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3.54 AVERAGE
3.54 AVERAGE
two dragons
To read the full review go to https://www.literarydragonreviews.website/2019/04/14/13-little-blue-envelopes-by-maureen-johnson/
Disclaimer: this book is very hard to review without spoilers because it has so many issues. I have done my best to note all spoilers within the review, but this is my forewarning just in case.
There are some huge issues with 13 Little Blue Envelopes that can be ignored if you read it as surrealist fiction: close to reality but so very far away. The two numbered paragraphs below cover the main issues of this if it is realistic fiction.
1) Let’s begin with “what the f*ck were her parents thinking?” They let a sixteen or seventeen-year-old hop on a plane to a different country, specifically, one of the most dangerous cities in that new country, with absolutely no way to contact them besides snail mail and no money based entirely on the whim of a woman who had something seriously wrong with her brain (like hallucinations and delusions).
2) *Sort of spoiler, though the author makes it pretty obvious what’s going to happen* Ginny’s sort of boyfriend, Keith, just shows up in Paris. She calls him and mentions what hotel she’s in and he manages to travel from London to Paris in just a few hours without spending money because some people saw his (awful) play and decided to buy him and his crew a ticket to Paris. Riiiiiiight, because that kind of thing happens to me all the time. Also, this is pretty stalkerish I mean Ginny just says what hotel she’s at (in another country!) and he’s like sure thing I’ll surprise you by showing up in a few hours without asking if you even want me there. WTF? **end of spoiler**
The kiss that Keith throws at her is super awkward and gross. Ginny doesn’t even describe it as romantic she says it’s sort of a friendly challenge or something. Eww. Don’t put your lips on someone unless you’re interested. She writes in letters that she’s in love with him, but then doesn’t feel anything when he kisses her, puts his arm around her, or talks to her. He kind of just exists so that Ginny can feel grateful that a boy is looking at her. I really hate Keith. When he does something stupid and Ginny calls him on it he flips out. He acts like a child and a creeper adult. Definitely not good book boyfriend material.
To read the full review go to https://www.literarydragonreviews.website/2019/04/14/13-little-blue-envelopes-by-maureen-johnson/
Disclaimer: this book is very hard to review without spoilers because it has so many issues. I have done my best to note all spoilers within the review, but this is my forewarning just in case.
There are some huge issues with 13 Little Blue Envelopes that can be ignored if you read it as surrealist fiction: close to reality but so very far away. The two numbered paragraphs below cover the main issues of this if it is realistic fiction.
1) Let’s begin with “what the f*ck were her parents thinking?” They let a sixteen or seventeen-year-old hop on a plane to a different country, specifically, one of the most dangerous cities in that new country, with absolutely no way to contact them besides snail mail and no money based entirely on the whim of a woman who had something seriously wrong with her brain (like hallucinations and delusions).
2) *Sort of spoiler, though the author makes it pretty obvious what’s going to happen* Ginny’s sort of boyfriend, Keith, just shows up in Paris. She calls him and mentions what hotel she’s in and he manages to travel from London to Paris in just a few hours without spending money because some people saw his (awful) play and decided to buy him and his crew a ticket to Paris. Riiiiiiight, because that kind of thing happens to me all the time. Also, this is pretty stalkerish I mean Ginny just says what hotel she’s at (in another country!) and he’s like sure thing I’ll surprise you by showing up in a few hours without asking if you even want me there. WTF? **end of spoiler**
The kiss that Keith throws at her is super awkward and gross. Ginny doesn’t even describe it as romantic she says it’s sort of a friendly challenge or something. Eww. Don’t put your lips on someone unless you’re interested. She writes in letters that she’s in love with him, but then doesn’t feel anything when he kisses her, puts his arm around her, or talks to her. He kind of just exists so that Ginny can feel grateful that a boy is looking at her. I really hate Keith. When he does something stupid and Ginny calls him on it he flips out. He acts like a child and a creeper adult. Definitely not good book boyfriend material.
Okay! I’ve certainly got some time to kill, so allow me to rant about the book that epitomizes all of the problems that come with Missing Parent Syndrome in YA novels.
The premise: Ginny is your average teenage girl. She’s fairly well-behaved, her parents adore her, and she attempts to fly under the radar (“something that was more or less impossible with thirty pounds of purple-and-green backpack hanging from her back”). Did I mention the backpack? This backpack is mentioned a plethora of times throughout the novel. I kept waiting for something to happen with the backpack, to no avail. Yep, Ginny just enjoys complaining about how she WEIGHED THE BACKPACK AND IT WAS THIRTY POUNDS. Why, Ginny? Is it symbolic? Representative, perhaps, of the great burden you are taking on in discovering your aunt’s legacy? Hmm. I feel like you just enjoy complaining, but okay.
