For nearly every emerging adult, there comes a time when they look at their lives and ask themselves, wait, who decided this is who I am? For 17-year old Val, that means a sudden switch from classical ballet, skinny-girl expectations and the conservative romantic life that her parents encouraged her in. Instead, she pursues the freedom of expression that comes from creating punk music and growing as the lead in an all-girl band. The theme is an iteration of the Riot Grrrl movement of the early 90s and showcases both how far equality has come and how far it has yet to go. Both the story and the art draw a sharp contrast between the pink facades of female expectations and the gritty, sometimes dangerous world of freedom of expression. Even if one has never danced ballet or picked up a guitar, this is a story that is easy to resonate with.
Trigger Warning: abuse of authority, assault, eating disorder, bar fights, strong language, cigarette and alcohol use.
As I read this story, a part of my heart lifted up and flew away with Val and Kat. Sometimes as an adult it's easy to forget the teenage pressures of fitting in at school (dance school and high school), not disappointing your parents, making friends and boyfriends happy, and struggling to be true to yourself. Yet there is a part of me that still wishes I could go back and do it over again, choosing to be free like Val. Kat is the best friend I wish everyone could have, unashamed of her weight, body hair, gender expression, sexuality, and dreams, and she is totally willing to share that cheeky confidence with Val throughout the story. I'm so proud of Val's mom. I understand her frustration and fear at the beginning of the book, but I love her letting go and willingness to love through it all.
There's really just so much crammed into this relatively short book, my review could go on much longer. I'll stop here with a high school/young adult recommendation, and advise anyone who is curious about why some women seem so angry all the time to give this novel a chance.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with an eArc in exchange for an honest review.
Trigger warnings: eating disorders, body shaming, racism, police brutality, sexual harassment, slut shaming.

I wanted to like this, but there is just something about a "feminist" story written by a man that doesn't sit right with me. The writing and the pacing were both rushed, and the story fell victim to wanting to tackle too many issues at once, and therefore not taking the time to properly handle any of them. Many serious issues were simply used as backdrops for our privileged white main character's story- specifically the inclusion of riots after a Latino man is murdered by police. This plot point exists solely for the main character to realize "how dangerous the world is", but at no point is the fact that a MAN WAS MURDERED BY POLICE DISCUSSED! Instead, Val loses her job for engaging in a FOOD FIGHT with her friend while riots are going on. The two characters of colour in the story feel like they are simply props for the white main characters. This felt extremely insensitive. It would be one thing to have a privileged main character who addresses their privilege and combats it, but that was not the case. I also did not love the fact that the main character engages in serious disordered eating habits in the beginning of the book, without acknowledgement of it in the latter half. Again, if this had been longer, I think these serious issues could have been better handled and expanded on.
The Riot Grrrl era is one of the true loves of my life. The bands that the main characters are inspired by are bands that I love, and seeing girls in punk is one of my favourite things in the world. I was so excited to read a graphic novel about girls in punk music, but again, the story being written by a man means that it lacks nuance and that my enjoyment seriously suffered. The Riot Grrrl era had major problems with racism and transphobia, and that isn't addressed, and the privilege of the main characters is not tackled. This can be attributed to the pacing, but also to a romanticization of the era without critical analysis of the major issues in the community. This story just feels extremely white-feministy and lacks intersectionality, but tenfold.
The saving grace of this book is the art- the art is gorgeous. I loved the colour palette and adored the character designs. My favourite scenes were by far the concert scenes, especially the pages that included the band's lyrics. They felt very akin to cut and paste zines of the Riot Grrrl era, which I absolutely adored. Major props to the artist, Emmett Helen, as this is their debut graphic novel, and I think it is designed so lovely. I will definitely be on the look out for their future work. Ultimately, I wanted to love this so much, but the lack of nuance and understanding about the bigger issues in these character's worlds just doesn't sit right with me.

Welcome Back!


I have been trying really hard these past few weeks to wrap up some reads that I have had on my list for a while or reads I have just started and stopped for no reason (other then my mood shifted). I love reading graphic novels because I can pick them up on a work break or right before bed and read the whole thing in one sitting (most of the time, there are some bind ups and super long mangas). I was given an E-ARC of this graphic novel on Netgalley and I really wanted to read it but again my whole mood shifted and I just stopped so last week I sat down and read this graphic novel, and I enjoyed my time with it!


