The Gilmore Girls Reading List

Saturday 19 September 2020

The Nowhere Girls by Amy Reed

 


Publish Date: October 10th, 2017
Format Reviewed: Audiobook
Author: Amy Reed
Author’s Goodreads
My Review on Goodreads

Quick Review

Introduction

When Grace moves into a new town, she learns about a high school girl who was raped about a year prior. Horrified, she digs deeper. Nothing was really done about it. There were no consequences. She and her family moved away. Misogyny runs deep in the high school, and with her friends, Rosina and Erin, they start the collective known as the Nowhere Girls, in hopes of changing sexist culture. 

Characters

This book has a tonne of interesting characters. Grace comes to town because her mom was a former southern Baptist preacher, but after she fell off a horse and hit her head, she became more liberal and took up a position in this new town. Erin has Asperger's and loves marine biology and thinks she may be an android. Rosina is a lesbian and clashes with her conservative Mexican immigrant family. While the book starts off with three perspectives, it eventually does add more voices of various girls, some of the other Nowhere Girls, and some girls who have not joined. 

Overall Thoughts/Verdict 

This book does deal heavily with sexuality, consent, rape culture, and family dynamics. Ultimately, I recommend this book to older teens. However...I think we need to have these conversations with teens before they are ready to read this book. So in a way, this book affirms beliefs we (probably) already hold. If someone doesn't hold these beliefs, I don't see why they would pick this up, and I don't see this as changing anyone's mindset. It's still a fabulous book worth reading, though it does try to do a lot of things at once. I would have liked for the school to have changed in some regard, but it doesn't. With the exception of one teacher, we only see negative reactions from the school. The principle is a cartoonish villain besides the concept of generational misogyny. I still highly recommend it, though some readers may be put off by the themes.   

No comments:

Post a Comment