Blood Moon
-
- $12.99
Publisher Description
This powerful, timely novel in verse exposes provocative truths about periods, sex, shame, and going viral for all the wrong reasons. After school one day, Frankie, a lover of physics and astronomy, has her first sexual experience with quiet and gorgeous Benjamin—and gets her period. It’s only blood, they agree. But soon a gruesome meme goes viral, turning an intimate, affectionate afternoon into something sordid, mortifying, and damaging. In the time it takes to swipe a screen, Frankie’s universe implodes. Who can she trust? Not Harriet, her suddenly cruel best friend, and certainly not Benjamin, the only one who knows about the incident. As the online shaming takes on a horrifying life of its own, Frankie begins to wonder: is her real life over? Author Lucy Cuthew vividly portrays what it is to be a teen today with this fearless and ultimately uplifting novel in verse. Brimming with emotion, the story captures the intensity of friendships, first love, and female desire, while unflinchingly exploring the culture of online and menstrual shaming. Sure to be a conversation starter, Blood Moon is the unforgettable portrait of one girl’s fight to reclaim her reputation and to stand up against a culture that says periods are dirty.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Though Frankie and Harriet have been best friends forever, Frankie feels like they're growing apart. Frankie loves astronomy, but all Harriet seems to care about is boys ("Does she actually like him/ or does she just like flirting?"), while Harriet thinks Frankie "can be/ such a nun." By the time Frankie gets together with fellow science lover Benjamin Jones, she and Harriet aren't speaking. When someone creates a meme about Frankie getting her period during a moment of intimacy with Benjamin, it's easy for Frankie to blame Harriet and Benjamin, of course, since he is the only one who knew that it happened. Feeling betrayed and utterly alone, Frankie must find a way to persevere as the internet piles on to shame her. In her debut novel, Cuthew flips a horror story about toxic masculinity and internet-enabled misogyny into a tale of empowerment as Frankie begins to see she's not in the wrong, and she and her friends reclaim each other and the narrative. The plot holds few surprises, especially around the meme maker's identity, but Cuthew's verse is sensitively written, enlivened by hashtags and typographical flourishes that successfully convey Frankie's feelings. Ages 14 up.
