Avie Reveare has the normal life of a privileged teen growing up in L.A., at least as normal as any girl’s life is these days. After a synthetic hormone in beef killed fifty million American women ten years ago, only young girls, old women, men, and boys are left to pick up the pieces. The death threat is past, but fathers still fear for their daughters’ safety, and the Paternalist Movement, begun to “protect” young women, is taking over the choices they make.

This review is based an advanced reader’s copy given to me by the site, see NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review. This had no influence on the integrity of my review. 

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GoodReads Summary:

Avie Reveare has the normal life of a privileged teen growing up in L.A., at least as normal as any girl’s life is these days. After a synthetic hormone in beef killed fifty million American women ten years ago, only young girls, old women, men, and boys are left to pick up the pieces. The death threat is past, but fathers still fear for their daughters’ safety, and the Paternalist Movement, begun to “protect” young women, is taking over the choices they make.

Like all her friends, Avie still mourns the loss of her mother, but she’s also dreaming about college and love and what she’ll make of her life. When her dad “contracts” her to marry a rich, older man to raise money to save his struggling company, her life suddenly narrows to two choices: Be trapped in a marriage with a controlling politician, or run. Her lifelong friend, student revolutionary Yates, urges her to run to freedom across the border to Canada. As their friendship turns to passion, the decision to leave becomes harder and harder. Running away is incredibly dangerous, and it’s possible Avie will never see Yates again. But staying could mean death.From Catherine Linka comes this romantic, thought-provoking, and frighteningly real story, A Girl Called Fearless, about fighting for the most important things in life—freedom and love.

My Review:

I had the ARC for this book, sitting on my Nook, for AGES. I had heard really great things about it but honestly just hadn’t had the time to sit down and read it. I was in the middle of reading another book and I just wasn’t feeling it, so I decided to read this one. I had just seen Catherine at the Pasadena Teen Book Fest and she was SO incredibly sweet and I knew that I had to read her book before I saw her again at the Ontario Teen Book Fest (which is next week!).

I was immediately hooked from page one. I’m not even kidding. I don’t know how I could have put off this book for so long. I ripped through this book so fast and I started to have a panic attack when the battery on my Nook started to run down toward the end. I stayed up until about 2 am to finish it and just…wow. It was amazing.

What really catches me about this book is that it brings forward a sort of futuristic, dystopian feel but in the world we know. So much about Avie’s world is so incredibly familiar. She has iPods and cell phones and text messaging and normal things like that. It’s almost what makes the book, and what’s happening in the book, that much scarier. This sort of thing can go on in the world that we know, and its extremely frightening.

I think that part of the book really got to me. Avie’s every move is controlled, because she is female. Her schooling is controlled and instead of getting a real education, she is learning about how to be a wife and mother (backtracking, much?). She probably will not have the chance to attend college. Her future husband could be chosen for her, and is chosen for her, and he has the right to complete control over her (Hawkins makes me shudder. Agh, just thinking about it him makes me so sick). In the kind of culture that we live in, the horrific rape culture, the huge population that wants control over a woman’s body, etc, its not hard to imagine backtracking this much, and assuming this much control over the female population. Its a scary prospect and that left me with chills the entire novel.

But, of course, there is more to the book than that. I love the character of Avie, and her drive and determination. She doesn’t always believe in herself, or that she has even an ounce of bravery and that feels familiar and relatable. She breaks out of that though, and does a lot of things that are incredibly brave. She’s a very strong character and I love that. I think we sometimes forget that a female character doesn’t always have to be physically strong to be a great character and I think Avie proves that. She does some physical things to get where she needs to go but in the end, she’s incredibly smart and incredibly capable and this is what makes her a great character. She doesn’t need to wield a gun or be able to punch someone in the face to do so. I say this with mad respect with characters who are physically strong, including my own MC. I just love finding those characters that are strong mentally and emotionally.

I could literally go on and on and on about this book and what I loved about it but I’m tired of talking your ear off. This book just hit shelves this previous Tuesday which means you need to get off your computer or phone or tablet or whatever, just GET off the internet and hit a bookstore and pick up a copy of this wonderful book!

Rating:

5 out of 5 Stars