SPOILERS AHEAD


Val is a teen ballerina, her dream is to become a professional ballerina someday but that all changes this year. When Val's ballet school announces they are putting on a performance of Swan Lake she is called into the head teacher's office. Here she and her best ballet friend are both told they need to lose weight before the performance or they will not be cast. Val is crushed and wants to be in Swan Lake more than ever, she is willing to do anything including start smoking to try and lose the fifteen pounds her teacher demands. Val heads to a local store to try to buy cigarettes, but of course, she is turned away by the clerk. Another girl in the store sees her struggle and steals the cigarettes for her. Val never expects to see this girl again but she does during a riot in their neighborhood. From here the girls become fast friends and even start a band! They form an all-girl band (who mostly has to practice over the phone because Val gets grounded). Eventually, when she is ungrounded they perform their first gig and things take off! People love their band! They do a small tour, Val quits ballet, and embraces her love of music and herself.


Val's story was not an easy story and I hated her ballet teacher. In the end, I loved where Val ended up (I am not going to spoil the end of the graphic novel but they do tell you where Val ends up after high school). Additionally, I loved all of Val's bandmates. They stood up for one another and were always a team no matter what was going on. I really enjoyed my time with this story and I loved the illustrations!


Goodreads Rating: 5 Stars





***I was given an E-ARC in exchange for an honest review

Ableist slurs. Fat shaming. Assaults. Adults behaving badly. No recourse or discussion in the text. I’m disappointed in Oni for publishing this.

Felt like a great mash-up of Moxie and Ten Thousand Saints. Val has dreamed of becoming a ballerina, but between her teacher pressuring her to lose weight and maintain a certain image, her mother focusing on her may-or-may-not-exist sex life, and a new friend introducing her to the punk scene, she can feel herself changing more and more by the day. When Val and her new friend Kat start a riot grrrl group, the risks she takes lend her the confidence she needs to start fighting for what she wants and how she feels. Slut shaming and body issues feature heavily in this graphic novel, and behaviors related to eating disorders are seen in the illustrations but are not necessarily addressed as such in the text.

2.5 stars

This book suffers from trying to talk about too many "issues," and as a result, it never really properly discusses any of them. Val is a ballerina, and she's being pushed by her dance teacher to drop from 115 to under 110 pounds, no matter the cost. Her teacher not-so-subtly implies that she should start smoking to lose weight, and requires weekly weigh-ins. Meanwhile, Val starts a punk band with a new friend, which gains fans immediately after their first show. Val has to decide whether it's worth pursuing an art which no longer feels exciting to her and requires her to change herself or to commit to her band, where she feels she can truly express herself.

The concept is good, and there were parts that could be really empowering. I loved the feminist message and the songs Val writes. But there were too many impractical elements to this book to make it truly enjoyable. For example, Val seems to manage going from chain smoking a pack a day to quitting cold turkey and has an (unnamed, but seen) eating disorder that immediately disappears when it's convenient to the plot. The band is immediately amazing and has fans even though the girls don't know how to play their instruments or perform yet. Some parts feel rushed while others go on for too long.

(originally posted to GoodReads; reformatted here)

Something happened to this book. Either it was never loved, or deadlines crunched the love out of it. Did someone lose interest while working? It's so rushed it lacks nearly everything a book should have; it's hard to find a moment of substance. Without interesting characters, a real plot, or anything unique at all, what is this book about?

This review answers that question. Comprehensively.

PAGE ONE

(image of first page)

This is our first page of the book (I've cut the interviewer's response.) First pages are vital. You have to immediately hook your readers; establishing the character, conflict, appeal, & setting.

This hook is not unique (we don't learn much that doesn't apply to most seventeen-year-old girls), it includes no clear conflict, & there's nothing about our plot. We don't even get a hint of music or the time period. We could say Val's being forced to do ballet & the lack of knowledge on jobs makes her privileged, but that just makes her directionless & unlikable.

