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4.02 AVERAGE
4.02 AVERAGE
This is the book that I read for Challenge #1 of Bookriot's Read Harder Challenge, an epistolary novel or collection of letters. I loved it and recommend it. It's an epistolary novel from the perspective of a senior in high school in the Inland Empire, which I had not heard of as such. It was funny, poignant, and lots of fun.
Gabi is a modern day fat girl. Her mother constantly harps on Gabi because of her weight, and in doing so, takes pieces of Gabi away. This strong poetic novel truly covers the gambit of young adult issues. From budding sexuality, to teen pregnancy, and lgbt issues, this was a wonderfully compelling novel.
The cover is completely misleading and does a disservice to the novel. (I know it is part of Gabi’s zine, but I was really put off by the cover.) Gabi presents her story through journal entries and poems. Just before senior year, Gabi finds out that her best friend is pregnant (she didn’t even know her best friend had sex!). Her other best friend is gay and he is working on coming out to his parents, who are completely unreceptive. Gabi’s mother and aunt (guided by their Catholic and Latina heritage) think that Gabi’s friends will ruin her life because of their poor decisions. All this girl wants to do is pass Algebra II and get into Berkley.
Gabi’s life is further complicated by her troublemaker brother, her drug addict father, and her pregnant mother.
Whew, this girl has a lot going on. I am glad I read this book because it was really awesome. Totally worth reading.
The cover is completely misleading and does a disservice to the novel. (I know it is part of Gabi’s zine, but I was really put off by the cover.) Gabi presents her story through journal entries and poems. Just before senior year, Gabi finds out that her best friend is pregnant (she didn’t even know her best friend had sex!). Her other best friend is gay and he is working on coming out to his parents, who are completely unreceptive. Gabi’s mother and aunt (guided by their Catholic and Latina heritage) think that Gabi’s friends will ruin her life because of their poor decisions. All this girl wants to do is pass Algebra II and get into Berkley.
Gabi’s life is further complicated by her troublemaker brother, her drug addict father, and her pregnant mother.
Whew, this girl has a lot going on. I am glad I read this book because it was really awesome. Totally worth reading.
challenging
emotional
funny
lighthearted
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
emotional
funny
hopeful
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Gabi’s voice is so clear and distinct and truthful.
Cute, sweet, funny teen diary. Not much else to say about it. Gabi's cute! If I knew anyone of that age range I'd recommend this.
This was so true-to-life tonally and style-wise to teen journal entries. Sometimes that was a little frustrating, from a narrative sense, of course.
Such a great story- lots of drama and also humor & the audio is fantastic!
The following review response was an assignment turned in for class in the Fall 2021 semester at the University of Iowa for a Latinx Childhoods class taught by Dr. Elizabeth Rodriguez Fielder. The assignment asked students to write a response paper (with any topic of interest) on the novel Gabi, a Girl in Pieces by Isabel Quintero. This book, and the following response paper, had a profound impact on my understanding of childhood. It formed new insights that I used to analyze other books I read this year. Because of that, it would be only right to include this paper for Gabi, a Girl in Pieces and Gabi, a Girl in Pieces as part of my blog and review page. This paper, and thus the following review response, is an original piece of work.
The phrase “growing up” is used to describe the time period when young adults are finding their voices and questioning the world around them. This is an inherently powerful process, as it is the first time in a child’s life where they begin to have the power to make their own choices and suffer the consequences. Yet, when does that process end? When is a teenager grown, and when have they grown into themselves? Gabi Hernandez, from Isabel Quintero’s Gabi, a Girl in Pieces, directly confronts growing up, ultimately coming into herself when she is able to voice her opinions and put those opinions into action. Once she does so, she has a power over her identity that she hadn’t before, which gives her the courage to face her life exactly the way she wants to.
