THINGS A BRIGHT GIRL CAN DO by Sally Nicholls was a Netgalley read, and I really loved it. It follows three girls from different backgrounds who all get involved with the suffragette movement, and the story was in turns funny, gripping, and at times quite sad. Delving into political activism, family dynamics, sexuality, class, justice, and a whole raft of other important themes in a way that doesn't drag the book's tone down or make it feel like A Lesson, I think this is a very timely feminist book, and one I'd definitely recommend to any teen or YA reader. Or just anyone, really.

Things a Bright Girl Can Do follows three young women who join the fight for the vote. Evelyn is seventeen and from a rich background. She is smart and ambitious, but because she is a woman she can’t follow her brother’s footsteps to university. She is expected to marry her childhood sweetheart and settle into the domestic life. Enraged by her lack of freedom, she joins the Suffragettes. May is fifteen and is already fighting for the vote. However, her and her mother are part of the Suffragists who refuse the violence used by the Suffragettes. Nell is a working-class girl who isn’t just fighting for the vote, she wants the freedom to be who she wants to be, and she doesn’t have anything to lose. When May and Nell meet, the two fall in love. Challenges arise, and relationships strain, and the three girls discover just how much they are willing to sacrifice.

While I really enjoyed most of Things a Bright Girl Can Do and it discusses some really important issues concerning women’s rights, social class, and women’s sexuality. I do want to give a trigger warning for trans and non-binary readers as I do feel like there were aspects of this, regarding Nell, that I feel could be harmful to trans and non-binary readers. Things a Bright Can Do was also very white, ignoring the racial struggle and, especially ignoring prominent South Asian who were also involved in the suffrage movement.

Things a Bright Girl Can Do was an otherwise good read that I enjoyed reading. I particularly enjoyed the fact that different social classes were portrayed. Seeing a working-class m/c is extremely rare, especially in UKYA. I appreciated the nuanced discussions regarding both Nell and May and their outlook on life and how the fight for equality both effects them. May fights for the vote, her family refusing to pay their taxes, and always has a warm meal on the table. Nell, a working-class factory worker, fights for fair wages and to live as she wishes. The two have a romantic relationship which comes under strain when their social classes come between them.

Evelyn came from a privileged background, but she was restricted in what she could do with her life. She wanted to go to University but was expected to just marry her childhood sweetheart Teddy. And while she loved Teddy and did want to marry him, she also wanted to be free to make her own choices. I loved her devotion to the movement, and I especially loved her relationship with Teddy who was supportive of Evelyn and the movement.

Things a Bright Girl Can Do started about the suffrage movement, but later showed that when the war started a lot of middle-class women exited the movement and put their effort into supporting the soldiers. The book also did a good job in portraying the horrors and brutality of the first world war.

Overall, Things a Bright Girl Can Do is an enjoyable and passionate historical fiction which I would recommend.

GAY SUFRAGETTES!!!

This book was pretty darn beautiful. Set just before & during WW1 (which isn't a period i'm particularly familiar with), we meet 3 very different types of people and stories. First, is fiery (ok... every female character in this novel slays actually, an accurate description of women if you ask me) Evelyn, the eldest daughter of a well off family, slated to marry her best friend since she was a child, but how can she know if she wants to marry Teddy if she doesn't know who she is herself? With big aspirations and the whole world holding her back - by her whole world, i mean mainly her family and those obsessed with societal standards that women should not go to University, which is pretty much the whole world - except for Teddy, who is wonderfully supportive every step of the way like literally...
I want a Teddy!!!!

Evelyn and the other two girls dont really interact too much, but there is a small overlap, where Nell meets Evelyn. But, both Nell & May (who become friends, and then lovers) and Evelyn are all suffragettes, even though they do it very differently. I'm not gay/lesbian so i cant comment on the validity of the rep, but i thought it was pretty darn beautiful how May, so sure and well-read (despite the problematic philosphical 1914 view of what it means to be gay), guides Nell and assures her and loves her and tells her that her feelings are valid and beautiful.

if you dont want to read this book and be submerged in WW1 history and see the ripples it has on every-day society as well as history, and see 2 young girls discover their sexuality through fighting for womens rights, plagued by stereotypes and poverty, we probably would be poor company if we were on a desert island, sorry

//thanks to netgalley for providing me with a copy of this in exchange for an honest review//

Evelyn, May and Nell come from very different backgrounds and have different ideals, but all are impressed with the Suffrage movement, all desperate to change what it means to be a woman. As these three move about their lives, grow up and fall in love, they come to realise that their childish ideals of a perfect world require a bit more hard work.

It was incredibly clever and informative without being too imposing - it gave a very good impression of what life was actually like in the 1910's, not knowing the significance of larger events, just going about daily life. As a bit of a history nerd, I adored reading about their lives, how each family worked and lived a slightly different way but all wanted a better life.