Anyway. Basically, Ginny flits around Europe with an assortment of letters from her aunt, each providing some sort of challenge that will inevitably end up in some sort of mini-catastrophe and/or life lesson. Including, “ask out a stranger in Rome!” What could go wrong?
This brings me to my next point. Where, pray tell, are Ginny’s parents in this whole fiasco??? We never get to meet them. There is no talk of them disapproving of Ginny’s (frankly disastrous) adventure. Perhaps if they were characterized as whimsical and spontaneous, like Aunt Peg, I could see them sending Ginny off with a pat on the hand and a smile. But the supposedly dependable, reliable parents who would like nothing more than for their daughter to settle down and get a steady career? I...am having a tough time believing that they just waved her off to go about Europe with no cell phone, no map, and zero resources to search for her missing aunt.
Then Ginny finds a guy. Of course she does. And their relationship is...meh. Do I ship it? Not to an overwhelming degree. But since I don’t have any serious qualms in this area, I’ll leave it at that.
So we’re not off to a great start. But here, my dearest readers, is what made this book so infuriating, so ridiculous, so absurd: the ending. I am not entirely sure how to format a spoiler, so I’m just going to do a bit of caps-lock screaming:
*SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER IN WHICH I REVEAL THE ENTIRE (ANTICLIMACTIC, VAGUELY-PATHETIC) ENDING, DO NOT READ IF YOU DON’T ENJOY SPOILERS*
The last letter is stolen.
The whole reason I persisted to the end, that one last bit of hope that this book might be fulfilling and interesting—
Is gone.
BUT you can purchase the sequel and find out! :))))))
Words cannot describe how annoyed I was when I read the last page in disbelief. Whatever happened to having a story come full circle??? Just give us that last letter, let Ginny read her poor aunt’s last words to her, bam, we’re done.
Or even if the unsatisfying ending is intentional, if you’re going to say that the last envelope is missing to prove a point, that the journey was the end destination or whatever—then DON’T MAKE A SEQUEL. It’s that easy. I can understand saying, well, it’s better this way, we’ll never know what the last letter says, Peg’s mysterious legacy can live on, how glorious. But making a sequel completely undermines that point and feels like a cheap trick to get people to keep buying your books.
(I am refusing to read the sequel out of principle.)
Two stars because it was decently written, I liked Aunt Peg, concept of the letters was good.
But seriously. That was not a good ending.
The premise: Ginny is your average teenage girl. She’s fairly well-behaved, her parents adore her, and she attempts to fly under the radar (“something that was more or less impossible with thirty pounds of purple-and-green backpack hanging from her back”). Did I mention the backpack? This backpack is mentioned a plethora of times throughout the novel. I kept waiting for something to happen with the backpack, to no avail. Yep, Ginny just enjoys complaining about how she WEIGHED THE BACKPACK AND IT WAS THIRTY POUNDS. Why, Ginny? Is it symbolic? Representative, perhaps, of the great burden you are taking on in discovering your aunt’s legacy? Hmm. I feel like you just enjoy complaining, but okay.
Anyway. Basically, Ginny flits around Europe with an assortment of letters from her aunt, each providing some sort of challenge that will inevitably end up in some sort of mini-catastrophe and/or life lesson. Including, “ask out a stranger in Rome!” What could go wrong?
This brings me to my next point. Where, pray tell, are Ginny’s parents in this whole fiasco??? We never get to meet them. There is no talk of them disapproving of Ginny’s (frankly disastrous) adventure. Perhaps if they were characterized as whimsical and spontaneous, like Aunt Peg, I could see them sending Ginny off with a pat on the hand and a smile. But the supposedly dependable, reliable parents who would like nothing more than for their daughter to settle down and get a steady career? I...am having a tough time believing that they just waved her off to go about Europe with no cell phone, no map, and zero resources to search for her missing aunt.
Then Ginny finds a guy. Of course she does. And their relationship is...meh. Do I ship it? Not to an overwhelming degree. But since I don’t have any serious qualms in this area, I’ll leave it at that.
So we’re not off to a great start. But here, my dearest readers, is what made this book so infuriating, so ridiculous, so absurd: the ending. I am not entirely sure how to format a spoiler, so I’m just going to do a bit of caps-lock screaming:
*SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER IN WHICH I REVEAL THE ENTIRE (ANTICLIMACTIC, VAGUELY-PATHETIC) ENDING, DO NOT READ IF YOU DON’T ENJOY SPOILERS*
The last letter is stolen.