& I thought to myself, Oh, great. An adult man is trying to write a teenage girl, & his first thought is to make her quirky.

NOT ALL MEN?

Actually, the male author initially enticed me to this book (the artist, who earned the book its second star, is nonbinary.) I thought that was interesting. What's a man got to say about a feminist past? Must be deep ties.

Unfortunately, it became a men writing women situation right away. From Val's forced quirkiness; to her profession that (all-female) ballet class is full of "cattiness, snobbery, and venomous backbiting"; to the way she talks about her breasts; to the eating disorder that pops up & disappears after two pages of binge/purge, never to be mentioned again.

This is a professional review, & it may seem odd that I am focusing so much on the author's gender. It may seem like I'm trying to personally insult him. That's not what I want to do. Men can write female characters! The trouble here is that I could tell. I could tell, the whole book long, because every reference to women felt so inauthentic.

PACING

Not just that; everything felt inauthentic.

Val's mother blows up at her for owning condoms, then buys Val birth control (& more condoms!) within 50 pages. Every time Val sees a guy, she crushes on him. Two-timing guys = problems. The ballet teacher asks Val to lose weight, so for a couple pages she has addiction & eating issues, until she doesn't. Now Val is trying to start a band when she's never played a guitar before. She gets an article in the paper on her band for their first gig! Which is just cover songs! Oh that boyfriend she knows nothing about is acting jealous now... Things just HAPPEN in the book, with no connection, continuity, or follow-up.

I admit it: I was considering DNF by page 30, but stuck it out to write this review. So here's the comprehensiveness I promised.

Simple summary: Val gets ice cream job, doesn't enjoy ballet because of a teacher who pressures her to lose weight, loses ice cream job while riots are happening, realizes she likes the ~vibe~ of riots, listens to some punk bands, gets grounded for doing so, decides to start a band (p. 73/188), starts the band, band gets popular somehow, montage of band being popular (176), epilogue. Insert some romance.

I thought this was going to be book one of a comic series, which is why I figured nothing happened in the first half (look at those page numbers!) & why nothing got followed up on. We get ~100 pages of actual bandbuilding, with no conflict at all.

Then the entire story gets compressed-- it seems like we're flipping through years, because Val's CRAZY successful for a teenager in a band for a couple of months, but she's still 17. Then we DO fast forward, to where she is now. All of this is jarring & confusing & I just can't get a grip on where I am in her life.

(I'll mark spoilers if asked; can't tell if these things are spoilers when you can predict them.)

For a real spoiler: I'm going to talk about the romance plots & how Val is shitty to her boyfriend/s.

(spoiler: Val's into Danny, visiting ballet student, but also straightedge band boy Jake. She flirts with both & doesn't communicate well to either that she's seriously interested in the other guy. Danny takes it as a challenge & they ask each other out. The date's at a show she's doing; while Val waits for Danny she argues with Jake; ultimately Val says Jake needs to make a commitment if he wants her to commit to him. He kisses her, & Danny sees. Obviously. He leaves, upset, as Val tries to apologize.

Jake & Val date & have sex within a month. Jake's earlier quote was "if I met the right girl, and we were committed to each other... Then I think sex could be a wonderful expression of love" btw.

A handful of pages later, Val sings "You weren't my first and you won't be my last / I'm on the pill, baby, let's have a blast." Jake thinks the song is about him (we don't know anyone else Val has slept with) & they fight about it. Hey, it's a rude song! This would have been a great opportunity to discuss how you can retain feminism as a general political view without directly insulting men who are close to you, but we don't get that conversation. It's just Val being a dick to a guy. Again.

Then a venue asks the Proper Ladies to headline instead of Jake's band; he's pissed even after Val ensures they do it his way. They break up & Jake says he's "not this guy... all jealous and insecure." This is a great moment to potentially get into guilt-tripping, but again, just something that happens.

In the end, the romances just make everyone look like dicks-- except Danny, who, while weird (he says Val can't dance because "she hasn't been in love"), deserved better.)

