Book Review: Moxie by Jennifer Mathieu

Title: Moxie

Author: Jennifer Mathieu
Series: n/a
Pages: 340
Publisher: Hodder Children's Books
Date of Publication: 21st September 2017
Source: borrowed from Reading to Recover
Synopsis from Goodreads:
It's time to fight like a girl!

Vivian Carter is fed up. Fed up with her high school teachers who think 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 Moxie, a feminist zine that she distributes anonymously to her classmates. She's just blowing off steam, but other girls respond and spread the Moxie message. 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.

My Thoughts:
This book was GREAT. I don’t think I could have a better book to start the year, to be honest!

Viv is sick of the sexism that rules her small town high school, so when she finally decides to do something about it, MOXIE is born. She secretly leaves copies of the MOXIE zine in the girls’ bathrooms, calling the girls to action and it takes off. The story follows the girls as they fight back against the sexism in the school.

I was lucky enough to go to an all girls grammar school in Kent where we were always pushed to do the best we could and we were never held back because we were girls, and so I was rather shocked at some of the things that went on in Viv’s high school. But I wasn’t upset for too long because Viv and Lucy and the other girls fought back in such exciting and innovative ways that it was impossible not to cheer and celebrate their breakthroughs with them.

The book makes such a powerful point about how even though it is 2017, there is still a lot left to do to undo such ingrained sexism in our schools and lives. I’ve read other books like this that have come across preachy and a bit too info-dump-y, but Moxie is written so well that it is natural, yet still informative and a call to arms against things that are so ingrained we often miss that they are completely sexist. The MOXIE campaigns start small, yet grow to be so big and influential and its impossible to read and not feel inspired to stand up for what is right and what we need to, as women. Everything has to start somewhere so what's stopping every single one of us from doing our bit?

Moxie was just such a joy to read. I was enraged by things that happened to the girls in East Rockport High School, and I wish I could have been right there with them to make a stand against sexism, so when they did and they succeed it is so empowering! I cannot recommend it enough if you need some small hope in humanity or if you’re on the hunt for some girl power. Every teenager (and actually just every person!) needs to read this!