This book was very cool - and I mean that unironically. I wanted to be friends with these girls, though I'm pretty sure I'm not nearly cool enough. Although it was really different from Moxie, it still had the same banter and characters that make Mathieu a wonderful writer. Definitely recommend.

I love anything associated with The Outsiders so I’ve been waiting for a book like this one for a long time.
Before I start, let me say that no one will ever replace Dallas Winston, but Connie Treadway is a great girl version. The book is not so much a "remake" of The Outsiders but instead holds its own with strong well-developed characters. I found this book to leave me angry, hopeful, and satisfied all at once. I could see this becoming a must-read for classrooms and home with the fantastic groundwork for some important discussions. I really loved reading this one. Bad Girls Never is about female friendships against societal expectations and it’s just really good; entertaining, sentimental, and meaningful. Give it a read.

I’m a sucker for the Outiders so I should obviously love this retelling. Shocking to no one: I love it! I will say this book is slow paced. We come out guns blazing, then there’s a long lull til the end. As someone who loves character building in stories, this was much appreciated. You truly get a sense of who the girls are and their sordid past. It truly is a Feminist Outsiders story. The marketing is perfection. The gang of girls? Amazing. The stories of their lives? Heartbreaking. The ability to band together and show your loyalty to those you love? Inspiring. I can’t wait to share this book with my students!

Two things made me know I wanted to read this book - the first being it was written by Moxie author Jennifer Mathieu, and the second being that it was billed as a gender-flipped reimagining of The Outsiders. The Outsiders was the first novel I bought myself as a seventh grader (and I still have it), so I was very interested in seeing what Mathieu did with it.

Our "Ponyboy" is Evie Barnes, a fifteen-year-old bad girl with bad girl friends, Connie, Sunny, and Juanita. Evie lives with her mother and grandmother and has an older sister, Cheryl, who "had" to get married and now lives with her military husband in base housing. One night at the drive-in, Evie makes the mistake of going to the bathroom alone, where she is attacked by a boy from the "right side of the tracks." Evie passes out, and when she awakens, she is met by Diane Farris, a former River Oaks girl who now attends Eastside High. Diane is covered in blood and confesses she has killed the boy attacking Evie, but that she just meant to scare him.

Over the course of the book, it is easy to spot characters inspired by S.E. Hinton - Betty, a former friend of Diane serving as the Cherry Valance, Connie, whose parents don't notice she or her brother are alive except when beating them, reminiscent of Johnny Cade. Diane herself seems a combination of Dallas and Johnny. But the relationships between the girls is all-original. Taking place in Houston in 1964, Mathieu paints a world where girls don't have many options and where there's a fine line between a good girl and a bad one.

I cried when the book ended, which tells me Mathieu created such a real world for her bad girls that I was sucked in completely. If you're a fan of The Outsiders, you will love this book. (You might love it even if you're not a fan.) Fabulous story, well-defined characters, and a breath of fresh historical fiction air for a modern society.

I enjoyed this twist on the Outsiders. Told from the girls point of view, it was an interesting timeline of the early 60s. Evie goes through a loss of her sister who moved away and a friend. She also shows the difficulty of growing up a woman at this time. She is torn between pleasing her mom and becoming a more independent woman.

Thanks to net galley for this ARC.

A quick read on what it meant to be labeled a "bad" or "good" girl who is coming of age in the 1960s. The author weaves in elements similar to those in 'The Outsiders' and while predictable it was still an interesting read.

Enjoyable but somewhat predictable read. This book focused on the girls friendship and how far they would go to protect each other. The story sometimes dragged along for me but I did end up enjoying this one!

Was excited to read this book because it was being marketed as a gender swap retelling of The Outsiders however I was disappointed that didn't turn out to be true. The being on the brink of the feminist movement and relationship between the tea-sippers and those from the east side felt a little forced.

