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A review by impybelle
Bad Girls Never Say Die by Jennifer Mathieu
3.0
Sometimes having no memory of most of the classics one is forced to read in school (no, seriously, my brain dumped all knowledge of most of them because I hate being told what to read and hated it more as a kid) is helpful. I didn't spend any real time comparing the two beyond wondering if maybe I should read The Outsiders at some point.
Can't tell if marketing this as a gender flipped The Outsiders was a good idea or not since so many people touch on that as being a sticking point for them. On the other hand, had they not mentioned it at all, people would be bringing it up anyway so... eh.
I found myself pretty quickly loving Evie and Diane and Juanita seemed pretty fab right from the start as well. I liked that you kind of had to get to know Connie to love her and ditto for Sunny, though the latter is more because of her being eclipsed by her relationship with her boyfriend and her friendship with Connie. Some of the twists are only twists if this is your first time around the block, like Evie, but they still work because of how they hit the characters.
My favorite thing has to be the strong theme of friendship. These girls would do anything for each other, even friends who seem to have burned bridges with one another, and that's something I think we need more of in the world.
That said, I went three stars (my kingdom for half stars, dangit!) because while Evie and to an extent Diane felt fleshed out, everyone else did feel shortchanged and also some stories nail the historical feeling and some don't quite make it. This felt close but not quite there.
Can't tell if marketing this as a gender flipped The Outsiders was a good idea or not since so many people touch on that as being a sticking point for them. On the other hand, had they not mentioned it at all, people would be bringing it up anyway so... eh.
I found myself pretty quickly loving Evie and Diane and Juanita seemed pretty fab right from the start as well. I liked that you kind of had to get to know Connie to love her and ditto for Sunny, though the latter is more because of her being eclipsed by her relationship with her boyfriend and her friendship with Connie. Some of the twists are only twists if this is your first time around the block, like Evie, but they still work because of how they hit the characters.
My favorite thing has to be the strong theme of friendship. These girls would do anything for each other, even friends who seem to have burned bridges with one another, and that's something I think we need more of in the world.
That said, I went three stars (my kingdom for half stars, dangit!) because while Evie and to an extent Diane felt fleshed out, everyone else did feel shortchanged and also some stories nail the historical feeling and some don't quite make it. This felt close but not quite there.