Elsie Parker gets to spend eight weeks learning about important topics like the difference between sex and gender, but at school, her fifth grade classmates will get their puberty education only via a generic hourlong video in a gender-segregated class at the end of the school year. Elsie decides to fill the gap: She hangs a whiteboard on her locker, creating an anonymous advice column. Though some of her classmates poke fun and call her Puberty Girl, most seem to appreciate the service she provides, asking questions about pimples, periods, and the meaning of LGBTQ. She makes sure to look up facts using reputable sources before answering. The school administration isn\u2019t as receptive, however. Elsie, who\u2019s implied white, has recently been accepted at a prestigious arts and STEM\u2013focused middle school, and she worries she may be jeopardizing her chances there if she gets in too much trouble. But through conversations with her Latina best friend, Mara Morales; her Pakistani and Egyptian American crush, Nadia Hadid; her bisexual mom; her transgender dad; and her parents\u2019 friend Nate (her \u201cDNA provider\u201d), she realizes that sometimes it\u2019s worth getting in trouble to make the world a better place. Some pop-culture references seem outdated, but Elsie\u2019s voice and the social dynamics feel authentic, and the pacing is solid. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Elsie Parker gets to spend eight weeks learning about important topics like the difference between sex and gender, but at school, her fifth grade classmates will get their puberty education only via a generic hourlong video in a gender-segregated class at the end of the school year. Elsie decides to fill the gap: She hangs […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":6615,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6614","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interesting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6614"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6614"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6614\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6615"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6614"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6614"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6614"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}