💭 Overall Thoughts: While not something I’d typically read, I enjoyed the story of friendship and unity. The book blends girls from the wrong side of the tracks with a sweet girl who seemingly has everything going for her. The bonds of friendship are tested and we find out people aren’t always who we judge them to be. This book reminds me of the movie Now and Then mixed with Grease… with a few additions. It’s a coming of age story with a twist. Definitely check the trigger warnings before reading if you are sensitive to certain topics.

Follows a group of "bad girls" around Houston, Texas during the 60s. The "bad girls" stick together and look out for each other. A "good girl" from the other side of the tracks is causing trouble and loyalties will be called into question. Mystery, suspense, & intrigue. Pegged as the feminist/female version of The Outsiders. Unpopular Opinion: I thought The Outsiders was just 'OK.' This is the first title I've read by the author but I'm planning on checking out her book - Moxie - because it is being developed into a movie by Amy Poehler for Netflix

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TAGS: fiction, historical fiction, young adult, ya, coming of age, romance, suspense, mystery, thriller, romantic suspense, feminism

*Thanks to NetGalley, Macmillan's Roaring Brook Press & Jennifer Mathieu for providing a free eARC in exchange for my honest review #BadGirlsNeverSayDie #NetGalley @NetGalley #RoaringBookPress #MacKidsBooks @mackidsbooks #AuthorJenMathieu #JenniferMathieu #JenMathieu @jenmathieu @authorjenmathieu

I will say that I appreciate the goal with this book and the attempt that Mathieu makes with her character development and the homage that she so clearly shows to The Outsiders. Is Bad Girls Never Say Die as good as The Outsiders? Nope. Is it a worthy attempt at recreating the storyline but with girls instead of boys? I believe so.

The issues are similar and the bigger issues of sexual assault, protecting yourself, protecting each other, and being a strong woman for yourself and others is not lost on me or any reader, I would venture a guess.

I will say that the pacing of the novel is a little slow for me, not in a bad way, just in a way where I found myself wanting the story to progress in a faster way. There was a little too much build time for each character and a lot of sitting around waiting for things to happen (the characters, not me).

I love Evie though and I think that she is a remarkable version of PonyBoy. I think that the connections made between the characters and the whole "not judging a book by its cover" analogy of making friends is the real magic of this book.

I recommend this book for people who are fans of The Outsider or any underdog story. You will root for the "bad girls" to win and to find themselves.

This was such an amazing story! I got sucked in right away and ended up finishing the whole book in one day. Evie was a great protagonist, and I felt like I was torn in wanting her to straighten up and keep to her independent ways. Diane was also very dynamic and by the end I was so invested in her story. I loved the 1960's Houston setting, and the author did a great job setting the scene. I would recommend this to anyone, but especially Outsiders fans!

This book was kind of disappointing for me. I had high expectations considering Moxie is one of my favorite books, but I was let down. I was excited about this 70s feminism type of thing but it just seemed boring and I didn’t find anything I liked about Moxie here. I liked the concept though, it seemed really interesting and I’m still looking forward to reading more of Jennifer Mathieu’s books in the future.

I really enjoyed this book. It was well paced and the characters were fully formed. I would enjoy reading other work by this author in the future.

Life for a teenage girl who just wants to be herself without social stigmas is hard enough, let alone in 1964 Texas. Reminiscent of The Outsiders, with its own twist of feminism and girl power, Mathieu delivers a powerful punch to those who try to put women in an outdated domestic category. Themes of friendship, forbidden love, freedom and prejudices are threaded throughout this book that I didn’t want to end.

A really excellent and compelling re-working of The Outsiders that truly evokes the feeling of 1960's Houston, with great feminist themes.

Bad Girls Never Say Die, by Jennifer Mathieu, is a gender-swapped reimagining of The Outsiders, but it doesn’t actually rely on readers knowing the inspiration very well. (Which is good, because my main memory of reading The Outsiders in high school was vague confusion that while any real screwup meant we’d fail out of high school, never go to college, never get a decent job and be completely worthless, at the same time, fictional tuffs were high art about Life and Truth.) This book can be read by itself perfectly well.

