I love Susannah Simon as a character so much
I love that no matter how abrasive and “tough” she is, she’s also so GIRLY POP. You know that interview with Kristen Stewart about faux girl power and how often when people write a female protagonist they actually just write a male protagonist and give her a girl name and it’s so frustrating because they didn’t actually do any work to make the character have depth so being female doesn’t add anything and ends up making her kind of boring? Yeah, the mediator does NOT have that problem.
One of my favorite things about the first book is when she first meets and touches Jesse (grabbing the finger he angrily points at her face and threatening to break it) and he says, “what kind of…girl are you?” and she gets so offended! As she should! She’s like, “hey, you don’t get to call my gender identity into question just because I threatened you with violence” and she goes through all the things that she identifies with being a girl. Not a single thought of being “not like other girls”, not a single stray despair at being a girl instead of a Big Strong Boy TM, and nowhere in the entire series does she disparage the interests or feelings of other girls.
And there are so many different kinds of girls and women!! Suze with her leather jacket and batgirl boots and also her affinity for high fashion and designer clothes and accessories, Gina with her raw sex appeal and blazing self confidence, CeeCee with her intelligence and lack of interest in her looks but still an interest in boys, Kelly and Debbie as shallow and silly but still being shown as sympathetic, Heather as a silly and shallow girl with a legitimate mental illness that is shown as valid and Suze doesn’t let people disparage it, Helen Simon-Ackerman as this successful news lady who is also so soft and motherly, even sister Ernestine!!
And also, as confident as Suze is in some of her abilities, she’s also so clearly an insecure teenage girl!! She wonders why boys never liked her while also assuring the reader that clearly it can’t be because she’s ugly because Suze has a high opinion of her looks. And she lets herself be wooed by boys she doesn’t like simply because it feels validating!! What a common phenomenon! I would have and have done the same! I’m pretty sure that as she’s kissing tad (before Jesse interrupts them lol) she’s like “ew why does he dress like he’s from New Jersey, and also there’s clearly nothing behind his eyes” but also “wow he’s such a good kisser, I can’t believe I’m being kissed by a hot guy!!” And I LOVE that dichotomy so much.
I will always love Meg Cabot for creating such a kindred spirit to so many girls in Suze Simon.