I fell in love with all of them, and especially appreciated how each young woman encompassed a different value of the Suffragettes. Nell, used to wearing her brother's hand-me-downs, was hard working and tough and wanted what was best for her large family. When she meets May, their differences seem hardly important and they fall head over heels - which was not only adorable but so unique in a historical fiction, I nearly cried! It was just May and her mother, both Quakers and pacifists, who have differing opinions to the rest of the country when war is declared. Evelyn is determined to have the same opportunities as her older brother and wants to study at university, whereas her parents want her to marry.

As I said, they might be different women on the outside but all three just wanted a world that treated them fairly. It was just fascinating to read about women with their feet on the ground, as it were, in the midst of the Suffrage movement and the first year of the Great War. Definitely a new favourite and one I will be happily recommending.

When I first heard about Things a Bright Girl Can Do by Sally Nicholls, there was absolutely no way I wasn't going to read it. A book about the Suffragettes! As a feminist, there's just no way this book wasn't going to appeal to me. Having finished, I can say that Things a Bright Girl Can Do was such a good book - but for different reasons than I expected.

Things a Bright Girl Can Do isn't about the Suffragettes - it's about three girls who are Suffragettes/ists, or become one. It's about what Evelyn, May and Nell think, their opinions and their morals, and their individual stories. To be honest, there isn't a huge amount of them actually being Suffragettes/ists; there's some, but mostly it's them talking about or thinking about how unfair the world is for women, while their individual lives and what happens to them make the core of the plot.

Evelyn comes from a wealthy family. She's clever, and has a passion for learning, and absolutely hates that a university education isn't easily available to women. Because women don't need an education; they will marry men who are educated who will provide for their family, and the women will have children and look after their family - rich women, that is. Evelyn's parents don't understand why Evelyn would want a university education or a degree (not that she can actually get one; women can take the classes, but they don't get a qualification at the end of it), because it's not a necessity as she won't work. They look at it as something she wants to do that isn't really important, and will cost a lot of money, and as it's unnecessary, they're not paying that money. It's almost like they think Evelyn weird for wanting an education - why would a woman want more than getting married and having children? This enrages her, and having already been interested in the Suffragettes, she becomes one. She goes on marches, she where's sandwich boards and hands out handbills, she takes part in actions - risky missions the Suffragettes undertake to fight for their rights. But she always doubts herself and what she's doing, wondering if it's the right thing to do. When it comes down to actual risk, her heart is never fully in it. (Though she does end up going to prison and hunger striking, and oh my god it was appalling, and major props to Evelyn - or rather the actual real life Suffragettes who went through it - for going to such lengths to be heard.)

May is a Suffragist like her mother - a woman who wants the vote, but is more for trying to get it through peaceful means; protests and conversations and handing out handbills, basically fighting for their rights through talking rather than violence and criminality. Due to being a Quaker (which Nicholls is herself, making this book #OwnVoices), May is also a pacifist, and frowns upon Emmeline and Sylvia Pankhurst's methods. She is a very opinionated, and confident in talking about what she believes to be right, assertively fighting her corner. She's not quite holier-than-thou, but she is genuinely bewildered and upset when people don't understand or at least respect her views. Because she genuinely believes she is right, this is the right way of doing things, and everyone else has got it wrong and she doesn't understand why.

Nell is from the East End of London, a Suffragette who is all for violence and criminality, though mainly because she gets a thrill from it all, finds it exciting, not necessarily because she doesn't believed they won't be listened to otherwise. She lives in extreme poverty, which only highlights for her how needed equality is, because there are certain jobs women simply can't have, and in the jobs which men also do, the women get paid far less. At times in the book, things for Nell's family are absolutely desperate.

The three girls have one thing in common; wanting votes for women. But otherwise, they're completely different. Evelyn is wealthy, May is middle class, and although they have money, they don't really have enough to replace their worn clothes, and Nell has practically nothing to spare. Their morals when it comes to rights for women are at odds. I was actually surprised that May and Nell ended up together, because they as people, and their views, are just so different.

They're Sapphists, which is an old fashioned term for lesbians; it comes from the Greek poet Sappho, who wrote about women and loving women. Although their relationships to the wider world is secret, it's not something that's completely clandestine; May's mother knows, has known her daughter is a Sapphist for a while, and has no problem at all, even gave her a book to understand herself better, and introduced her to other Sapphists in the Suffragist community. I don't know if Nell's mum knows or not, but May does visit their house a number of times. Basically, to everyone who does know, there's not a problem, and there's never any worrying about being found out, or experience homophobia. It's just them, together and their happy.