I just don't know what to say. The book feels rushed, guys. It feels like they had to get it done, so they squashed it into 188 pages. This needs to be a maybe 300 or even 500 page book. It's a lot of content. Really give it that depth-- give her 'conservative' family, her band, her feminism depth. The nicotine addiction mentioned once after she officially quits (she complains she'd really like a cigarette.) All these things have so much more to discuss-- so why couldn't that time be spent?

PROSE

The writing's not great. Here's an example from when Val's grounded for two months (spoilered for image size):
(the two page montage of Val being grounded, where she listens to music handed to her by Kat)

(Then she calls up her friend to start the band.)

This is basic show vs. tell. It's not just that it doesn't sound like a teenage girl, it's that it's so blandly put. These songs talk about things she actually cares about & feels-- like what? She likes music, & she likes rebelling, but what does that mean? The best of punk is about justice, awareness, change. All I know is she doesn't want to be grounded. Her mother JUST BOUGHT HER CONDOMS, for God's sake.

How much more impactful would this scene be with examples of what the singers are singing about? Hell, just have Val pick up a cassette & go "Like this track. This artist grew up poor and had to work as a kid to feed her family. I've never known what that was like. It's not like what I hear on the radio; all these songs about dressing up and partying. ...Have I ever thought about something bigger than myself?" Still cheesy, but it makes it feel REAL. Hell, it'd make the job interview at all relevant to the larger plot! Which it wasn't!

Give a tangible example for the reader to connect with-- I saw this tip on Tumblr recently. It just makes me feel bad to say these things about published books. Where was the editor?

RACISM

Let's discuss the actual riots.

"Apparently a street celebration got out of hand and a cop shot a Salvadoran man right here in Mount Pleasant. They're saying it was a rookie African-American policewoman that shot the man. They're saying the man was drunk and disorderly. Gangs of Latino kids have taken to the streets. / I've never seen my parents look so worried. So fragile. / When I woke up the next morning, my Dad was still up with the TV on. His knuckles were white from gripping a golf club all night."

"Gangs." Police brutality. Her white parents are scared... WHY?

Val goes to work (her mother's scared for her! the riots! all those LATINO KIDS!), & she thinks "I mean the riots were last night. The cops are on it now, right?" &"Last night’s riot was the release of pent-up racial tension. Tonight looks like it’s just gonna be a fucking free for all. (YES. REALLY.)

This is the text in the boxes as looters/rioters first break the window & then break the glass on the ice cream containers, which shatters over Val.

"I never saw the brick until it was part of my life. Everything dropped into slow motion just like they say... ...And suddenly TinkerBell is sprinkling me with fairy dust. I smile knowing I'll be able to fly soon, and I'll never have to grow up. It's like a baptism. And chaos dances in celebration."

To be clearer, I wouldn't take issue if the entire book were trying to be this deep. But it's not. & for that matter, it's so purple prose-y it doesn't quite make sense. Is she thinking she's going to die? Actually going to die? Fairy dust? That's glass. It should hurt. Chaos dances... what? Val, what are you talking about?

Then the looters/rioters... leave. Completely. They broke some stuff, but that's it. (We never see or hear of what happened to the riots/rioters again.) Val & her new delinquent friend Kat (no other personality) have a food fight with the ice cream. I'll quote the next couple of lines here, because they speak fairly well for themselves.

"After the riots, everything was different, electrified, and there was no going back. I felt like I'd been through the looking glass. I was Alice in Suburbia. For the first time in my life, I felt truly vulnerable. Suddenly my world was dangerous. And all I wanted was more."

More of WHAT? Val, you're white. You're upper-class-- you never worked a job 'til 17; you didn't care when you lost it. Your mom's going to buy you condoms in twenty pages. You can quit ballet whenever you want. What could you possibly understand or relate to in these riots about race-based police brutality? You threw some ice cream.

Remember when I said this was about the aesthetic? This is what I am talking about. Riots over police brutality are backdrop to this book, to Val. No sugarcoating: using Latino deaths as set dressing for white characters is racist.

Without a real plot, or a real character, or real messaging, this book is only aesthetic. The '90s, punk bands, riot girls. The idea of a book. It's like... someone read an actual book, then described it to someone who wrote/illustrated it in this format. It doesn't feel real.

