Rules For Being A Girl

From Katie Cotugno and author of Sex and the City Candace Bushnell comes this fierce and feisty exploration of feminism: standing up, speaking out and rewriting the rules.

Don't be easy. Don't give it up. Don't be a prude. Don't be cold. Don't put him in the friendzone. Don't act desperate. Don't let things go too far. Don't give him the wrong idea. Don't blame him for trying. Don't walk alone at night. But calm down! Don't worry so much. Smile!

Marin is a smart, driven, popular girl – she's headed for Brown when she graduates and has a brilliant career as a journalist ahead of her. Especially in the eyes of English teacher Mr Beckett. He spends a lot of time around Marin, and she thinks it's harmless . . . until he kisses her.

No one believes Marin when she tells them what happened, so she does the only thing she can: she writes an article called 'Rules for Being a Girl' for the school paper to point out the misogyny and sexism that girls face every day. As things heat up at school and in her personal life, Marin must figure out how to take back the power and rewrite her own rules.

Candace Bushnell is the critically acclaimed, international bestselling author of numerous books, including Is There Still Sex in the City, Sex and the City, Summer and the City, The Carrie Diaries, One Fifth Avenue, Lipstick Jungle, Trading Up, Killing Monica and Four Blondes. Is There Still Sex in the City is currently in development as a TV series with Paramount.

Katie Cotugn is the New York Times-bestselling author of messy, complicated, feminist love stories. She studied Writing, Literature and Publishing at Emerson College and received her MFA in Fiction at Lesley University. Katie is a Pushcart Prize nominee whose work has appeared in The Iowa Review, The Mississippi Review, and Argestes, among others.

Rules For Being A Girl
Macmillan
Authors: Candace Bushnell and Katie Cotugno
ISBN: 9781529036084
RRP: $16.99

 

Interview with Katie Cotugno

Question: What inspired the story of Rules For Being A Girl?

Katie Cotugno: Candace and I figured out pretty quickly once we started brainstorming together that we wanted to work on a project inspired by all the brave women of the #metoo movement. We were both really interested in how easy it is for lines to be blurred and how confusing these kinds of situations can be when you're in the thick of them. Once we came up with Bex-this really cute, hip, charismatic teacher who everyone loves-the rest of the story just sort of fell into place.


Question: What was it like working with Candace Bushnell on Rules For Being A Girl?

Katie Cotugno: It was a dream come true to work with a legend like Candace! We hashed out the storyline first and passed the manuscript back and forth, with both of us taking turns writing and editing each other's work. She's such an incredible writer, and has such a keen eye for human behavior-collaborating with her was definitely a master class in voice.


Question: Do you remember your own feminist awakening?

Katie Cotugno: I was raised by a tough-as-nails mom in a very feminist household, so I've identified as a feminist since I was very young. But as I've gotten older and read more widely my understanding of what it means to be a feminist has changed, especially in regards to intersectionality and the ways in which women of color have often been left out or ignored by the mainstream white feminist movement.


Question: There are several issues raised in this book. Was this deliberate or did the story evolve this way?

Katie Cotugno: Feminism is definitely a recurring theme in both my work and Candace's, and we knew we wanted to write something timely, but I think I speak for both of us when I say we didn't set out to write an "issues book" necessarily-we just kind of followed these characters and this story where they wanted to take us.


Question: What's next, for you?

Katie Cotugno: I actually have another book out in June! You Say It First is a messy, complicated feminist love story about a pair of strangers with nothing in common: Meg, a Type-A overachiever who phonebanks at a voter registration call center in her Philadelphia suburb, and Colby, who's stuck in a rut in small town Ohio, reeling from a family tragedy and working a dead-end job"unsure what his future holds, or if he even cares. They get under each other's skin from the moment they first start talking, and-across state lines and phone lines-form a once-in-a-lifetime connection. But in the end, are they just too different to make it work?


Interview by Brooke Hunter

Rules For Being A Girl 

Macmillan
Authors: Candace Bushnell and Katie Cotugno 
ISBN: 9781529036084
RRP: $16.99