For the most part, because Nell is confused about herself. She wears her older brother's old clothes; breeches, shirt, jacket, hat. A lot of people on first meeting think she's a boy. It would be interesting to read a review by a trans person, because I think Nell might be trans; she thinks of herself as not a girl, but not a man either; when she gets upset, she fights her tears, because of toxic masculinity - guys don't cry, and so she won't either. Because of what she says, I was never really sure why Nell wanted equal rights for women, because she wants to do the things that guys can do, but it's never really clear whether she wants more freedom for women, or she wants to be a man herself. There's a lot of confusion for Nell; she didn't realise that Sapphists were a thing, she thought it was just her until she met May, and she puts down her thoughts and confusion down to being a Sapphist, but a lot of it is about gender, and so I do think that she's trans, but I'm not trans, so obviously, I can't say for sure. But there is a lot of heartache for Nell because she doesn't know what she is, as she herself says. It's heartbreaking to watch.

There's more heartbreak for us as readers when it comes to Nell once the First World War starts. For me, it seemed there were two parts of the book, the first part that deals with Suffrage, and the second that deals with the war, and where Suffrage has to take a back foot. The war affects all three characters, but Nell more so. Things a Bright Girl Can Do tells us the story of the war that we don't hear. I knew the war was hard for the people at home, what with rationing and evacuation, but I never realised just how terrible it could be. When you're poor, and the breadwinner of the family is called up, it's devastating. Not only are you worried about your husband/father, but you're also worried about how you can survive. During war, the price of everything goes up. Jobs are lost because, in the case of Nell's job at a jam factory, who cares about jam now? It was mostly sold to the Germans, so no-one is going to buy, and most of the top men in the company are now at war, so the factory is closed. So many jobs are lost. There are so many women who are out seeking work, but not enough jobs to go round. Possessions had to be pawned, even when you have practically nothing anyway, right down to your bedstead. Appeals for help were made, but too many people needed help. No work, meant no money, and no money meant no food and no coal, and not paying the rent. God forbid you get ill, because there's no way to pay the doctor's bills. Reading about Nell's experiences of the war was horrific.

May isn't struggling as much as Nell, of course, and although she offers to help, Nell refuses charity. But even May's family has very little food now, and her mum is gone all the time on her various committees to try and stop the war. As pacifists, they are completely against the war. May is vocal about it, and is treated terribly by the people at school. She loses friends, and is bullied. When her mother complains, the school pretty much says, "Well, if she's going to be unpatriotic, what do you expect?" I really, really struggled with May. I respected her views, but she doesn't seem to want to respect anyone else's. She and Nell get into a huge fight when Nell finally gets a job in a munitions factory, telling her she shouldn't accept it, because it's wrong - no matter that it's the only job she can find, no matter that her family is in dire straits, no matter that her younger brother has pneumonia. No matter that if the soldiers don't have weapons to fight back with, they will be killed by the Germans, including Nell's father. Nell simply shouldn't take the job, and May feels betrayed that Nell is even considering it. This, on top of thinking bitchily about how Nell hadn't realised that things at school were terrible for May and not asking her about it, when there's a very strong chance her family could be kicked out of their home or starve or die from illness... it was just too much. I did not like that girl in that moment, and I haven't really forgiven her for it.

I did at first think I wouldn't like this book. The language used made the characters feel like caricatures; there was a lot of "jolly good", "rotten", "splendid", and so on. People did probably talk like that at the time, but it just didn't feel natural at the beginning. I did get used to it, however, and it stopped bothering me. I also never related or connected to any of the three girls. Although I respected them in some ways, there was a lot I didn't like about each of them. Though I did find that even though I wasn't a huge fan of them as people, it didn't mean I didn't care about them and what they went through, especially Nell. It's so odd, because I've never cared and felt so emotional for a character I didn't really like before. But it was difficult not to care when you think about how the things that happened in this book actually happened in real life.

I would have preferred to have seen more of what the Suffragettes/ists did rather than just being told about it, I would have liked more of it to have been on the page. But it was still so amazing to hear about the unbelievable things these wonderful, passionate, brave women would do in the fight for equality. Just thinking about it is kind of overwhelming, and I feel such gratitude to these women who thought so hard and were treated so terribly so that I can have the life I live now. I feel such pride in these women that they thought so hard and risked so much for me and the rest of us women, but also such huge disappointment that they suffered so much, and yet there's still a long way to go.

Things a Bright Girl Can Do is such a wonderful, wonderful book. I may not have got on with it all the time, but it was eye-opening, thought-provoking, and just brilliant, really. I can't recommend it enough.

Thank you to Andersen Press via NetGalley for the eProof.

I was very lucky to receive a proof of this book from the publisher as well as go to the #drinksYA launch event in London. Thanks Anderson! One fun fact I learnt at the event was that the publisher came to Sally Nicholls after having dressed as a Suffragette as a protest to the suffragettes not being honoured as they had been previously at the derby).

