Take a photo of a barcode or cover
A review by plexbrarian
Yaqui Delgado Wants to Kick Your Ass by Meg Medina
5.0
tl;dr Piddy just moved across town and got transferred to a new school, where she becomes the victim of Yaqui Delgado and her group's cruel bullying.
triggers: bullying, peer pressure, child/family abuse, alcohol abuse
This book made me feel a lot of stuff, which I hadn't really experienced in the past several months of reading lots of books. Having been bullied in high school for no apparent reason, I identified a lot with Piddy. You feel helpless. You're terrified of telling an adult, even if there's a 'No Bullying' policy in place because you KNOW it'll get back to your aggressor and it will make everything worse AND make you seem weak, because eventually all your peers will find out. But in the meantime, the bullying gets worse. Piddy has to make a lot of decisions, and I think that would be a great talking point with middle and high schoolers. The kids experiencing the same things as Piddy would have a chance to reflect on whether what they're doing to avoid or resolve their issues are the same as Piddy's and vice versa, and think about what might work to help them. The story might present them with possible options they'd never considered before on their own. Plus, this book deals not only with bullying in schools but also in the home.
I wasn't sure what to expect coming into this; I think I'd seen something about it in the CCBC listserv before it shut down, and the title intrigued me. I had thought it might be more lighthearted, about a girl making friends with her bully after treating her with kindness and teaching her how to walk while "wiggling her ass" the way Piddy apparently does that causes her so much undue grief.
This is not at all how the book went. It is so much more realistic and harsh and personally significant that I felt angry and hurt for Piddy and wanted to be there and other stuff that's probably spoiler-ish to disclose. So happy the library where I work has a copy so I can talk about it and grab it for anyone interested.
triggers: bullying, peer pressure, child/family abuse, alcohol abuse
This book made me feel a lot of stuff, which I hadn't really experienced in the past several months of reading lots of books. Having been bullied in high school for no apparent reason, I identified a lot with Piddy. You feel helpless. You're terrified of telling an adult, even if there's a 'No Bullying' policy in place because you KNOW it'll get back to your aggressor and it will make everything worse AND make you seem weak, because eventually all your peers will find out. But in the meantime, the bullying gets worse. Piddy has to make a lot of decisions, and I think that would be a great talking point with middle and high schoolers. The kids experiencing the same things as Piddy would have a chance to reflect on whether what they're doing to avoid or resolve their issues are the same as Piddy's and vice versa, and think about what might work to help them. The story might present them with possible options they'd never considered before on their own. Plus, this book deals not only with bullying in schools but also in the home.
I wasn't sure what to expect coming into this; I think I'd seen something about it in the CCBC listserv before it shut down, and the title intrigued me. I had thought it might be more lighthearted, about a girl making friends with her bully after treating her with kindness and teaching her how to walk while "wiggling her ass" the way Piddy apparently does that causes her so much undue grief.
This is not at all how the book went. It is so much more realistic and harsh and personally significant that I felt angry and hurt for Piddy and wanted to be there and other stuff that's probably spoiler-ish to disclose. So happy the library where I work has a copy so I can talk about it and grab it for anyone interested.