100% a book my teens will love! This is a book I will order for our 9th grade curriculum. it would be perfect for an interdisciplinary unit!

4.5 Stars

CWs: Mild instanced of bullying, invasions of privacy, and some derogatory comments

This is an AMAZING story and the perfect gateway into Natalia Sylvester's work. "Running" tells the story of a young Cuban-American girl named Mariana who's trying to come into her own and find her own voice all while being watched by the entire nation as her father runs for President. It's such a thoughtful depiction of our current political landscape in Ameria, where the advent of social media, clickbait journalism, and even meme culture has proved to change the tide from one day to the next.

Mariana's life is extremely restricted and scripted to a T for these exact reasons, and the story is very much about her rejecting her role as a political prop in her father's family man image and figuring out what she actually believes in. She's also learning that saying nothing and doing nothing are politically charged actions, and that there is no such thing as a neutral stance when it comes to real issues that effect real people.

This is about Mariana making political choices for the first time in her life, and realizing that not having a vote is not equivalent to being helpless. This is an empowering and emotional story about standing up to injustice even when it's not easy or straightforward, which is exactly the kind of story young people need right now.

I love what Natalia Sylvester has accomplished in this book and I look forward to reading more of her work in the future.

I recieved a free copy from netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Running is a great book that doesn't try to preach and has characters that feel and act like real people. Mari's father is a career politician and is now running for president. However, Mari has gotten frustrated with the spotlight being on her and when things start changing she has to decide what she believes in even if it may go against her father. Great book for both teens and adults.

Mari has never really thought about her father's policies. He's always been in politics in one way or another. But now he's running for President of the United States, the whole family is under intense scrutiny. Forced to learn more about the issues, Mari is dismayed to realise she doesn't always like what he stands for.

Not being American, I've never really understood their system (primaries?) but this is still an engaging story of a young girl realising she needs to fight for her beliefs. It reminds me a little of Moxie, both in style and in one particular set piece.

I liked Mari's original friends better than her new friends, but they were all important in different ways. Her mother was nice, if a little passive. Her father was certainly a - piece of work, wasn't he? I didn't like Joe either, but that was clearly the aim, and it was very well done.

Overall I liked this read, I thought it was interesting and thought provoking, and Mari is my new favourite character.

This was so nuanced and thoughtful. I love YA romance but it felt refreshing to read a contemporary YA that was more about the heroine's journey than a romantic relationship. I heavily empathized with the heroine's slow realization of discovering her own political identity instead of blindly following her parents' ideology. Highly recommend.

I have only read one other Natasha Sylvester book before and I was hooked on the writing style. This one was a little different since it was YA, but it was amazingly well written and the characters were all so well developed. I could relate to Mari a lot. Mari has grown up believing that her father is a politician because he wants to help the American people. She has never questioned anything, not even the fact that she is forced into the spotlight due to her father's decisions. Mari has her own opinions and she is starting to ask more questions and the people around her (mainly her father) act condescending to her, as though she is someone to be humored, rather than someone to be respected As the only liberal in a family of conservatives, there have been MANY times where I have been condescended to and people in my family have treated me as though my opinions are ridiculous and as though I just don't know any better. Annoying.

In this book, Mari is struggling to find her voice and she is trying to reconcile that the father she thought of as a hero might not be such a hero to the American public like she thought he was. It's not easy when her father treats her like one of his constituents instead of his daughter. Her father drove me crazy. I loved the growth and development of Mari. She doesn't want to hurt her father, but she soon learns that not taking a side or staying silent IS taking a side. I loved her friendship with Vivi and the way Vivi's issues helped Mari see what was going on with the people around her. The issues on this book were so timely, especially all the talk about climate change. I also loved that there was ZERO romance in this book. This is the story of a young girl finding her voice and learning to stand up for what she believes in, even if it is opposite of what her father believes. This was such an amazing story. Highly recommend!

Oh this book is so much a coming of age story about identity, family and heart all dressed up in one man’s campaign for president. I loved it. I love the fact that politics has become something we can talk about in Young adult fiction. I felt like this writer assumed I had prior knowledge of the electoral system and the political playground as a whole and I love it when I feel like an author doesn’t have to talk down to me. More politics in fiction please!

Mari was a great character to spend this book with because she is at that stage of life when she has her family loyalty and that is as strong as it has ever been but she also wants to be her own person and has her own ideals and values and sometimes those go against the family values. I loved watching her trying to overcome these struggles and find a balance at the same time as forming her own identity.

There is an awful lot about friendship in this book as well. Friendships where you wouldn’t think to find them and friendships weathering the test of time. We have all been through those times when actually a friendship isn’t what it used to be and it can be painful to acknowledge that or throw away your preconceived ideas about where your loyalties lie.

Identity is such a key theme in this book, racial ideaty, family identity and identity as a woman coming of age in today’s society, Throw into that mix some political identity and some gender identity and wow Mari has a lot on her plate. It was tough to read at times but overall this book has something for everyone and is definitely something I wish I had read when I was struggling with my own conflicting identities when I was her age!

Mariana Ruiz is the daughter of a prominent politician. Her father is in the running to be the GOP nominee for president, and he needs to win their home state of Florida. This is the story of the children of immigrants, of what it's like to be a teenage girl, and how it feels to starting becoming your own person. This book worked on so many levels, but I appreciated it mostly for how honestly the voice of Mari was presented. I never felt like I was reading a book where an adult was trying to sound like a teenager - Mari genuinely sounded/read like a teenager. She was perfectly flawed and growing through the entire course of the book. The struggles she went through may have been a little anomalous to a typical teenager (photo ops with your parents, letting the press film your bedroom), but there was enough every day life to resonate with young (and older!) readers.
I'm looking forward to digging into the audio version of this book when it's released a bit later this year, because there's so much Spanish in the text! I know I am butchering pronunciation in my head.
If you are a YA fan, a fan of immigration stories, or looking for a good read in general, please pick this up!