I took me a little while to get into this book, (more my own slow reading mood at the time) but I am glad I persevered as I did really enjoy it. I don't read a lot of historical fiction but this (re)opened my eyes to the suffragette's and war time experience.

As well as being a re-education for me, I really enjoyed the story line. The fact that there was a both a heterosexual and lesbian relationship, it spanned across the classes, across political opinions and upbringings. It was really great. It made me laugh as well as mourn for the difficulties of both suffragettes and war time Britain. I will be recommending this to the students in my library, and I expect it to be very popular!

Loved that she followed three very different female protagonists & how the suffragette movement affected each of them. Learned a liot about I didn't know about the history of this era.

Three very different girls from all walks of life, fighting for the same thing. For many reasons they all know that women deserve the vote just as much as men do and they are all willing to do whatever they can to get it. But then the war starts and most people's priorities are suddenly very different. I felt quite emotional throughout the book, reading about what these girls and women went through, and the different reactions to the start of the war. This is one of those books that stays with you even when you're not reading it.

<B> Things a Bright Girl Can Do </B> Is the story of three young female protagonist- Evelyn, Nell and May who are all a part of the Suffragette movement. The book is set in London during the peak of the Suffragette movement and WW1. It’s always interesting reading historial fiction told from a Young Adult POV, I think this is what stood out the most for me and this book.

All three girls, though a part of the movement came from different backgrounds and were in the movement for different reasons. Evelyn is the oldest and is set to live the cliched life of marrying her childhood sweetheart, having kids and managing a household. Except, Evelyn wants to go to University and learn and be able to make decisions on her own. Nell, who is from a humble background lives with her parents and 7 other siblings, is the expected to work to take care of her family. She dresses like a boy because that’s how she feels most comfortable and she also loves girls. She is a part of the Suffragette movement because she believes in Girl Power and their right to be who they want in the world. May lives with her Mom who is a known rebel, as a child she was exposed to various movements and causes that spoke to Women’s rights. She lives for a protest and fighting the power.

The book is told from the POV of these three girls during a time where their future is unknown with the impending war. We get a glimpse into their personal lives, how they handle the demands and expectations of society- which for me was the most insightful read for me.

Overall, a great YA novel, I think every young reader should be privy to this book. If you are interested in the Suffragette movement, this is a must read as well.

As is often the way, I’d seen a few people talking about Things A Bright Girl Can Do, by Sally Nicholls, for a while, and then my friend Sarah told me I had to read it because I would love it, so of course I had to give it a go. She was right of course; I did love it, because it is right up my street. History! Feminism! Wonderful characters! Everything I love to see in a book, in fact. Things A Bright Girl Can Do starts in 1914 and moves through to the beginning of 1918, following the three young women throughout. It’s a really interesting way to look at the time period – we tend to concentrate on men’s stories in the war period, and although we all learn about the Suffragettes, we don’t tend to drill down past the leaders, and certainly not to teenagers, so I very much enjoyed reading about it from the point of view of three very different young women. All three stories are fascinating and cover the breadth of Edwardian society, and I particularly liked the way they all had different reasons pulling them towards the suffrage movement. It was also good to see the historically accurate potrayal of May and Nell’s relationship, and how it was clear that it was Nell who was taking all the risk, because of the different attitudes of their communities.

I loved Evelyn and Nell as characters, although if I had to pick a favourite, it would probably be Evelyn. She’s intelligent and stubborn right from the start, but once she discovers the Suffragettes she gives herself to the cause wholeheartedly, despite her previously cosseted lifestyle. I found myself desperately worried for her at various points in the book, which shows how much I engaged with her. I also engaged with Nell, but to a lesser extent. The hardships she and her family suffered were heartbreaking, and there was a point where I really regretted reading the book in public, because I knew I was about to cry. May I was much less interested in. Although she shows spectacular growth by the end, for much of the book she came across as a bit self-obssessed. She had no idea about the things Nell was going through, and treated her abominably, and it kind of put me off her, even though the other aspects of her story were interesting. An honourable mention here for Teddy, who was my favourite of the supporting characters. His relatonship with Evelyn was just so lovely, in the way he supported her even though he was worried about what the consequences were, and I was terrified for him when he went off to war.

The period detail in Things A Bright Girl Can Do is also fantastic. The social history of Britain in this period happens to be the area I studied most at university, so while my knowledge isn’t quite up to date, I fancy I’ve got quite a good idea of what it was like, and Sally Nicholls has done a great job of portraying it right across the social classes. From the lack of opportunities for women to get an education (they can study and sit all the exams at Oxford, for example, (if they’re rich enough) but they can’t actually get a degree), to the conditions Nell and her family live in in the East End, Nicholls has got it right. Not only that, she writes in such a way that the setting is vivid and real, even to people who don’t have the historical background.

