What If You Could? by Jacinda Ardern

When Jacinda Ardern became the prime minister of New Zealand, she was one of the youngest people in the world to lead a country. Many people thought she would never succeed — herself included. Wouldn’t her insecurity, overthinking, worrying, and tendency to empathise stop her from being able to achieve her goals?

As she soon learned, though, it was exactly those attributes — as well as kindness and wanting to listen to and serve others — that made her into the empathetic, adaptable, and effective leader that she was.

This book has been adapted for young adults by Ruby Shamir from Ardern's memoir A Different Kind of Power.

Ardern herself has said that when she wrote her memoir, she wanted to create something meaningful for her fourteen-year-old self. This book fits the bill.

Shamir has taken the memoir, cutting and rearranging it into a guide for teens on chasing their dreams and embracing all their qualities. Each chapter poses a question: What if you could be sensitive? What if you could listen? What if it's okay not to have all the answers? - and backs each up with Ardern's experiences.

A lot of the deeper detail from the memoir is gone, and there are large parts of events during her prime ministership that aren't mentioned or lightly skipped over. However, Shamir has done a nice job smoothing out some of the potential clunkier transitions. 

She also rephrases parts of the memoir, ensuring that concepts that younger readers may not have a good grasp of are explained in an age-appropriate way.  A new epilogue rounds the book out. It is a shame photographs aren't included like the memoir, although again, it isn't a memoir.

This is the type of book I would have loved as a teenager, and a lot of teens will recognise themselves within Ardern's experiences and words. 

What If You Could will inspire our younger generation to embrace themselves, quirks and all, and encourage them to turn their 'coulds' into 'cans'.

Reviewer: Rebekah Lyell

Penguin Books