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It happens every year. A list is posted, and one girl from each grade is chosen as the prettiest, and another is chosen as the ugliest. Nobody knows who makes the list. It almost doesn't matter. The damage is done the minute it goes up.
This is the story of eight girls, freshman to senior, "pretty" and "ugly." And it's also the story of how we see ourselves, and how other people see us, and the tangled connection of the two.
Ages 12+
"Every girl who has ever felt the pressures of trying to fit in will find herself in the pages of this book." - Children's Literature
"Starred Review. This riveting exploration of physical appearance and the status it confers opens a cultural conversation that's needed to happen for a long time." - Kirkus Reviews
"Starred Review. Offering a well-differentiated cast of complex characters and a thoughtful focus on femininity, sisterhood, relationships, eating disorders, and what it means to be singled out, Vivian proves that beauty and ugliness aren't always a matter of appearance." - Publishers Weekly
This information about The List was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Photograph: Janelle Bendycki
Siobhan Vivian was born in New York City on January 12, 1979. She attended The University of the Arts, where she graduated with a degree in Writing for Film and Television. She received her MFA in Creative Writing: Children's Literature from The New School University.
Siobhan has worked as an editor of several New York Times best-selling novels at Alloy Entertainment, and as a scriptwriter for The Disney Channel. She is the author of the young adult novel The List, as well as Not That Kind of Girl, Same Difference, and A Little Friendly Advice, and the Burn for Burn trilogy, cowritten with Jenny Han.
Siobhan she currently teaches Writing Youth Literature at the University of Pittsburgh.
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