The Mockingbirds by Daisy Whitney

The Mockingbirds are a not-so secret society at Themis Academy. When the administration won’t step in because Nothing bad could ever happen at Themis, the Mockingbirds will. They are a group that believes wrong doing should be punished. Alex’s sister Casey started the Mockingbirds after a Themis student committed suicide her senior year. Casey wanted to prevent something like that from ever happening again. The Mockingbirds, named after Harper Lee’s classic novel To Kill a Mockingbird, hears cases brought before them and decides whether or not to try people in a mock court with lasting punishments.

Now a junior at Themis, Alex knows about the Mockingbirds, every student at Themis does, but she doesn’t know how they work or really what they can do. She like others knows the Mockingbirds have had a hand at campus judgment, but that’s all. She never expects to need the Mockingbirds services, even though her sister warned and encouraged her to seek out the Mockingbirds if anything were to happen, before she started Themis.

That all changes one day when Alex wakes up naked to a boy she doesn’t know, with no memories of what happened the night before. As she starts to get dressed to leave before he can wake up, she remembers his name—Carter, but nothing else. She remembers going to a concert with her Friday night privileges, but not how she got to Carter’s room. As she leans over, she glances into the trashcan and sees the evidence of what occurred the night before—2 condom wrappers split down the middle. Alex realizes she had sex the night before, but doesn’t remember saying yes.

Leaving Carter’s room she walks the long way back to her dorm, hoping to not be detected, hoping she can get back to her room before anyone notices her “walk of shame”. Once in her room, she is confronted by her roommate, T.S. who realizes there is more to what Alex remembers. T.S. calls Casey and from there they encourage Alex to seek out the Mockingbirds. It’s Casey who puts a name to what happened to Alex the night before with a simple sentence. . . “All that matters is that you said yes. Did you say yes?” When Alex can’t answer her sister, Casey simply says, “It sounds like you were raped.”

Piecing information together, Alex enlists the help of the Mockingbirds to help her bring Carter to some sort of justice. Even though she refuses to go to the police, she wants to reclaim her life and the Mockingbirds will help her. The question is, will Alex be able to let them help her and will she be able to accept the results of what happens next??
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This novel is the book that is bringing me out of my hiatus as a blogger. It has been a very long time since I have found a book so gripping that I couldn’t put it down. Not since Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer. For Daisy Whitney’s first book, she did an AMAZING job.

I found myself curled up in my chair itching to know what was going to happen next for Alex, would Carter be brought to justice, would she ever be able to piece together all the information to find out what happened to her and WHY ON EARTH were the adults so clueless as to what was going on at Themis Academy. I really like how the Mockingbirds work in the school. I love the whole sort-of secret society aspect and I was pleased to find at least one adult finally coming forward to help the students of the school.

I must say I am eagerly awaiting another novel by Daisy Whitney.