Running is about Mariana Ruiz, a fifteen year old Cuban American whose father is running for President. Mariana is uncomfortable with the spotlight involved in her father's campaign. As the primary election nears, Mariana begins to learn things about her father's political position that cause her to reevaluate who her father really is, and she has to make a choice between speaking up or staying silent.

I really enjoyed Running. It was easy sympathize with Mariana's desire for peace and quiet, and her need for just one thing that belonged to her and not her father's campaign. The book presented a pretty realistic view of how it's not just an individual who runs for President, or any political office, but that it's the whole family. I also sympathized with Mariana as she began to learn things about her dad that changed her opinion of him. Part of growing up is learning to see your parents without rose colored glasses and I thought the book handled this very well. I liked Mariana and seeing her find her voice.

i awoke to some tragic news thursday morning & amidst all of the commotion that immediately ensued i did the only thing ive ever known to do when i don’t know how to even begin to process my emotions, i read (&write). (so bear w/ me through this sea of emotions that spilled out as i read #RUNNING by Natalia Sylvester)

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i want to thank @nataliasylv & @netgalley for providing me with this eARC & for the much needed opportunity to be able to begin to decompress, process, & for the beautiful memories.

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when i saw this book cover a while back i remember thinking - Latinas, politics, & family drama - what could be more *me*? (& while yes, it does have all these things, i was blown away by the direction that she posited with these matters). picture your usual coming of age story w/ strong familial ties, now picture it honing in on the overall wellbeing & character development of Mari - our first born, (come on I know all my first born Latinx friends will understand the magnitude of what i’m implying by this) Latina daughter of a temperamental father that’s running for a seat in the oval office.

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i want to highlight what stood out to me the most & thats something that i don’t see done quite often as well as Natalia was able to excute it - & that is the fact that she truly gives the young characters she writes about a *voice*. i can’t tell you how empowering it felt to read about these kids learning to find their voices, learning to stand up for themselves, & learning what & to whom their willing to stand up against, no matter the outcome.

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as a young Latina woman, i know how daunting it can feel to have differing ideas, opinions, etc & how much harder it can be to voice said opinions in an environment that isn’t as receptive to change. reading this book felt like a lyrical power move against those systems used to oppress us. so while yes, this is a book about politics, in a more traditional sense, this is a book about discovering what you’re willing to fight for. & yes you NEED to preorder & read this book!!

Running tells the story of Mari Ruiz, a Cuban American whose father is running for president. As Mari joins in the fight for clean water, she realizes she may not always be on the same platform as her father. This is an excellent story about a teenager who learns to separate herself from her parents, and stand up for what she believes is right, even though it doesn't always align with her parents beliefs.

This is an excellent book for young adult and adult readers alike. It will open up many conversations about current affairs and about how to stand up for your beliefs.

Thank you to NetGalley, Clarion Books, and Natalia Sylvester for the digital advanced copy of Running in exchange for my honest review.

A great read that deals with complicated topics in a thoughtful yet emotionally true way. Great characters and an interesting plot that didn't devolve into a simple ending but had a great flow to it.

Marí's dad has been a politician for maybe half of her 15 years, and now the Republican senator from (or congressmember? I forget) is running for president. Marí has taken her dad's political life and goodness for granted all these years, and her seven-year-old brother Ricky (yep, Cubans with a kid named Ricky--they love I Love Lucy) is gaga for their father and loves publicly supporting him. Marí, on the other hand, is about done with invasions of her privacy, having her social media curated, and having everyone at school know her business.

All that was bad enough...until she started to really see her father's politics and their consequences.

Sounds good, right? But the rendering was merely good, or maybe reading the book under quarantine my head wasn't in the best space for it.

This is the YA I want my little sister and nieces to read. The YA I wish I would have had when I was younger. We follow so much character development with a girl who has been coached by her father to support his dreams at the cost of her own mind. Seeing Mariana find her voice and fight for a cause she truly believes in was so inspiring. Definitely read this and come to make Mari your friend and your inspiration.

I really enjoyed this story of a girl waking up to politics through the lens of figuring out that she and her father (who is running for president) do not believe the same things. It did a masterful job of weaving together the common teen experience of separating yourself from your parents and their beliefs with the heightened experience Mari has with her dad running for president.

The side characters, Jackie, Didier, and Crissy were great as were Gloria and Amarys. Highly recommend especially for teens feels the desire to be more politically active as they reach voting age.

This was a really great read! I really enjoyed reading this book, would definitely recommend. This is a good book for all ages.

I think books featuring diverse characters, politics, or activism are so important for young readers. So many of my students think that they shouldn't care because they aren't old enough to vote or make a difference; this is a great story to encourage those young voices still. Highly recommend.

I really enjoyed the dialogues and especially the translations in this book. Some slang just can’t be translated. 🙂 In many ways this dichotomy was reflected in families not communicating and how in politics what is said isn’t exactly what is meant. The author made the characters and situations very real and honest. I appreciated not wrapping the book up in a neat bow. Life is messy. Politics is messy. Families are messy.
The second story line centers around the environment. How all of our actions have consequences in the environment. It really makes you think.

A wonderful story of activism, finding your voice, and using it to make a change. YA as a genre needs more books like this, powerful books that readers will love.

Running is an incredible story that showcases many of the themes which will draw in YA readers: friendship, finding your voice, family, and political activism. Particularly in an election year, this book will be incredibly important for students looking for ways to get involved in decision making. Natalia Sylvester presents a real and nuanced main character whose family and experiences never fall into caricature. Highly recommend this great book.