One of the concepts Gabi questions through the novel is the definition of “good girlhood” and what it actually means to be a “good girl.” This is one of the first things Gabi begins to question, when she introduces readers to her family’s background as the equivalent of her “sexual education” (7). One of Gabi's mom's refrains is “‘Ojos abiertos, piernas cerradas.’ Eyes open, legs closed” (7), and Gabi immediately combats that by stating she “[doesn’t] necessarily agree with that whole wait-until-you’re-married crap” (7). Early in the novel, Gabi establishes these powerful ideas, setting her apart from her family that would prefer she remain docile and complacent in society. Gabi would never tell her mom that she disagreed with her, though, at the risk of her mom thinking Gabi is a “bad” girl (7). Within the first few pages, Gabi introduces one of the main tensions of her teenage existence—defining what it truly means to be a good girl, and how that definition relates to sex.
Gabi navigates many different girlhood experiences, some of which aren’t always traditional, but that all help shape the definition she is forming of good girlhood and sex. Her best friend Cindy gets pregnant in the summer, and has a baby in the spring. Gabi starts to date a boy named Martin, whom she has sex with for the first time after prom. And when Gabi finds out that her mortal enemy Georgina is pregnant, Gabi supports her all the way through the abortion process. She constantly calls into question her mother’s definition of good girlhood, recognizing that Cindy is not “bad” for having sex, and neither is she or Georgina. Rather, they are just teenage girls who want to explore what life has to offer, without feeling tied down by the unspoken rules (220). Having the ability to question what she’s been taught, while also making the choices that reflect what she believes, is one of the first ways Gabi regains power over her narrative as a teenager in America. Throughout the novel, Gabi’s relationship with sex evolves—she stops viewing it through her mother’s good-bad binary, and understands its complexities, and finds power within those complexities. When she learns that Cindy was raped, Gabi calls into question why boys are always excused for their behavior because they are boys (229). After Gabi has sex, she demands to understand why her value as a human being is synonymous with an intact hymen (275). Gabi, through her journaling, is realizing that sex is not the way to define goodness—“What is good anyway?” Gabi asks. She knows food is good because “taste buds never lie. But a good woman? A good girl? I have no clue” (275-6). Gabi now understands sex as its own experience with its own connotations, and no longer connects that to a definition of “good.”
Only after Gabi has shared all these experiences with her friends is she able to reframe the term “good” away from sex. While she is no longer sure exactly what goodness is, she knows what it’s not. Gabi realizes that her Tía Bertha is a hypocrite, “‘always telling [Gabi] how bad of a girl [she] is . . . when [tía Bertha] doesn’t even live by her own rules’” (265). Tía Bertha and her mother have given Gabi a narrow definition of good girlhood, and Gabi has watched time and time again as they defy their own expectations. This narrow definition of good girlhood only held Gabi back from having a full and nuanced understanding of life, and the different definitions that good girlhood and womanhood can take. It is the reason she had to go out and have conversations and experiences with her friends and boyfriend that allow her to start articulating her own understanding of good girlhood. While Gabi still isn’t sure what good is, she does know that not being true to oneself is not good, and not the standard that she wants to hold herself to (276).
When Gabi finds her voice, and indeed when she finds the power to use it, she is able to change the minds of those around her in regards to her new definition of goodness. Gabi is the voice her tía needed to hear so that she could stop living a lie, which “‘doesn’t do anyone any good’” (282), tía Bertha finally admits. In a way, tía Bertha, who for so long stood in Gabi’s way of understanding what good girlhood really is, helps Gabi come to the conclusion she needs—that being good ultimately means finding the power and courage to be true to oneself. That doing what makes her happy—whether that be eating the food she wants to eat or going away to college or writing poetry to share with her friends—is what truly makes her good.
Growing up for Gabi is about finding her voice, questioning the world around her, and putting her own definitions into action by showing everyone else their fullest potential, too.
Ultimately, Gabi’s story is just one of the many young adult narratives that explore what it means for a young person to grow up, and the ways in which that process is innately tied with finding power in experiences and using one’s voice. Yet, her story is a useful case study for what growing up can be defined as.
