched the movie but couldn't get past the pathetic and petty actions that were so unbelievable. It was much the same with Editing Emma.
 The humour was good, really good. Of what I remember of Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging this book is for a slightly older audience. There's joking about masturbation, a subject not nearly talked about enough amongst young women that will be relatable for some and abhorrent for others not there yet. I thought it was hilariously nonchalant considering where the text was being posted.
 The book is a series of posts on Emma's private blog. The concept of a private blog I have a problem with, I just don't understand it. Why bother? Why not just go with a good old-fashioned, handwritten diary. The handwriting shows emotion. You can sketch stupid stuff. It can be burned. Someone is going to find this blog. As I see it there were some comments on the blog posts by people Emma surely wouldn't have given the address to. Maybe they were Twitter posts, it was unclear. I have no problem with epistolary-like books, I enjoy them, it's a breath of fresh air in a library of chunky books and long chapters. But she posted so often it became unbelievable, this blog was clearly being used as a diary to express every thought in her little head.
 A good book in general but especially a contemporary book you are supposed to empathise with, in my opinion, needs a likeable character. Emma was no such thing. She ponders after Leon and exhibits some really creepy habits that set a pretty pathetic character that I'd have nothing to do with if I  met her in real life. I'm not picking up those pieces all the time, get on with your life. I had a few crushes I obsessed over and I knew I thought about them too much. Yes, we all stalk our crushes on social media. Yes, the tings they touch can occasionally look as if they've turned to gold. But she was on another, unbelievable level. I just can't or don't want to imagine someone could really be sunk to such a pathetic level over a boy at that age.
 I wasn't a fan of her friends either, their characters were your typical range of friends but they were portrayed bitterly through Emma and so came across negative. Her friends in truth, were so lovely by even dealing with Emma in her state but she was blind to their needs. If they had problems of their own they were selfish, if they didn't make an effort to cheer her up they got the cold shoulder. All vented about on the 'safe place' of her blog. For me it portrayed that kind of competition and pettiness between  girls that is very true and brought back a lot of bad memories for me.
 I haven't got the book on me whilst writing this (Hola Feurteventura!) but I remember the ending to be this kind of discovery that didn't ring true. It just. . . appeared. It was a bit of a non-ending to a straight lined character arc. Emma was changing her outlook on life as a new way to deal with her rejections. Same old story. Denial disguised as a revelation.
 At a younger age, all for this. If you're getting into Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal snogging about now, go for it. It's a funny and to an extent realistic book. A few years later you'll see the flaws.

YALC 2017 Book Haul

So I've been quiet the past few months, I've had A levels and then YALC, need I say more?

Here are all the books I gained at YALC with a swag video to come later, beware my use of 'awesome' and 'excited'.

S.T.A.G.S.

Author: M.A. Bennett

Publisher: Hot Key Books

Year: Aug 2017

Pages: 290

ISBN: 9781471406768

Genre: Young Adult Thriller

Reading Time: July 31 - Aug 1
Binding: Signed Paperback

Goodreads

Blurb:

It is the autumn term and Greer MacDonald is struggling to settle into the sixth form at the exclusive St. Aidan the Great boarding school, known to its privileged pupils as S.T.A.G.S. Just when she despairs of making friends Greer receives a mysterious invitation with three words embossed upon on it: huntin' shootin' fishin'. When Greer learns that the invitation is to spend the half term weekend at the country manor of Henry de Warlencourt, the most popular and wealthy boy at S.T.A.G.S., she is as surprised as she is flattered.

But when Greer joins the other chosen few at the ancient and sprawling Longcross Hall, she realises that Henry's parents are not at home; the only adults present are a cohort of eerily compliant servants. The students are at the mercy of their capricious host, and, over the next three days, as the three bloodsports - hunting, shooting and fishing - become increasingly dark and twisted, Greer comes to the horrifying realisation that those being hunted are not wild game, but the very misfits Henry has brought with him from school...

Review:

 Let me start off by saying this is not a mystery. What is going to happen is clear, sometimes because Greer is retrospectively telling us the story and likes to remind us of what happens at the end but also because it's pretty obvious. When the popular kids at school invite the misfits on a secluded weekend that involves weapons, something bad is going to happen and the characters that don't suspect something are naive. Greer likes to make comments on things she sees and link them to her knowledge of movies. When this first happened I thought it was cool, then I realised it added nothing to the story and was just one of the characters odd quirks that entertained herself. Some of the references (Cogsworth) were funny but there were some that I didn't understand, so it got a bit pretentious and added nothing to the story. You'd also think that Greer would have watched plans to humiliate the misfits play out a million times with this movie knowledge, so why the hell wasn't she suspicious sooner?

 This is a thriller for a younger audience, I believe the age suggestion is 14+ and I think at 14 I would have enjoyed it much more. But at 18, I wanted this to be darker. None of the traumatic or shocking parts are really dealt with, they happen quickly and are mostly dismissed by Greer. Instead there is a lot of scenery description (nice) and some teenage relationship obsessing. I think Greer is 17 but she acts about 14 in the face of a possible relationship. I'm not sure whether it's accurate as people get giddy around these kind of changes or if it's a drawback of an adult writing as a teenager. Either way, if an older audience had been decided and this was New Adult instead, it could have been awesome and more bloodthirsty to my liking.

 The plot is good, but knowing who lives and dies from the first few chapters is a bit weird. Greer makes comments on how stupid she was or how she should have felt throughout and this only reminds you that she survives, meaning there aren't any real stakes in this book. If it had been left open, the thriller element of this would have come through perhaps to even a mild horror.

 We spend little time at the school, enough to make an introduction into why Greer's invitation is odd and then we jump into the action. This was really good as I don't think that having long dreary lessons with Greer being lonely and self-pitying would have been entertaining or helped me empathise with her. It likely would have made me dislike her character more. I liked Greer until around the morning of the shootin' day. If you read it, you'll know why. Her attitude was...urgh. She didn't develop a huge amount and nor did any other characters, there were only realisations of what the Medievals were really like. 

 I should mention this Medieval thing, because it could get really annoying. The popular group is called the Medievals, they are old money and act like they still live in our world a few hundred years ago. They use cars but ignore modern technology. Technology is 'Savage'. With a capital 'S'! Swearing is Savage. Phones are Savage. Anything that is Savage is automatically discarded by most people in the school who want to become a part of the Medievals. This is one of those school cliches that works in a book. If it's a social norm at S.T.A.G.S. then it fits, but it's constantly referenced and Greer checks herself for anything Savage before acting in front of the Medievals over the weekend.

 The end was a slow kind of redemption. The act you've been waiting for the entire book happens and there are 50 or so pages left. Things continue and you wonder why until a few things happen and everything becomes bigger than the characters realised which answered a couple of questions I had along the way.

 I realise my review has been pretty negative but I feel like this book won't work for readers that are ready for adult thrillers, it's a kid's thriller book. There are quirks that are irksome for older readers that you wouldn't notice at a younger age. I noticed them, but I still read this book in under 24 hours and enjoyed it whilst I was reading. I'd love for the idea to be told for an adult audience. The underlying ideas the Medievals have are pretty awesome and could pull off some great following books.