By: Jenna Guillaume
Genre: YFB - General fiction (Children's / Teenage)
Published by: Pan Macmillan Australia
Published: 26 Feb 2019
ISBN: 9781760559120

Description

The last thing Maisie Martin thought she'd be doing this summer is entering a beauty pageant. Not when she's spent most of her life hiding her body from everyone. Not when her Dad is AWOL for Christmas and her best friend starts going out with the boy she's always loved. But Maisie's got something to prove. And she's not going to let anything or anyone - including herself - hold her back.


Review

Our lead character Maisie Martin is a wonderful voice of empowerment that screams out to be heard.


It’s summer and this years holiday, although it’s in in the same place as always, will be so different. Firstly, her Dad doesn't come with them and we discover a ‘why’ that I didn’t see coming.


Secondly, Maisie brings her best friend Anna, who promptly gets together with Maisie’s forever dream boyfriend Seb (the son of her mum’s best friend). Even worse, Seb’s annoying mate Beamer starts making moves on Maisie - but could she possibly have feelings for him?


On top of all that, her sister Eve, who Maisie hasn’t spoken to for years, ever since Eve body-shamed her, is there with her girlfriend Bess.


Lastly - and this is big - Maisie enters the beauty pageant - the very same one that Eve won and is now the poster girl for. Maisie is set for quite the summer holiday….


Maisie has so many self-doubt moments in this story - and with everyone telling her she is so brave to enter, and reminding her that it is a ‘beauty’ pageant, who wouldn’t?!


But as they say… you go girl, just be you and own and love your body.


What I Think About Me is a rollercoaster of highs and lows, that you will want to keep reading to the end.


With themes of family, friendship, body image and growing up in today’s world, it is a fantastically uplifting and important teenage story that will best suit girls 13 years and older.


Reviewed by Rob