Things A Bright Girl Can Do is a fantastic book, full of historical detail and great characters. I really enjoyed it, and as this is the first book I’ve read by Sally Nicholls, I will immediately be searching out her other books. I recommend you do the same.

Before reading it, Things A Bright Girl Can Do was definitely one of my most anticipated releases of the year. It'd been on my radar for a while so after being unsuccessful (for three days in a row) in my attempts to win a copy at YALC I was overjoyed to be approved for an e-ARC on NetGalley and dived straight in.

On the whole, I'm not a huge reader of historical fiction, but there are certain time periods or movements that I've always been interested in. The Suffrage movement definitely falls in to this category - I've always been intrigued to learn more about the movement and the lives of the women who were a part of it, so having a novel which considered three different perspectives was really fascinating. I loved seeing how, although they were all ultimately fighting for the same thing, the views of each girl were not always the same. I think this really helped make the complexities of the Suffrage movement more accessible to those who may not know much about it, as often all the women can be simply grouped together. This also made the individual characters feel more rounded and well-developed.

My favourite of the girls was Evelyn, who thinks it's unjust that her brother is allowed to study at Oxford University whilst she is not. I found her comments on this to be particularly interesting. I also really liked the inclusion of her boyfriend, Teddy, who, first of all, helped to dispel the notion that all feminists are perpetually single, men-hating creatures. He also helped to highlight how attitudes towards gender roles would have been engrained in the young men of the time, but what I really liked was that he seemed willing to learn from Evelyn.

Whilst Evelyn fought for women's rights by joining the Suffragette movement, which I was already quite familiar with, I was not so familiar with the Suffragists, a group who refused violence. May and her mother align themselves with this group as opposed to the Suffragettes, something which I was really grateful was depicted because I felt like I learned a lot whilst reading about the different ways the different groups tackled the same issues.

We meet the third main character, Nell, through May as the two girls meet and develop a relationship. I've never read anything set in this time period that features LGBT characters before so again, I found the inclusion of this relationship really interesting. I know a lot of people are also trying to read more diversely at the moment so if you're after a feminist read which features an f/f romance then I'd definitely recommend checking this out!

Overall, I really enjoyed this book. The characters were really well developed and they all felt unique. I also thought the representation of class was well delivered and played into the idea that no two women's experiences as part of the movement were the same. A lot of research must have gone in to this book to weave all these different elements together so well. The reason why I bought it down by a star in the end was because I found the second half of the book to be a bit slower than the first. This may also be due to my personal circumstances at the time that I read it, i.e. it was during the first 2 weeks of my brand new (and first ever 'proper') job so reading had been taking a back seat. But I personally just found myself more engaged during the first half of the book when the focus was more heavily on why the individual women were so passionate about equal rights. During the second half the effects of the war are often foregrounded which, whilst I also enjoyed and obviously realise that this was the reality for the lives of women at the time, I wasn't quite as gripped as I was during the opening of the story. The ending, however, hooked me back in again and, although there was one moment in particular (that I won't mention because spoilers) that I thought was particularly bittersweet, on the whole I was satisfied with how everything wrapped up.

YA look at suffragettes and World War I

It's about time that young women (and men) had a book aimed at them that looked in a grown-up way at the pre-War suffragist movement, how the War affected it, and what that War did to the young men and women in Britain. And this one takes on several issues in one book.

Three young women are our eyes on this world of a century past - one rich girl (Evelyn) who is pushing back from marrying her childhood sweetheart. One is the daughter of a feminist vegetarian activist - May, and the third, Nell, is part of a large struggling family, a young woman comfortable in boys' clothes who develops immediate feelings for May after they meet at a suffragist rally.

In the course of their interactions and over a few years span, we watch one go to prison for her attempts to gain women the vote, we watch how they and their families cope with the arrival of war, how each decides on the future they want to have and their attempts to achieve them.

For many readers, this might be the first exposure to the period and situation women like this trio were in back in the early twentieth century. The period detail is descriptive and thorough, and gives an excellent background to the women's lives. It also doesn't shy away from the sad facts of War - injury, death, psychological damage, and touches upon conscientious objectors, white feathers and other issues that today would not be the scandals they might have been then.

I really loved hopping from one young woman to the other, all three stories were equally fascinating. A bold author, to include sexuality in the mix as well, though there is nothing here that makes it unsuitable for young readers interested.

The ideal audience is probably ages 13 and above, and it could make excellent extract reading for KS3 history/PSHE lessons.

With thanks to Netgalley for the advance reading copy.