Now, I'm not allowed to give a review lower than 5 stars without talking about how I'd improve the book, so let's talk about it.

In addition to my prior critiques, I'd make Val: 1) angry, 2) politically aware.

None of the characters here are real feminists. Kat toilet papers an old man's house. Val doesn't care about the guys she dates. Rudie doesn't even get a personality outside of taking the jokes Val & Kat make about her race. Kat doesn't shave her legs, but that's never discussed; Val's songs about being on birth control fall flat when you remember her mom bought it for her.

There's a moment when Kat reads a zine that teaches her about Anita Hill & a case in which a young girl died because she couldn't get a legal abortion without parental consent. She thinks for a moment about how she's the same age as that girl. It feels like she's about to understand her own privilege. But that never returns.

And Val does have something to rebel against. Weight issues, female beauty standards, sexism at large. Multiple occasions in the book present opportunities for this, but it's never brought to the fore. & if it were, I fear it would feel disingenuous; after all, it's a white man writing this book. Would he understand how much of this pressure comes (however indirectly) from men? It sucks to want these issues explored & know the author might not even be able to do that.

(If you want to read a book about a ballet dancer struggling under sexism, read Spinning by Tillie Walden. It's a true story, by a woman, who knows how to show vs. tell. #ownvoices options for eating disorders are also available.)

I'll sum up with possibly the worst pages, over the girls on a road trip.

"I always wanted to be part of something and I didn't realize I was until it was being torn apart. A lot of people just couldn't understand all these girls with "slut" written on their arms and fire in their hearts. They had to quantify and categorize. Sanitize and make it safe. Our songs, our lives, were taken out of context to sell more newspapers, more ads, more air time. To make money off our struggle."

WHAT STRUGGLE? What's there to sanitize? If anything sanitizes the movement, this book does. It's a narrative of a deeply political feminist movement which offers no progressive ideals or specifics at all. A man writes songs he thinks a feminist would sing. TO MAKE MONEY OFF THE STRUGGLE. This is so self-unaware it's unreal.

In the epilogue: "...they ask us if we’re still feminists... You just have
to laugh sometimes. I'm not a slogan. I'm not a T-shirt. I don’t need a label. Even one of my own design."

A male writer critiquing 'feminist' as a label? This feels wrong. Val has no agency; a white man is saying this through her (and Rudie.) Like everything else in the book, it's inauthentic. And she isn't a feminist, not without actual politics; she's a woman who's mean & independent. She's a man's idea of a feminist; feminist aesthetic.

OVERVIEW

I know I sound mean. I'm sorry. I'm depressed by disappointment, and I want to help improve the authors' future works. It's not just out of frustration...

See, I wanted to like this book. I really did. But I'm not sated by color-- I'm sated by good plot, fleshed-out characters, & a unique hook. This book wasn't given the hard labor it needed. Maybe the thumbnails weren't good enough. Maybe there was no outline. Maybe it looked like the author/artist would have more time than they did. But in the end, it came out rushed & tasteless, & all that remained of the writer's ideas was the aesthetic. It kills me that a book that could have been good was ruined.

All in all, a book about the concept of '90s riot grrrls. If you're here for aesthetic, you won't be disappointed. If you want a good book... skip it.

P.S.: Sorry for odd formatting; ran out of characters & wanted to do the book/critique justice.

CW for disordered eating, body image, slut shaming, racist violence, and sexual harassment

What a great read about finding yourself in 1991. 17 year old Valerie is a dancer who's trying to find herself. Then she meets Kat and things change forever! The riot girl punk scene is a very specific time period and this settles in so well. The cast is diverse in both race and body types. Definitely for older teens!

This was a fun, fast paced coming of age story about Val, who begins to discover what she wants to do and who she wants to be rather than who other people want her to be. We follow her as she goes from ballerina to riot girl, and discovers her sexuality, her freedom, herself. I really enjoyed this graphic novel and thought the art style was a lot of fun too.

