review: The Mockingbirds by Daisy Whitney

The Mockingbirds by Daisy Whitney
January 2, 2012 (Paperback) 
Little, Brown Books For Young Readers
Young Adult | Contemporary
The Mockingbirds #1
Pages: 332
Source/Format: Publisher/Paperback
Author's Website | Goodreads
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | IndieBound


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 Patrick is date-raped during her junior year, she has two options: Stay silent and hope someone helps, or enlist the aid of the Mockingbirds-a secret society of students dedicated to righting the wrongs of the student body. 

In this account of a teenage girl's search for her voice and the courage to use it, debut author Daisy Whitney reminds readers that standing up for someone, especially yourself, is worth the fight.

REVIEW:

The Mockingbirds is an unusual type of contemporary read. It deals with rape, but it isn’t the girl coming to terms about being raped—no, the girl gets justice with an elite student group. Themsis Academy is the type of boarding school I’d like to go to, just to be on the Mockingbirds board.

I’m not entirely sure why I didn’t get a copy of The Mockingbirds before, or why I hadn’t read good reviews. I freaking loved this contemporary book. I loved the idea of the Mockingbirds and how they brought justice to the school where the faculty fails to do so. I loved that Casey created the Mockingbirds and that it’s based on How To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee.

Alex is somewhat of a tough girl. There’s a conversation in this book that takes place between her and Martin, one of her friends, and he says she’s tough because she went to the Mockingbirds and she’s bringing justice to Carter. And I think she is a tough girl to a point—I would have rather seen her go to the police than a student group that can’t do a whole lot (even though at times it seem they can.) At least then she would have been tough AND smart, but whatever. If she’d gone to the police, we wouldn’t have a story, now would we?

However, I did like the way the Mockingbirds and Alex brought justice. I liked that there was even a school justice system, lurking underground in the laundry room basement.

What I didn’t like was the romance aspect of this book. I knew it was coming—I so KNEW—and when it happened, I groaned and thought, “No, Alex, noooooo.” I don’t know if it was me who didn’t want Alex, the date-raped girl, to have a relationship in this book or if it really just shouldn’t have happened. I’m not going to say WHO Alex has a relationship with, just that she’s the first to initiate it. She kisses him first, says she wants to kiss him. This happened a month after she’s been raped, and the first time she’s okay with kissing him… but later in the book, she pushes away from him because it reminds her of Carter and what he did to her.

I don’t know, it just felt really awkward and weird to me and I SO didn’t want a romance subplot in The Mockingbirds. And I do see its positive point for the plot: it helps Alex move on from being raped, to get on with her life even though the relationship starts before the trial. It just didn’t do it for me.

The Mockingbirds is a unique contemporary, and I’m dying to read the sequel, The Rivals. If you haven’t picked this one up, do it ASAP. You won’t regret it.