Obviously, I’m not saying that bringing these topics into conversation isn’t good, just that frequently they cover common, if not very talked about, knowledge without any deep understanding of the generation they aim to write about and teens in general. Long story short: in those books it’s very hard to relate at all to the character. This is a great book with relatable characters and real-life problems that that could definitely happen. It evokes sympathy, empathy and anger from the reader. On the cover, Holly Bourne describes it as a book teen girls need to read, and I agree. In the meantime, as part of a research project, Anna digs into the history of Maggie, a local girl convicted for witchcraft 400 years previously. As both girls’ stories start to unravel, it becomes clear that attitudes towards young women have not moved on much over the last four centuries. The Burning is one of those books that takes you on an emotional rollercoaster ride, from sadness to anger to despair to redemption and Laura Bates, through her beautifully written character voice, shows you what it means to be a teenage girl in today's social media society. It’s worth knowing that sometimes people see you as a symbol of something, instead of a person. And, when they do, it reflects on them, not on you’.

Laura Bates | Waterstones Fix the System, Not the Women by Laura Bates | Waterstones

Despite working in a school, I found the cruelty and language used by the teenage characters almost incredible, although my student reviewers assured me it comes as standard. Trigger Warnings: This book features rape, non-consensual pornography, sex shaming, victim blaming, bullying, discussion of abuse due to abortion, and discussion of death from cancer. Another interesting plot turned into something complicated, messy, okay WTH I just read kind of story! Laura Bates’ book Everyday Sexism is powerful and very effective. Going to become required reading for my boys.’ The compelling YA debut from Laura Bates, founder of the Everyday Sexism Project and bestselling author of Girl Up.When Anna moves from Birmingham to St. Monans in Scotland, she hopes it will be a fresh start. She's left her past behind, and is ready to begin anew. She's just starting to settle, to find her feet, and has made some good friends, when her past finds her, and everyone knows what she ran from. As she struggles with the abuse and bullying, and the sudden loss of her friends, her history project keeps her going. She must research the life of a local person, and has discovered that in the 17th Century, a teenage girl, Maggie, was executed as a witch. The more she discovers, the more she finds she relates to the girl whose whole town turns on her because of something someone else did - and that the world is not so different now as it was then, with girls getting blamed for what boys do to them. The Burning follows Anna, who has moved to Scotland following the death of her father and following her nude photos being leaked across social media. She is in a new school, in a new town, with a new last name and she still can’t escape the rampant bullying and slut-shaming she has experienced over one photo. For a history project, Anna has to research a local person of interest and she comes across a woman accused of witchcraft and is desperate to find out her story. I would most definitely recommend this book to anyone who hasn’t already read it, no matter their age or sex.

Laura Bates Author — Laura Bates

Laura Bates - founder of the Everyday Sexism project and author of Everyday Sexism and Girl Up - also uses subtle supernatural touches to add to the darkness throughout the novel. A smart, explosive examination of gender discrimination and its ramifications." — Publishers Weekly opowieść o plotce, o niszczącej sile słowa, o samotności w cierpieniu. Do bólu współczesna i miejscami mrożąca krew w żyłach – „Spalona” Laury Bates, którą mogłyby przeczytać wszystkie dorastające dziewczyny oraz każdy, kto z dorastającymi, współczesnymi dzieciakami ma na co dzień do czynienia. From Laura Bates, internationally renowned feminist and founder of the Everyday Sexism Project, comes a realistic novel for the #metoo era. The Burning will prompt all readers to consider the implications of sexism and the role we can each play in ending itI received a free ebook version of this from Netgalley! Thankyou to both Netgalley and the publisher for allowing me to read this. My review is still honest. The last bits got me crying so bad. The part with her mother and Anna’s speech at the end was so emotional. I wish at the end what was happening, I wish there was a visual of it. Now I want to read more of Laura Bates works

THE BURNING by Laura Bates - Hay Festival THE BURNING by Laura Bates - Hay Festival

I am always intrigued by any book that finds parallels with history in a modern problem and The Burning did that very well. It follows Anna, a teenage girl, who has moved away from a big city to a small fishing village in the East Neuk of Fife in Scotland. Anna and her mother have moved to escape the fallout from an incident involving the very real dangers of modern technology. She then begins to find out more and more about a girl who lived in the village hundreds of years ago who was accused of witchcraft. I can't deny that this book had an effect on me. The author captures Anna's fear, shame and frustration as she is confronted with constant double standards. It's also very British, and I related a lot more to the high school culture here than I do when reading American YA. Some parts hit very close to home. I recognized such moments as this one: a b "Bates, Laura Carolyn, (born 27 Aug. 1986), Founder, Everyday Sexism Project, 2012". Who's who & who was who. 2014. doi: 10.1093/ww/9780199540884.013.U281470. ISBN 978-0-19-954088-4 . Retrieved 28 August 2021.Anna e la madre si trasferiscono in un piccolo paesino della Scozia, Saint Monans, dopo alcune vicissitudini che le hanno costrette ad abbandonare il Maine. I wasn't so keen on the ending, either, unfortunately. It's more that I didn't find the reaction to what Anna does quite believable, I just don't think it would have happened like that. Maybe it's end the story on a hopeful note, but I had various question marks over it - would Anna have actually have done that? Would she have said what she said? - and it just felt a little unrealistic? But maybe that's just me. Unlike O’Neill, though, Bates allows her heroine to have the last word. In a cinematically rousing culmination, Anna turns on her harassers. It is particularly satisfying that Simon, the originator, is given no arc of redemption, though the reader glimpses the nastiness of his father early on; and that the headmaster who dares to suggest that Anna’s choices somehow justified her subsequent treatment is verbally eviscerated by her furious mother. This is a hard and challenging read, but its power and necessity are impossible to deny. It is a gripping, if unpalatable, story, a huge hit with the students. We all very much enjoyed the way that Maggie’s experiences are slowly revealed to mirror Anna’s. I would recommend this book to older readers, owing to its mature themes, explicit language and sexual material. CW: horrific slut shaming, sharing and doctoring of nude images of young teen, death of father from cancer, teen abortion.