I have loved learning and reading about the suffragettes for years, and from when I first learned that this YA suffragette novel was being published, I was brimming with excitement. I was thrilled to be sent a copy. However, no matter how excited I was, and how much I wanted to like this book, I just didn’t think it was a good book. I thought that the writing was poor and the story was stretched too thin across the characters and the time that it spans. I’m gutted to be one of the lone voices so far disappointed in this book so far, but I can’t help it. I read this a while ago, but held publication of this post back until today when the book is published because I suspected it might not go down too well, but I hope anyone who disagrees with me will remember that these reviews are just my personal opinions on the book as a novel and not the subject matter.

Things a Bright Girl Can Do follows the story of three young girls – Evelyn, May, and Nell – from 1914 to 1918, through their struggles as they campaign for votes for women, the trials of the First World War, and finally to the first extension of suffrage to women in 1918. Evelyn is seventeen, from a wealthy background, and expected to marry her childhood sweetheart. However, she is frustrated at not being allowed to follow her dream of attending Oxford University, which drives her to join the suffragettes. May, however, is seventeen and has grown under the influence of her feminist, socialist, pacifist, vegetarian mother. Being a suffragette to her is a given. Nell is also already a suffragette, driven by the poor living and working conditions that she witnesses her family dealing with on a daily basis, and motivated by the suffragettes’ promises of social reform. The three of them join the fight for votes for different reasons, and we follow them as they pursue this fight through four tumultuous years.

A positive of this book is that the characters are diverse for a book set in this period, and which follows three white women. The book not only explores class and sex, but also LGBT issues, and even mentions a few times the work of BME suffragettes like Princess Sophia Duleep Singh. Sally Nicholls managed to include a broad and varied amount of information relating to the suffragette movement, however, in my opinion, this scope was at the expense of depth for the characters and the story. I felt like the characters were not detailed and three-dimensional, but rather the writing and the characterisation felt flat, and the girls felt instead like a vehicle for the presentation of all of this social history. Further, if diversity of characters was going to be the highlight of this book, there could have been even more, perhaps in the form of a POC protagonist.

My main issue with the characterisation of these girls was that their motives for acting the way that they did felt superficial. I’m not saying that I don’t understand why they were suffragettes, but I felt like Nicholls took for granted that modern audiences will. As a feminist reader, of course I will instantly cheer on these suffragette protagonists, but I still want characters to feel real. I have recently been watching Susan Dennard’s writing tips on her Instagram stories, and she mentions that characters must have a ‘desperate desire’, something that drives the more superficial desire of the plot. Yes, these girls want the vote. But why? What drives them to these lengths? What makes them abandon social norms? What makes them, in particular, act differently to other women who do not become suffragettes under the same pressures? As understandable as their reasons are from a detached perspective, I couldn’t feel their motivations on a human basis. I understood that Evelyn wanted to study and have opportunities like her brothers, but I didn’t feel her anger and her resentment come across in the writing.

You might have heard of the saying ‘Show, don’t tell,’ in writing. In my opinion, I couldn’t feel this because it didn’t stick to this rule. It meant that I couldn’t experience what Evelyn, May, and Nell were thinking and feeling because the author’s narrative was a wall between us rather than a bridge. Rather than getting into the characters’ heads, feeling exactly what they are feeling, we’re held at arms’ length. For example, one of the girls is arrested. We are told that it is the worst thing that has ever happened to her, the cell is described in detail, we are told that she feels lonely, but we can’t feel her loneliness, and we just have to take the description for face value rather than trying to experience for ourselves what it might be like to be arrested like her. This personal connection felt even more important than in most books considering that we know, in hindsight, that the suffragettes did eventually achieve their goal of female suffrage. If the only thing hooking us as readers is ‘Do they get the vote?’ the hook isn’t strong enough, because we know that they do. Instead, we have to also be hooked by the girls’ personal deep desires, and I just wasn’t.

This made it difficult for me to feel emotionally connected or invested in the girls as people. I had to just accept when characters fell in love, rather than feeling the love that they felt, accept that they were angry, rather than feel angry with them. Rather than feeling Nell’s pain and struggle, I was treated to a pages-long retelling of her families’ troubles during her entire childhood. I generally cannot stand info-dumps, and this book was full of them. Rather than embedding the historical facts more gently in the story itself, perhaps revealing information through conversations or experiences, and so making the historical facts feel more poignant, the information was simply dumped on us in the narrative. On the other hand, there were things that could have been mentioned. I expected, when Nell starts work as a munitionette, that mention would be made of many munitionettes being poisoned by the substances they were working with and the health implications, or of the explosions that killed many, something that would have been easy to point out considering its relevance to her story, and yet it wasn’t.