The phrase “growing up” is used to describe the time period when young adults are finding their voices and questioning the world around them. This is an inherently powerful process, as it is the first time in a child’s life where they begin to have the power to make their own choices and suffer the consequences. Yet, when does that process end? When is a teenager grown, and when have they grown into themselves? Gabi Hernandez, from Isabel Quintero’s Gabi, a Girl in Pieces, directly confronts growing up, ultimately coming into herself when she is able to voice her opinions and put those opinions into action. Once she does so, she has a power over her identity that she hadn’t before, which gives her the courage to face her life exactly the way she wants to.
One of the concepts Gabi questions through the novel is the definition of “good girlhood” and what it actually means to be a “good girl.” This is one of the first things Gabi begins to question, when she introduces readers to her family’s background as the equivalent of her “sexual education” (7). One of Gabi's mom's refrains is “‘Ojos abiertos, piernas cerradas.’ Eyes open, legs closed” (7), and Gabi immediately combats that by stating she “[doesn’t] necessarily agree with that whole wait-until-you’re-married crap” (7). Early in the novel, Gabi establishes these powerful ideas, setting her apart from her family that would prefer she remain docile and complacent in society. Gabi would never tell her mom that she disagreed with her, though, at the risk of her mom thinking Gabi is a “bad” girl (7). Within the first few pages, Gabi introduces one of the main tensions of her teenage existence—defining what it truly means to be a good girl, and how that definition relates to sex.
Gabi navigates many different girlhood experiences, some of which aren’t always traditional, but that all help shape the definition she is forming of good girlhood and sex. Her best friend Cindy gets pregnant in the summer, and has a baby in the spring. Gabi starts to date a boy named Martin, whom she has sex with for the first time after prom. And when Gabi finds out that her mortal enemy Georgina is pregnant, Gabi supports her all the way through the abortion process. She constantly calls into question her mother’s definition of good girlhood, recognizing that Cindy is not “bad” for having sex, and neither is she or Georgina. Rather, they are just teenage girls who want to explore what life has to offer, without feeling tied down by the unspoken rules (220). Having the ability to question what she’s been taught, while also making the choices that reflect what she believes, is one of the first ways Gabi regains power over her narrative as a teenager in America. Throughout the novel, Gabi’s relationship with sex evolves—she stops viewing it through her mother’s good-bad binary, and understands its complexities, and finds power within those complexities. When she learns that Cindy was raped, Gabi calls into question why boys are always excused for their behavior because they are boys (229). After Gabi has sex, she demands to understand why her value as a human being is synonymous with an intact hymen (275). Gabi, through her journaling, is realizing that sex is not the way to define goodness—“What is good anyway?” Gabi asks. She knows food is good because “taste buds never lie. But a good woman? A good girl? I have no clue” (275-6). Gabi now understands sex as its own experience with its own connotations, and no longer connects that to a definition of “good.”
Only after Gabi has shared all these experiences with her friends is she able to reframe the term “good” away from sex. While she is no longer sure exactly what goodness is, she knows what it’s not. Gabi realizes that her Tía Bertha is a hypocrite, “‘always telling [Gabi] how bad of a girl [she] is . . . when [tía Bertha] doesn’t even live by her own rules’” (265). Tía Bertha and her mother have given Gabi a narrow definition of good girlhood, and Gabi has watched time and time again as they defy their own expectations. This narrow definition of good girlhood only held Gabi back from having a full and nuanced understanding of life, and the different definitions that good girlhood and womanhood can take. It is the reason she had to go out and have conversations and experiences with her friends and boyfriend that allow her to start articulating her own understanding of good girlhood. While Gabi still isn’t sure what good is, she does know that not being true to oneself is not good, and not the standard that she wants to hold herself to (276).
