"Come on, why don't you show me that pretty smile?"

If you had to think about the society of today (2023) how would you see the way women are treated and viewed in public? A world screaming for equality when the world still exists in such a feral state towards women. To have to navigate as men prowl the streets like wolves viewing women as the sheep they desire to prey upon. Adult men prowling the outer fences of a high school, wolves salivating late at night as women walk to their cars in parking garages. What does it say that to this day women still have to live their lives with the sense that the wolves that hunt them could be around every corner.

“Such a Pretty Smile” by Kristi DeMeester is a book that follows Caroline and her daughter Lila starting in 2019 and jumping back and forth between Caroline’s early 20s in 2004 and the events that take place that have followed Caroline into motherhood. The themes range from adolescence and navigating intimate emotions, sexuality, puberty, mental illness, while also touching on the experience of navigating a world where it is expected for women to cater to men, their egos, and their desires. A patriarchal society constantly at odds with a movement fighting for racial and gender equality, the likes that reveal the wolves of men among us. Kristi DeMeester wonderfully crafts characters that feel grounded to reality, the character of Lila having a crush on her best friend Macie, the dialogue for them feeling like real conversations between teens.

In 2019 Caroline seems to be hiding something that happened in her past from Lila which raises the question of, “In the attempt as a parent to keep your child safe are you actually doing harm?” As children we often view our parents from a very focused lens, and hope to believe that what they keep from us is for our betterment. But in the discussion of mental health is it better to keep that history hidden or to be upfront regarding it? Keeping the bad parts of the world from your children isn’t always as helpful as it may feel so to protect children would it be best to figure out how to appropriately navigate sensitive and uncomfortable topics in a way that informs them, but without traumatizing them? Each theme is given time to breathe and be presented to us in such a way that doesn’t feel like a direct slap across the face, but perfectly woven throughout the dialogue and events in the book.

During the jump back to 2004, Caroline is living with their fiance Daniel who works in an art gallery, but with Caroline being such a known name in the art community of New Orleans it raised the question...why is Daniel the one with a job at an art gallery while Caroline is presented to be a talented artist not being given the same or better opportunity? In the art world being a man is already seen as a step up and this book does explore the idea of how women have to work often twice as hard as men just to be recognized while men can have a blanket of mediocrity, but still be presented with opportunities to succeed.

“Such a Pretty Smile” was a fantastically paced book, the time jump between 2004 and 2019 felt so smooth and every switch felt perfectly placed. This is honestly one of the best paced books I’ve ever read, and while it felt fast paced, it was a slow burn at the same tie with such an amazing payoff. The way the themes of misogyny, mental health, and trauma were all interwoven throughout the story really shows that Kristi DeMeester is a master of her craft. Despite exploring the nature of women and the effects of angry, ego driven men, it also provided us with a strong, independent, and steadfast view of women with how despite hardship Caroline also continues to push forward and persevere in opposition to that. A story that is a horrifying representation of the reality of a patriarchal society, but also a showcase of the fierce opposition to the idea that women should lessen themselves for the ego of men. Little do they know the “Pretty smile” is held up by a shield…and a sword.