I enjoyed how the author, Pénélope Bagieu, selected the heroines in her novel Brazen: Rebel Ladies Who Rocked the World. Some of them are well known and others aren’t. She managed to share how the heroines each faced the decisive moments or the obstacles in their life path and how they dealt with the situations. With the specific moments in the stories and the alternative routes that they take as they decide to make their own life paths, it was really interesting to see how they manage to solve their problems in the end. This novel can be a baby step in understanding the #METOO movement and feminism as the human rights movement. The heroines in the stories are from all different backgrounds, which present diversity and inclusion to the diverse readers. The writing style and the illustrations are similar to short newspaper comics, which are very easy to read and hard to be overwhelmed with the content. Using the form of a graphic novel does make learning about complex topics more accessible because, with the visualizations, readers of all ages can visualize the character’s actions, perspectives, and narratives. It will be easier to understand how and why the character is acting or thinking in a certain way, and by understanding the character’s mind, the readers are more likely to put themselves in the character’s point of view and think about the setting of the story.
—Lucille Park, CMRD101 Fall 2020