
Author: Daisy Whitney
Pages: 332
Publisher: Little, Brown
Format: Hardcover
My Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Summary (from Goodreads):
Some schools have honor codes.
Others have handbooks.
Themis Academy has the Mockingbirds.
Themis Academy is a quiet boarding school with an exceptional student body that the administration trusts to always behave the honorable way--the Themis Way. So when Alex is date raped during her junior year, she has two options: stay silent and hope someone helps her, or enlist the Mockingbirds--a secret society of students dedicated to righting the wrongs of their fellow peers.
In this honest, page-turning account of a teen girl's struggle to stand up for herself, debut author Daisy Whitney reminds readers that if you love something or someone --especially yourself-- you fight for it.
My Summary: Alex - known around school as 'piano girl' - is like every other student at Themis Academy: gifted and driven. But when a night at a concert turns her life around, Alex has no choice but to seek out the Mockingbirds - a disciplinary group dedicated to righting wrongs that the administration blinds themselves to.
Now with her friends behind her, Alex is speaking out for all the girls whose voices weren't heard - and figuring out who she is in the process.
My Thoughts: Although I didn't agree with everything in this book, I thought it did make a great read. It also make me want to re-read To Kill a Mockingbird! Alex was a very dynamic character - we really get to see her grow throughout the course of the novel. I also loved the secondary characters; Casey, T.S., and Martin were a great support system for Alex, and they were far from flat and one-dimensional (like most secondary characters seem to be).
I really liked the idea of a disciplinary committee that was seperate and secret from the aministration of the school. School politics and favouritism is so often a factor when it comes to deciding punishments for studetns, so I think this would be a great thing to have in place for any school.
I enjoyed the writing style as well - the writing flowed naturally, and I felt like the way Alex's thoughts were portrayed made her character seem all the more realistic. I found myself flying through the pages, finishing within eight hours of starting.
Final Thoughts: If you enjoy contemporary lit that's a little more on the edgy side I definitely recommend you check out The Mockingbirds!