To Best The Boys Review

Don a disguise.

Survive the labyrinth.

Best the boys.

In a thrilling new fantasy from the bestselling author of the Storm Siren Trilogy, one girl makes a stand against society and enters a world made exclusively for boys.

Every year for the past fifty-four years, the residents of Pinsbury Port have received a mysterious letter inviting all eligible-aged boys to compete for an esteemed scholarship to the all-male Stemwick University. The poorer residents look to see if their names are on the list. The wealthier look to see how likely their sons are to survive. And Rhen Tellur opens it to see if she can derive which substances the ink and parchment are created from, using her father’s microscope.

In the province of Caldon, where women train in wifely duties and men pursue collegiate education, sixteen-year-old Rhen Tellur wants nothing more than to become a scientist. As the poor of her seaside town fall prey to a deadly disease, she and her father work desperately to find a cure. But when her mum succumbs to it as well? Rhen decides to take the future into her own hands—through the annual all-male scholarship competition.

With her cousin, Seleni, by her side, the girls don disguises and enter Mr. Holm’s labyrinth, to best the boys and claim the scholarship prize. Except not everyone is ready for a girl who doesn’t know her place. And not everyone survives the deadly maze.

Welcome to the labyrinth.

To Best the Boys by Mary Weber is a fantastical young adult book. It feature spunky characters and an interesting premise. What I really appreciated about how the author told this story is how both all types of women were validated. I hate when a book is supposed to be empowering young females to be whatever they want yet puts down the character who, like Seleni, just really want to be a wife in mother. Both cousins wanted different things yet they supported one another. Also I really enjoyed the puzzles in the labyrinth. All in all I think To Best the Boys is a great novel for young women (and men) to read. 

5 out of 5. 

I received a copy of this book from BookLook in exchange for my honest review.