There are trigger warnings in this book for disordered eating, restricting, binging, and purging, so please be aware of that if that is something that bothers you. I think the author tried to do just one too many things in this, as it is only 188 pages, which doesnt leave quite enough room for proper development of every issue the author tried to tackle. However, I enjoyed seeing Val grow and prosper, and thought this was an easy and entertaining read.

My Riot is a coming of age story that puts female empowerment front and centre, and gives readers a lead character that you can not only identify with, but who you want to try and be. Val is a fairly average teenage girl, she's struggling to find a part time job, not wholly successful in relationships, and has a hot and cold relationship with her parents. In essence, she's a regular person.

At the beginning of the book Val seems to be going through the motions a little, just trying to carry on the way she always has and trying to find something in her life that sparks her joy. She's been doing ballet since she was a little girl, but seems to be in something of a slump with it, especially as her teacher is trying to get her to lose weight to be a 'better' dancer, even going so far as encouraging her to take up smoking to try to suppress her appetite. Her home life isn't much better, and she's been getting into arguments with her mother, especially when her mother finds condoms in Val's room, acting as if her seventeen year old daughter having safe sex is an awful thing.

It's in this slump where Val meets Kat. The two of them go to the same school, but Val hasn't really spoken to the outgoing Kat much before, but when the two of them shelter in the same ice-cream parlour together when a riot breaks out a bond quickly forms, and Kat introduces Val to the world of punk rock. The two of them decide to form a band together, and soon discover that they've got a talent for music, even convincing another friend, Rude, to join with them.

Things happen pretty quickly throughout My Riot, due to the constraints of the length of the book and not being able to show everything, as such, the progress of Val and the band does seem to happen a bit quickly. But, you can easily overlook this as just being something that's been dictated by things outside of the creators control. I've seen some reviews complain that it makes their journey seem too easy or convenient, but who knows, their band might actually be really good and deserve the early breaks they get.

But the book isn't really about the band, or the music, it's about Val and her journey to discovering herself and finding a place of happiness. At the start of the book she's an awkward teen who doesn't know who she is, but by the end she's a successful and confident young woman.

There are moments in the book where this journey makes some big leaps, where Val stands up and makes the decision not to back down or have her life dictated by others, and these are some of the best moments in the book. When her ballet teacher is encouraging her to smoke, to develop an eating disorder, and is telling her that she's failing as a dancer because of this Val stands up for herself. She tells her teacher to shove it, and quits dancing. It's a great moment of empowerment, and one that's really healthy. With eating disorders and body image being a hugely relevant thing to teenagers seeing a character breaking out of what could be a very dangerous situation is great. And it shows how strong of a person Val is.

Another moment that stands out is when her boyfriend finds out that Val had sex before they were together, as he'd just assumed they'd both been each other's first experience. He tries to make her feel guilty about this, to make her think that she's somehow the villain for having a sex life and normal desires. Rather than letting this be something that breaks her down she turns this into a moment that can inspire her music, that helps to make her a stronger person, whilst breaking out of a toxic relationship.

Val has these moments of wisdom and clarity that are needed to survive her teenage years, but never feels like she's older beyond her years, she's still clearly a teenager who says and does stupid things and makes mistakes. But that's what makes her so great. People reading this book after their teens will look at her and say 'yeah, I was a bit stupid as a teen too', whilst teenagers will be able to see themselves in her.

The artwork throughout, provided by Emmett Helen, is really nice, and fits the tone well. It's minimalist, with nice smooth line-work that doesn't go into huge detail, but still manages to convey everything. I don't want to say that the art is simplistic, because that would sound too mean, as it's not, but it's not detail heavy. It provides readers with everything you need to be able to experience the story. The fairly minimalist style means that you always focus on the characters and what they're going through, rather than having your eye drawn to other things in the panel, or searching through the background for tiny details. The book is a great example of artist and writer coming together to tell a story about people, and making that the focus.

My Riot didn't take me long to read, but I enjoyed every minute of it. I loved the characters and their journey, and the really positive message that the book tried to get across. Whilst I don't think we'll ever see more of Val again as her story's done, I'd love to see more from these creators working together in the future.

