Name: Take Three Girls
ISBN: 9781742612744

Cath Crowley

Fiona Wood

Simmone Howell

"This beautifully crafted, lively novel captures the good and the bad of female friendship" Bec Kavanagh Books + Publishing, 5 stars. 3 award-winning authors.1 compelling book.ADY - not the confident A-Lister she appears to be.KATE - brainy boarder taking risks to pursue the music she loves.CLEM - disenchanted swim-star losing her heart to the wrong boy.All are targeted by PSST, a toxic website that deals in gossip and lies. St Hilda's antidote to the cyber-bullying? The Year 10 Wellness program. Nice try - but sometimes all it takes is three girls. Exploring friendship, feminism, identity and belonging. Take Three Girls is honest, raw and funny

Take Three Girls

Sam Kiszonka

I have so much love for this book!

This book tackles some major issues that the majority of teenagers face during their high school years, especially now that the internet and social media is such a major part of everyday lives.
The story follows three completely different girls, thrown together during their wellness class. These girls become unlikely friends as they battle online bullying, go through heartbreaks and navigate the politics of high school.

The authors have done such an amazing job of tackling the tough subjects of sexuality, bullying, eating disorders and alcohol / substance abuse. Whilst the book can go to some dark places, there are so many happy moments as we get to see the girls grow and form a strong friendship.

I think that this is a brilliant and relevant book that everyone should read, as we all will be able to relate to something in this story. You know what they say, highschool never ends. So whilst we might leave the hallways and homework behind, similar issues are still prevalent in our lives as adults.

I would like to thank Pan Macmillan Australia and the authors for providing me with a copy of this book. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Jayarna La Bozzetta

This book really surprised me. I really don't enjoy contemporary at the moment, and the sheer length of this book put me off it for months. 

I LOVED it. I can't really give this five stars because this sort of subject matter doesn't really move me, but it's done so well in this book. It's also not really something I'll read again. That doesn't mean it isn't a great read.

It's got great female friendship. There's a great adult exploration of sex and boys. I hate when you read teen books and it's just so watered down it doesn't feel real. This is wholesome, but it still has swearing, it still has frequent mentions of sex (mostly in reference to characters thinking about it, because hello - teens think about sex! It's a lot of what teens think about!)

I also loved all the girls. I had the hardest time with Clem, but I enjoyed her perspective still and didn't find it a slog to get through by any means.

There was bisexual rep in this! I loved Ady more than I thought possible. She was my favourite character by a stretch. I was excited for her chapters for the entirety of the book. 

This book is pretty long, but I think it's really worth it. You get to really connect with these girls and by the end you're really attached and rooting for them. The small mystery element of finding out who runs psst also was a great one. I was curious the whole book. 

Well rounded, great story. Would reccomend

Lysh (She/Her)

If you don't know that I love changing points of view by now, then I don't know where you've been hiding. Honestly, it wins me over. Every. Single. Time. This books was different in that the changing POV did not add any mystery or suspense. Instead, it was used as a device to allow 3 authors to write in their own voices and still meld together beautifully, and to flesh out 3 very distinct characters within one novel. Bravo! I've never read anything else from these authors, but I did enjoy their writing styles. Having each 'voice' in its own font was a nice choice. I appreciated that tid-bit. 

The set-up was slow. Like, painfully slow. It took me 2 months to read the first 1/3 of the book because it just wasn't grabbing me. I did appreciate that the dillemma itself was realistic. It wasn't 'Pretty Little Liars' crazy, which was totally an option (and that probably would have pulled me in really quickly, but it would have been a cheap cop out). The slow burn definitely paid off in the end, as I was invested in each of our three girls and their year 10 problems at an all girl's school. I went to an all girl's high school. I know the problems. I know the feeling. Heck, I even went to boarding school for a year, so the boarding scenarios were a laugh! All-in-all, very realistic. Kudos to the authors for this. Not common in YA.

Unfortunately I guessed the twist ending at about halfway through. There were also A LOT of side characters to keep a track of. I understand that this added to the natural flow of the text, but for my forgetful brain, I didn't really know who I was reading about half the time. More my fault than that of the authors. 

Overall I really liked the message about building equality and that not all men are jerks and not all women are saints. Let's just all be nice humans, eh?