I wanted to give 2 stars just in recognition of its subject matter and representation of different social groups, but I decided not to, simply because the subject matter was literally the only thing that kept me reading this book. I also felt that the causes represented could have been more impactful with stronger writing, and perhaps a smaller focus. Instead of spreading the story so thinly over three girls and four years, perhaps focusing on one perspective with the others as secondary characters would have allowed for the depth of detail that was missing. I can’t describe how gutted I am to have not enjoyed this book, but I just couldn’t see past the poor writing.

«Things a Bright Girl Can Do» is a brilliantly written novel, telling a story of:

- Evelyn, who lives in the upper class of the social ladder and defies the settled role of women in her society;
- May, whose home environment and political views were influenced by a liberal Quaker mother; and
- Nell, a young suffragette from a poor, struggling family, who has some big fears of her own that she will need to overcome.

All of these characters were very well-constructed and presenting a different perspective on the single suffragette movement in Great Britain before, during and after the First World War.

Honestly, it was one of the most educational and inspiring historical fiction I’ve ever read!

But,

I just couldn’t make myself care enough about the characters or completely immerse myself into the story. The only character I absolutely loved was Teddy before the war. His wittiness and humour added an incredible pinch of spice in Evelyn’s story. It was an absolute delight to read about their interactions!

This book was so amazing and great to read but I don't really know what to say about it. I liked the characters a lot and the plot. The history was awesome and I learned a lot of stuff that I didn't know. It's an era of history that I'm really interested in, both the stuff with the suffragettes and with the First World War, so it's great to read about it from different perspectives and find out stuff I didn't already know.

The peace stuff from May was really interesting. I had no idea how many women were working so hard to try and end the war. The whole peace conference was something that I knew nothing about so it was great to read that.

I enjoyed Nell as well. It was great to see the idea of gender and homosexuality being questioned in a historical fiction book, because so many people pretend that this stuff didn't exist back then even though it's well documented.

I loved the cover with the black girl on it, so I was sad that there was no mention that any of the girls were black in the book. I would have been so interested to see the issue of race and how it was treated in England back then because I only know some stuff about race and suffragettes in America and even that I don't know much about.

This is definitely a great feminist read for anyone interested in women and history. Read it and get ready to feel powerful.

This was my most anticipated book of the year and it did not disappoint

This book is beautiful and necessary and everything I have ever wanted.

We follow Evelyn, May and Nell who are all teenage suffragettes/suffragists and their journeys before and throughout the First World War. They are all wonderful, complex, feminist characters and I loved them so much . All three of them are fierce feminists but they express their beliefs in very different ways. From going on hunger strike in prison to only engaging in pacifist activities, they were all wonderful and I can't praise the author strongly enough for creating these incredibly vivid, strong young women.

There is also some fabulous diversity- a beautifully written lesbian relationship between May and Nell which absolutely melted my little heart along with discussion about homosexuality within the historical context.

ALSO, can we just talk about Teddy because I am still swooning from his absolutely perfection. What a truly wonderful character!

The feminism in this book was so on point that I will struggle to appropriately praise it. Evelyn in particular resonated with me as all she wanted was an education that was denied to her simply because she was female. She struggled a lot with some of the decisions that she made and had a genuinely difficult path in this book (along with May and Nell of course but Evelyn was my favourite of the three), I think she was handled incredibly well by the author and her relationship with Teddy is gorgeous.

For me, this book is mostly about the characters and their development over time. But the plot is also fantastic, including real historical events such as the Buckingham Palace demonstration and it brilliantly depicted the horror of war including the Battle of the Somme. Basically what I'm trying to say is that this book is perfection.

To top it all off, the hardback is completely beautiful especially the back cover and I LOVE the use of suffragette colours- a small but important element.

I was almost 100% certain that I would love this book and oh my goodness I don't think I could have loved it any more if I tried. Now desperately hoping for more historical fiction from Sally Nicholls.

This book begins by following the lives and loves of 3 young women involved in the suffragette movement. Fairly early on the First World War happens so the suffragette part of the story for most of them begins to take a backseat to life during wartime although the politics with the characters needing to manage their response to the war (pacifism storyline alert!) while continuing to manage their love lives, education and career plans.

This book could easily have been bogged down in historical fact but fortunately the author avoids this. There’s an engrossing cross class lesbian romance and the author doesn’t downplay the role of women of colour in the suffragette struggle.

Things A Bright Girl Can Do had a stand at YALC as well, and although I didn't pick up a proof, I was approved for a NetGalley copy, so I was pretty chuffed. The story of three teenage suffragettes and suffragists was definitely something that piqued my interest, and I was on board from the first page.
With three girls from very different backgrounds championing this story of the fight for women's suffrage in immediately pre-WWI England, there was a diverse approach to how women saw themselves and sought the freedom to be themselves in stifling Edwardian (what a misnomer, the monarch at the time was George V) and WWI times.