An interesting transformation. We have this image of dance as a place of innocence, as if the intense focus required doesn't leave room for anything else. Book like this one show us competition, cattiness, self abuse, and sex. So we start with a dancer who is starting to question her place in that world when she is introduced to the punk scene, a place where she begins to find the energy she once drew from dance. She's fueled by the anger and aggression in new ways, straddling the two worlds until she's pushed over the edge. The more interesting part is her relationships with the two boys, one from each world. They speak to different parts of her personality and represent different approaches to life. But things end the same way for the same reasons with both. It's a plot that leaves you with plenty to contemplate.

This was a pretty average graphic novel and I never felt like I was connected to the characters. The art style wasn't really my thing but that's okay.

Full disclosure, I am a bit of musical disaster and knows absolutely nothing about punk rock, but I'm dancer so this is mainly why I picked that comic, and despite reading the synopsis and knowing (or at least thinking I knew what I was getting into), I got caught by surprise by that book, and I absolutely loved it.
I really enjoyed the characters, their relashionship and evolution through the story. I found really interesting that the author doesn't romanticise ballet and shows some of the darkest side of that discipline (TW for fat shaming and potential eating disorder), but also some of the diffuclties of being a musician.
This is a beautiful story about friendship, passion (old and new) and finding your own voice.

3.5 stars.

This graphic novel is a quick read that feels very autobiographical/like a real person's story, even though it appears to be fiction.

I was really not sold on this to begin with — the ballet mean girls, the eating disorders, the main character using background race riots as “suddenly my world is dangerous,” it just felt a little…ick. The angst and hating her parents is relatable and realistic, but also kinda hard to read.

Once the band stuff gets going though, it’s much more fun to read, and I ended up loving the vibe of the last third or so. And I really like the art style and character designs. I think this will be very relatable to (and nostalgic for) people who grew up in the 90s. I honestly can’t imagine what today’s teens will think, whether it will appeal to them or seem like a completely different world. But it’s hard not to feel swept along by the band’s rise, general badass-ness and raw, angry feminism, and growing fandom.

TW disordered eating/eating restriction, binging/purging, body/fatshaming (all mostly in the first bit where the mc does ballet).

ARC provided by Netgalley.

What was your favorite angry girl band of the 90’s? Did you make or read zines?

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Thank you to @onipress and @netgalley for the eARC of My Riot by Rick Spears! This graphic novel was full of 90’s nostalgia of afternoon’s trying to learn to play the guitar, blasting mixtapes of music as loud as they would go, and making zine like notebooks that were passed between friends. *Trigger warnings for eating disorders*

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Synopsis from the publisher: Set in the early ‘90s, My Riot is about a trio of teen girls team up to form a rock band and shake off society’s expectations of what it means to be a young woman coming of age in the modern world. 1991—Val, a teenager from a conservative family, has grown up dreaming of becoming a ballerina, but recently something has changed. She’s begun feeling pressure to conform to a specific idea of beauty, body type, and a personality that just doesn’t fit. Val meets Kat, a smart, witty girl that doesn’t take any crap off anyone. Kat introduces Val to punk rock. Along with Rudie, another new friend, the three form an all-girl punk band they ironically name The Proper Ladies. Soon Val and her friends find themselves caught up in a movement with other girls also starting bands—also finding their voice. Collectively, these “riot grrrls” discover that their songs ring out loud and powerful, and for Val, there’s no going back.

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This was a fun graphic novel full of great 90’s nostalgia. The story dealt with some heavier issues such as eating disorders and teen sex, but in a way that felt genuine and sympathetic. Even having a straight edge character being the love interest took me back to high school. I could name people from my own life that reminded me of each character. The art is colorful and perfectly matches the lively story highlighting the riot grrrl movement.⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

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Out in September 2020!

I received a free copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.