When Gabi finds her voice, and indeed when she finds the power to use it, she is able to change the minds of those around her in regards to her new definition of goodness. Gabi is the voice her tía needed to hear so that she could stop living a lie, which “‘doesn’t do anyone any good’” (282), tía Bertha finally admits. In a way, tía Bertha, who for so long stood in Gabi’s way of understanding what good girlhood really is, helps Gabi come to the conclusion she needs—that being good ultimately means finding the power and courage to be true to oneself. That doing what makes her happy—whether that be eating the food she wants to eat or going away to college or writing poetry to share with her friends—is what truly makes her good.
Growing up for Gabi is about finding her voice, questioning the world around her, and putting her own definitions into action by showing everyone else their fullest potential, too.
Ultimately, Gabi’s story is just one of the many young adult narratives that explore what it means for a young person to grow up, and the ways in which that process is innately tied with finding power in experiences and using one’s voice. Yet, her story is a useful case study for what growing up can be defined as.
3.5 stars rounded up for the moments it made me LOL.
I read The House on Mango Street last month and Gabi, a Girl in Pieces read to me like the grown-up girl version of Mango Street. The tone and the writing style are vastly different, but they are similar in that they examine the lives of Latina teens, dealing with all of the things life has to throw at them and navigating life lived in a minority community. That being said, I don't think it's fair to compare this book too much to anything else because it is fully capable of standing on its own. It tackles so many different issues, with varying degrees of success, and is a great addition to the YA genre.
I'm considering the title in a new way as I think about Gabi - she really is a girl split into pieces. She's dealing with so much for a young person - her father's drug addiction, her best friend's teenage pregnancy, her younger brother's delinquency, her friend's coming out, her judgmental aunt, her own eating disorder, school, boyfriends, poetry, etc. etc. If it seems crazy that all of that (and more) was crammed into a 284 page book, you are correct. Maybe that's what Quintero intended, but the overall effect did seem a bit scattered and overly dramatic. Gabi herself is very dramatic, but it's forgivable considering she is a teenage girl. She makes so many questionable, and a few downright wrong, decisions in the course of this book, but overall she has a good heart and she's just trying to make it. She also is so funny! I enjoyed the fact that Quintero wrote this as Gabi writing in her diary so we got to spend so much time with her and her teenage sass, not to mention her beautiful poetry. I'm not a huge poetry fan myself but I enjoyed the interjection of poetry into this story and seeing the way that it moved and shaped Gabi as a person.
I think YA fans will enjoy this, and hopefully get a lot out of the diverse perspective. CW for a ton of stuff, including disordered eating, potential suicide, drug abuse, date rape.
I read The House on Mango Street last month and Gabi, a Girl in Pieces read to me like the grown-up girl version of Mango Street. The tone and the writing style are vastly different, but they are similar in that they examine the lives of Latina teens, dealing with all of the things life has to throw at them and navigating life lived in a minority community. That being said, I don't think it's fair to compare this book too much to anything else because it is fully capable of standing on its own. It tackles so many different issues, with varying degrees of success, and is a great addition to the YA genre.
I'm considering the title in a new way as I think about Gabi - she really is a girl split into pieces. She's dealing with so much for a young person - her father's drug addiction, her best friend's teenage pregnancy, her younger brother's delinquency, her friend's coming out, her judgmental aunt, her own eating disorder, school, boyfriends, poetry, etc. etc. If it seems crazy that all of that (and more) was crammed into a 284 page book, you are correct. Maybe that's what Quintero intended, but the overall effect did seem a bit scattered and overly dramatic. Gabi herself is very dramatic, but it's forgivable considering she is a teenage girl. She makes so many questionable, and a few downright wrong, decisions in the course of this book, but overall she has a good heart and she's just trying to make it. She also is so funny! I enjoyed the fact that Quintero wrote this as Gabi writing in her diary so we got to spend so much time with her and her teenage sass, not to mention her beautiful poetry. I'm not a huge poetry fan myself but I enjoyed the interjection of poetry into this story and seeing the way that it moved and shaped Gabi as a person.
I think YA fans will enjoy this, and hopefully get a lot out of the diverse perspective. CW for a ton of stuff, including disordered eating, potential suicide, drug abuse, date rape.
