Girls With Rebel Souls (Girls With Sharp Sticks #3) by Suzanne Young

Girls with Rebel Souls by Suzanne Young
Series: Girls with Sharp Sticks #3
Published by Simon Schuster Audio
Published on 23 March 2021
Genres: Dystopian, Friendship, Girls & Women, Science Fiction, Social Issues, United States, Young Adult
Format: Audiobook
Source: my local library
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RRP: $19.99

The girls of Innovations Academy escaped the confines of their unethical school, fought against the system protecting predators who targeted girls for harassment, and they’re not done yet. They’re still not free.
Reeling from one revelation after the next, Mena and her friends begin to unwind the truth of their existence and, as a result, their destiny. The men from Innovations Corporation still hunt them, the woman who created them still wants control over them, and worst of all, Mena realizes that through all her pain, all her tears, the world of men has not changed. There is no more time to hope for the best. The girls know they are in a battle for their lives, a war for their very existence.
The girls of Innovations Academy have sharpened their sticks to fight back, they have fought for justice with blood from their razor hearts. And now, the girls will choose their true nature...and how they define their rebel souls.

Since this is the third book in a series I cannot talk about this book without spoilers.

I am obsessed with this book series.

I listened to the whole thing on audio, and I absolutely love it.

The first book is so subversive. The second book makes you want to cheer.

However this third book… while I enjoyed listening to it, at the end I just felt kind of meh.

Don’t get me wrong, while I was listening to it I really enjoyed it. Which is why I’m giving it 4 stars.

I love the relationships between Mina and the other girls. Between Mina and Jackson, who’s clearly struggling with his feelings for Mina. I love how the girls are driven not just to protect themselves, but to protect other women in this misogynistic shitty society which is not that far off from the real world, let’s the honest.

But this plot.

This plot was a whole lot of running around actually doing nothing.

And I feel it was that way because the author didn’t want the girls to actually kill anyone. Not in cold blood.

All the deaths were by the hands of other, ‘evil’ characters.

And the confusing thing is, Mina kept saying how they ‘beat’ the Corporation, they ‘won’, it was because of the girls’ actions that they saved themselves but… they didn’t.

Every time time they got close to their target, the target was mysteriously killed. This happened over and over again in the novel. The girls didn’t action anything, they didn’t save themselves. If you removed the girls from the novel, the same thing would have happened. They have no influence over the plot whatsoever. They were sent on a wild goose chase, and I didn’t feel that it made a particularly satisfying conclusion that matched and escalated the previous instalments where they took action and were responsible for their own destinies.

The girls sharpened their sticks and then someone else ensured they didn’t need to use them, and I find that a bit disappointing.

That being said, I love these girls with all my heart. Jackson is so adorable. Reading this book after a short break from the other two was like being welcomed home. I love this world – shitty as it is – because Mina, Sydney, Brynn, Marcella, and Annelise are part of it. I want to have Thanksgiving dinner with them. I want to watch them succeed with their chosen careers. I want to watch them raise families. The girls always, always have each others’ backs. There is no bitchiness, not cattiness, no jealousy. They are so damn wholesome and I am here for it.

And that’s why this book is getting 4 stars.

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