My Riot is a story about acceptance. Acceptance of yourself, you are not flawless but you are beautiful the way you are. The main character learns first-hand that the stereotypes the society is trying to impose on her are not her cup of tea. She does not accept how they are trying to change her, so she builds a new and better way to express herself.
Of this graphic novel I liked what the author is trying convey to the reader: you are beautiful, you don’t need to satisfy others to be satisfied and you can change the world on your own small way.
Unfortunately for me, this was not enough. I like the drawing and the overall story but the telling is too fast, too shallow. I would have loved to see the character develop little by little, here seems that one day she is one person and the next day is a total revolution. It was a pleasant reading but didn’t left me anything. Soz

My Riot by Rick Spears and Emmett Helen - 2.5/5 stars

Trigger Warnings: Eating Disorder, Graphic Vomiting, Underage Sex, Underage Smoking/Drinking, Slut Shaming, Racial Discrimination, Riots, Racism

I received a free copy of this novel from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This was a complicated read for me. It was a fun and fast paced (sometimes too fast paced) graphic novel about a teen girl who creates a riot grrrl band with her friends. However, this also depicts many issues such as eating disorders, slut shaming, stereotyping, and racial discrimination without follow-up or message.

Let's start with some of what I liked about this novel. First, I really enjoyed watching our main character Valerie discover herself and what she likes as well as owning her sexuality and desires. It was refreshing to see a young girl combat ideas of slut shaming and fighting past the ideas that others had of her to find herself. I also liked the art style, it was unique and gritty, setting the tone perfectly.

Some of the problems that I had though included the mention of many issues without resolution, explanation, or improvement. There was two cases of a ballerina instructor forcing eating disorders and underage smoking addictions onto her students. While yes, our main character left the dance class, there was no other resolution or discussion on the detriment of this topic. There was a few racial conversations, however, none of them involved progress, it was almost exclusively downfall. There was also a character who self-described as straight-edge. This aspect of him was mocked and teased by others, which felt like dangerous stereotyping. This was never discussed or resolved. There were also some inconsistencies, such as how Val's parents handled her sexuality to her request to travel across the country. And were any of these kids in school? They were only seventeen!

Overall, this was an enjoyable novel but with one too many letdowns for me to give a higher rating. I'm aware that this is Helen's debut novel, so I look forward to seeing what they do next.

This book was a roller coaster ride and it at times felt like to much was going on. My Riot is a very short and fast paced read and i think it needed a lot more detail. This is a very short read, being under 200 pages, because there was so much to the plot and it brought some great issues to discuss but it was not detailed. Like one of issues is eating disorders, and the MC stops eating to try and lose weight and starts smoking because the instructor said that’s one way of losing weight. The smoking gets resolved but there was no further discussion of eating disorders. The art is beautiful and goes really well with the theme of the book. I also loved the female representation in this book and how women should never be ashamed or made to feel bad about sex. I also liked that because of the situations with the MC’s relationships that she ended the story being single because it shows that it’s okay to be single and that you don’t need anyone but your friends and family. The characters I thought were great and so relatable, but I wished we got to learn more about them. There just wasn’t a lot to them especially the side characters. Overall, this is a really fun read but I think it would be better if it was longer to help build on the points that the author brings up.

Content Warning for Eating Disorders

My Riot is a wonderful story of self-discovery while bringing in the hardships that are seen within the process of finding what is right for you. This graphic novel brings up the toxic behavior revolving around weight loss that is seen intensely within the ballet industry. My Riot also touches on the issues surrounding feminism, even bringing up the concepts of female success in comparison to male success. I adored how the story allowed the readers to get a glimpse of how much life can change for someone, and how it is okay for nothing to stay the same.

My Riot is a charming, coming-of-age graphic novel set in the 90s Riot Grrrl scene. We follow Val, a ballerina struggling to fit in to that world in the same way she used to (Massive respect to our girl for recognising a shitty situation and saying FUCK THAT before it got out of hand). Her first day at a new job, Val becomes involved in a riot which sets off a series of changes which lead her to discover and explore her true passions, and meet her new best friend.

The story is laced with strong themes of female empowerment, which is always a delight to read. It also did a really good job of being realistic. None of the characters were too perfect or too wild. They all had their own personality and their own motivations for being the way they were, and I loved that. The ending too, was very natural. It didn't round up perfectly or finish exactly the way we all would have expected which made it so much more interesting to read.

It wasn't perfect - I wasn't fully invested the whole way through, and the situation with the boys frustrated me - but it was short and fun and just what I was looking for.