All three main characters were interesting, especially Nell and May, and their relationship. The clash of cultures between them and their differing values on war, violence, money, class, and their difficulties navigating those made for some really interesting conflicts, especially because we were in the heads of both girls at times. Evelyn, the third character, was less compelling, probably because a lot of her rebellion seemed to be teenage chafing against the constraints of what was laid out for her in life, and she dropped it before too long.

I really thoroughly enjoyed the commentary on class, war, suffragism, suffragettes, women's rights, poverty, and the impact of the outbreak of WWI on all aspects of life, including jobs for women and their position in society. All of these historical discussions were compelling, and all the more interesting as they were framed around the lives of individuals, which made them seem all the more real.

However, as I got further into the book, and it skipped more and more chunks of time, I really felt disconnected from the three main characters as people. The first 50% of the book was really excellent, and I felt connected to and empathised with all three girls (women?). However, as war broke out, and the chapters of the book became shorter and more disjointed, and there were larger and larger chunks of time between sections, I lost interest in all three girls and their struggles. 

Disappointingly, I finished this book feeling a little apathetic about all three main characters. For historical commentary, it was spot on, but for characterisation and emotion, Things A Bright Girl Can Do struggled more the further in it got.

Full disclosure: I know I a lot about the suffragettes. I’m writing my MA dissertation on them, and I find the campaign for the parliamentary vote for women absolutely fascinating. However, I also find that much of the media surrounding them tends to oversimplify the myriad of organisations, people, and viewpoints.

Things a Bright Girl Can Do didn’t do that. It exposed the complexities of the suffrage campaign–the tensions that existed between the Women’s Social and Political Union, and other, more constitutionalist suffrage groups. It looked unflinchingly at the hot issues of the day–like militancy and the tug between conscientious objection & fighting for your country.

Our story focuses on three young women; Evelyn, who is middle class & desperate to go to Oxford University, May, who lives a bohemian lifestyle and is a committed pacifist suffragist, and Nell, who’s family struggles to meet ends meet. All three characters are compelling, and I like how each story interweaved, however briefly.

My favourite character was Nell, a working class girl who prefers dressing in masculine clothes and shares a cramped house with her family of eight, AND another family. Nell is bright and frustrated with her lot in life. Her devotion and commitment to her family is lovely. And I adored her exploration of her sexuality and her relationship with May. But what I loved most about Nell’s ARC through the book was her gradual articulation of what she wanted from the vote–a career. Nell’s confidence, in herself, in her identity and in her abilities grew throughout the story. I LOVED seeing a working class suffragette so vividly portrayed. I feel sometimes there is an overemphasis on middle class suffragettes, so it was lovely to see someone like Nell represented.

May, Nell’s girlfriend, was a little more difficult to fall for. May has been brought up in a very accepting household, her mother is a suffragist and very involved in the Quaker movement. I really enjoyed reading about May’s commitment to her faith–I don’t think I’ve ever read a book with a Quaker MC, so that was lovely. May’s adherence to pacifism and non-violence provides a interesting insight into this area of suffrage campaigning. Especially in popular history, much of the films and books seem to focus on the militants. It was really nice to see a suffragist that wasn’t a militant (and her fav Pankhurst is Sylvia so I was 100% for that!) However, as the book goes on and war draws closer, May’s beliefs seem to get more complicated. On one hand, I admired May for sticking to what she believed in, and on the other–it frustrated me SO much that she couldn’t empathise with other people’s opinions. I also LOVED how confident May was with her sexuality, and the relationship with Nell was beautiful.

Evelyn’s story, who’s joining the suffragettes was a rebellion against her parents so she could access education, was equally fascinating. I really enjoyed her discourse on what happens AFTER we get the vote? It was interesting to see these characters grappling with the implications of what the parliamentary vote actually meant for their future. For Evelyn, she wanted an education, and more from her life than being a wife and mother. One of Evelyn’s scenes from the book was probably one of the most harrowing and powerful pieces of writing I’ve ever read.

Basically, Things a Bright Girl Can Do is a complex & nuanced YA book with heart. A lot of the time, the suffragettes are cast as heroes or villains, which does these complicated women a disservice. The women who fought for our right to vote over a hundred years ago were not badly drawn caricatures–they were people. Sally Nicholls has exceeded at creating a rich and compelling narrative, exploring a well-researched area of history, and writing three heroines that feel vividly real.

This is one of the best books I’ve read this year.

Excellent book for introduction the history of feminist and suffrage to young people with characters you can root for. There is so much you can pull out and adapt in the classroom and it is beautifully written. I would recommend this to my students who are around 12-15 as it works for the younger end of YA perfectly. I hope this will be a big hit because it deserves it.