The story is set in the 60s in Texas, but a lot of the book is about what it means to be considered a bad girl, which is part of every generation. This is part of what made The Truth About Alice so compelling. Being a “bad girl” here can mean anything from drinking to shoplifting to dating the wrong boy to wearing too much eyeliner.

Evie knows that as a bad girl, from a single-parent home, in the poor section of town, she is automatically in the wrong in all situations. Whenever the rich kids come over and start fights, it’s the local kids who get in trouble. Plus, aren’t girls always in the wrong when it comes to leading a boy on, being a tease, being a slut, or basically anything about sexuality?

When Evie is assaulted by a rich boy, a girl from a wealthy family stops him, accidentally killing the attacker in the process. The girls know that no one will believe their story of self- defense against a would-be rapist. (Evie already knows that the tuffs are blamed for everything, but even rich girls like Diane from upperclass families know about sluts and asking for it and ruining a nice boy’s life.) This new friendship begins with secrets, but quickly becomes the most important relationship in Evie’s life.

At first, I found the tea drinkers/tuffs split a bit too heavy, but there’s enough nuance and complexity in the relationships that the story worked. Complicated teenage friendships are at the heart of this story. Teen girl emotions aren’t mocked or minimized here. It’s simply hard to be a young girl, and any other challenges, like growing up in a poor family, having controlling parents, or facing stereotypes, can be layered on top of that. But as this novel shows, even pretty, wealthy girls have intense struggles, and the story honors those struggles.

Unfortunately, I remembered enough of my high-school reading of The Outsiders to see where the story was heading. But isn’t that often the case in a tragedy? You can see it’s coming, you know it’s going to be awful, and you still hope maybe you’re wrong. I knew it was going to be a tragic ending, I was just reading to see how it got there and how Evie would cope with it. Again, teenage emotions are honored and taken seriously.

Bad Girls Never Say Die, a feminist reimagining of S.E. Hinton's The Outsiders set in 1964 Houston, introduces "bad girl" Evie, who is a member of an Eastside High gang of economically disadvantaged white and Mexican girls, and Diane, a "good girl" who has been banished from her affluent community of River Oaks because of her involvement with a guy from Evie's neighborhood. When Evie is assaulted by Preston, a drunk boy from River Oaks, Diane inadvertently kills Preston while trying to rescue Evie. Through the shared trauma, Diane and Evie become friends and begin to confide in each other and Evie wonders about the difference between good girls and bad girls. As the police close in, Evie's gang tries to protect Diane, but when her lover is arrested for the murder, Diane insists on saving him. Melodramatic plot twists and engaging dialogue make for a thrilling read, as the story of star-crossed lovers and strong female friendships unfolds. Teachers might want to pair it with Hinton's book for a compare and contrast discussion.

Loved the atmosphere and era this one is set in. Brings up the vibe of the ride or die friends - or maybe it’s ride or murder? Either way - bad girls or not, I know who my friends would be.

2.5 stars

A gender-swapped retelling of the 60s runaway classic The Outsiders, Bad Girls Never Say Die had a lot going for it in the beginning. I love books that have a girl gang dealing with and fighting patriarchal ideals and it seemed like that was what we were going to get.

However, after the first, explosive conflict, the book shifted into a narrative that felt repetitive, one-dimensional, and underdeveloped. Mathieu gives such a great set-up for the main conflict that is never fully realized because the stakes never feel like they are that high. So many important things seemed to be occurring outside of what was being narrated and it made the book feel incomplete.

I might have been able to overlook the fact that the plot didn't completely land if the character development had been spot-on. Alas, it was not to be. Evie's perspective never really landed for me and I feel like Mathieu really missed an opportunity to deepen her narrative voice. Every member of the girl gang seemed to be defined by a single trait and even Diane, the character whose embrace of "being bad" is supposed to transform them, never manages to break free from the character confines in which she is placed. In the end, the characters are like the plot: one-dimensional and underdeveloped.

I definitely think that this book could have been a hit for me, considering the subject matter. However, the execution of the material was just not for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and Roaring Brook Press for an ARC of this book in exchange for a fair and honest review!