What’s the book about?
From the former prime minister of New Zealand comes a guide for teens on chasing your dreams and embracing the unexpected qualities that truly make a person strong.
When Jacinda Ardern became prime minister of New Zealand, she was one of the youngest people in the world leading 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.
While sharing her own experiences and challenges as a young person, and then as prime minister, Jacinda Ardern encourages readers to realise that true strength, success, and power come from embracing ourselves just as we are – imposter syndrome and all.
Recommended for: Ages 12+
Three reasons to read it:
- Jacinda Ardern is one of the most remarkable leaders of our time, and What If You Could gives readers something rare — a genuinely honest look at what it felt like to be her before she became famous. She writes about her self-doubt, her tendency to overthink, her worry that she wasn’t the right person for the job. For any young person who has ever felt like they weren’t quite enough, there is something deeply reassuring about discovering that one of the most admired world leaders felt exactly the same way. This isn’t a book about how to be perfect. It’s a book about how to keep going anyway.
- The book completely reframes what it means to be strong. Ardern argues that the qualities we’re often told to hide or overcome are actually the ones that matter most. Empathy. Kindness. The willingness to listen. The ability to admit when you’re uncertain. For teenagers navigating a world that often rewards loudness and confidence above all else, this is a genuinely countercultural message, and Ardern delivers it without preaching. She just tells her own story, and lets readers draw their own conclusions.
- What If You Could is the kind of book that makes you want to think bigger about your own life. Ardern writes about her journey from a small town in New Zealand to leading a country through crises – a terrorist attack, a pandemic, the daily pressures of public life – and through it all she remained recognisably herself. That’s the heart of the book’s message: you don’t have to become someone else to achieve something extraordinary. You just have to back the version of yourself that already exists. For any young person standing at the beginning of their story, that is a powerful and genuinely exciting idea.
Buy a copy of What If You Could by Jacinda Ardern here.
About the author:
Jacinda Ardern was elected prime minister of New Zealand in 2017 at the age of thirty-seven and became the country’s youngest prime minister in more than 150 years.
In 2018, she gave birth to her daughter, Neve, and became the first leader of a country in thirty years to give birth while in office.
In 2023, she was awarded the accolade Dame Grand Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit. She now spends her time writing, speaking, learning, and being a mum.
You can follow Jacinda Ardern
on Instagram and X @JacindaArdern
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