The whole reason I persisted to the end, that one last bit of hope that this book might be fulfilling and interesting—
Is gone.
BUT you can purchase the sequel and find out! :))))))
Words cannot describe how annoyed I was when I read the last page in disbelief. Whatever happened to having a story come full circle??? Just give us that last letter, let Ginny read her poor aunt’s last words to her, bam, we’re done.
Or even if the unsatisfying ending is intentional, if you’re going to say that the last envelope is missing to prove a point, that the journey was the end destination or whatever—then DON’T MAKE A SEQUEL. It’s that easy. I can understand saying, well, it’s better this way, we’ll never know what the last letter says, Peg’s mysterious legacy can live on, how glorious. But making a sequel completely undermines that point and feels like a cheap trick to get people to keep buying your books.
(I am refusing to read the sequel out of principle.)
Two stars because it was decently written, I liked Aunt Peg, concept of the letters was good.
But seriously. That was not a good ending.
I enjoyed this fast-paced book, and going along on the journey with Ginny. It all starts out with her Runaway Aunt leaving 13 Blue Enelopes with instructions for her to follow. Ginny goes along with it, and along the way she makes new friends, finds new love, and discovers things she never new about herself.
Check out more reviews at: http://the-crc.blogspot.com/
Check out more reviews at: http://the-crc.blogspot.com/
4.5 stars
I really enjoyed this book, the story, the characters and the adventure Ginny goes on. It was an exciting idea for a novel and the only thing stopping me from giving it 5 stars is the slight case of insta-love.
I really enjoyed this book, the story, the characters and the adventure Ginny goes on. It was an exciting idea for a novel and the only thing stopping me from giving it 5 stars is the slight case of insta-love.
This is one of the books where the concept is way better than the actual book is. I was interested all the way through but I think it could have come from a different angle.
I was so excited going into this, because it is by one of my favorite authors, but this was a huge disappointment. The characters didn't develop at all, I didn't care about any of them, and most of them were annoying. Not to mention how much I hated Ginny as a main character.
I couldn't connect to the story and I was lost half the time, because in one sentence they would be doing something and then two sentences later, they were in a different country.
I struggled getting through this so much, I ended up skimming the last 100 pages. :(
*question: how did Ginny' parents et her travel all around Europe, just because her dead aunt left her some letters?*
I couldn't connect to the story and I was lost half the time, because in one sentence they would be doing something and then two sentences later, they were in a different country.
I struggled getting through this so much, I ended up skimming the last 100 pages. :(
*question: how did Ginny' parents et her travel all around Europe, just because her dead aunt left her some letters?*
Incredibly easy read. It's a great sit by the pool or on the beach book. The plot is fun; a scavenger hunt of sorts across Europe? FUN! Some inaccuracies, but nothing major. The Roman Forum and the Colosseum are not connected.
Luchtig boek voor aan het Zwembad, gewoon lekker lezen zonder diepgang.
This was a cute book. I enjoyed it, but I thought bits of it were under developed. There were so many instances I found myself thinking how I wanted to know more about what was currently going on, but it was already over and done with, the author had moved on to the next thing.
The idea is very cute. Ginny's aunt, who had passed away, set up a series of envelopes with clues for her to follow. She was not allowed to open the next envelope until her current mission was done. This took her all over Europe and taught her a lot about herself and a lot about her aunt.
I do recommend this book. It was a refreshing quick read.
The idea is very cute. Ginny's aunt, who had passed away, set up a series of envelopes with clues for her to follow. She was not allowed to open the next envelope until her current mission was done. This took her all over Europe and taught her a lot about herself and a lot about her aunt.
I do recommend this book. It was a refreshing quick read.
This book follows Ginny (Virginia) as she follows her aunt's mysterious instructions, left in numbered envelopes, on an adventure across Europe. It's a great little idea for a story, but I don't think it was quite pulled off in this book, it often felt like a travel guide with bits of story squeezed in. As a Brit I found various flaws with the chapters set in London, just inaccuracies which stand out to someone familiar with British life. The library copy I borrowed was also littered with spelling mistakes of place names (Leister Square?) which a previous borrower of this book had actually gone through with a pen and corrected. I don't know if these were corrected in later editions. Despite all this, I did like it. I liked the main character of Ginny, and the sense of adventure, and there were some extremely touching moments throughout.