Frizzy

This is a great middle grade graphic novel.

Wonderful illustrations, with a charming, determined main character who learns to love her hair despite all the negative messaging she is bombarded with about it. She faces many obstacles including anti-blackness, unsupportive family members, and bullies at school.

Luckily, she has a small support system that shows her how things can be and is guided towards self acceptance and self love.

Highly recommend this to young readers, and look forward to seeing more from this author.

***Thank you to First Second Books for providing me with an e-ARC for free via NetGalley for an unbiased review.

I received a copy from the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review

Little Miss Marlene is growing up and with growth of age come growth of self and with that growth of self is growth in knowing what you like and don't like and acceptance of self. Lot's of ands but oh well. Marlene has been blessed with beautiful thick curly hair. She's also been blessed with a mom who loves her but has allowed las malas lenguas to infiltrate her mind. Marlene grapples with wanting to ditch the Dominican salon and make her curly hair tame enough where her mother will be cool with the ditching part.

This book was perfection. Painfully so. I didn't cringe at the thought of going to the Dominican salon but all that Marlene experienced at the salon, I did too. The long hours at the salon, the hairdressers complaining about how much hair you have, constantly saying that you should cut it... ugh... Not cool. When mom told Marlene not to even think of moisture because the thought alone would ruin the blowout... I felt it in my soul and memories brought me back to that place where you literally feel your hair getting bigger and bigger and bigger. Ain't nothing in the world that can fix it when it gets to that point. NADA.

Tía Ruby shows Marlene how to love on her hair and with that comes revelations that folks don't like curly hair because they are anti-black. I will say that there is that and a lot of it but sometimes it's not that cut and clear.

In my very pro-black family, hair has always been a thing. Absolutely everyone in the family has a different curl pattern/texture and most everyone doesn't have the patience to find out what works. Their answer to everything is to cut it and maintain it short. THAT is another topic better left for another day. To have curly/natural hair and maintain it curly/natural is a labor of love and patience. Wash day is an all day event and sometimes bleeds into day two because life. Products that worked for the last month no longer work and you have to have products on back up just in case they work now. There is SO MUCH. It is not easy and yet it has to be done because it is what it is. Acceptance comes. It takes forever for some but it does come. Some of us are just on to it a lot sooner than most.

Curly hair is absolutely beautiful. Curly hair is absolutely professional and neat. Even in it's maximum frizz, photographers have been able to capture it's beauty and make it the cover of these fashion magazines. I will absolutely purchase this graphic novel when it comes out and gift a few copies to all my curlies because they've all been on this journey and it's a good reminder to encourage others to accept themselves as the perfection they are sooner rather than later.