339 reviews for:

Imaginary Girls

Nova Ren Suma

3.28 AVERAGE

dark mysterious tense slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

"If anyone was a mythical creature here, it was Ruby, the one we all looked to and listened for, the one the boys loved and fought to be with, who couldn't be captured or caged."

????? What did I just read 

I mean, I enjoyed it...but!!??!? My biggest issue was the fact that basically no questions were answered. I wanted to know WHAT exactly was happening and WHY, but the reader never fully learns any of that. The first time I feel a book has gaslit me so successfully lmao... I felt crazy, disturbed, and confused by the end of it. But I still can't say it was a bad read, because it wasn't; it was interesting and had a dreamy, poetic feel to it. Perfect read for the Pisces full moon!

chloe's older sister, ruby, practically raised her alone and loves her more than anyone or anything else on earth. but after chloe, on ruby's encouragement, swims in the reservoir and finds a dead body, she wants to leave town and live with her dad. ruby will do anything to get her back, including impossible things...

i thought i would like this more. the writing was amazing- lovely and spare. also, i was intrigued by the town under the reservoir. but even when the mysterious events were explained, they weren't -really- explained. there wasn't that "aha" moment where everything falls into place because we never find out how ruby does anything.

that said, i would definitely recommend this to teens looking for something good & spooky.

I don't really know what to say about Imaginary Girls. It was shocking, disturbing, and just plain weird. It left me in a daze. The main character, Chloe, doesn't have much of a personality on her own. She doesn't speak for herself really, she mostly just does and says what her sister, Ruby, tells her to. She is like a blank vessel for her sister, and she doesn't even realize it. That, to me, was highly disturbing.


This novel is a mysterious, supernatural type of story. The events in the novel get stranger and stranger as the story goes on. This novel has a certain quality that most YA novels don't have, I just can't pinpoint it. It was unique, an oddity among other YA novels. I liked that.


Although there were many things I liked about Imaginary Girls, there is one thing I didn't like. It felt like there were too many loose ties at the end. There wasn't much of an explanation of anything. I'm fine with leaving some things unexplained, because sometimes it can add to the story, but for this one it just felt a little unfinished.



Over all, Imaginary Girls was a good read. I would definitely recommend it.
tess1209's profile picture

tess1209's review

5.0
adventurous emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

"I could see her smile. I wished I hadn't, because it was the kind of smile she never gave to me. It was smile for a boy who wanted to know her and never would. A smile for a girl who wanted to be like her and never could be. A smile for a perfect stranger."

Actual rating is 2.5 stars, rounded up to three.

Took a little while to get into this one but, once I did - I thoroughly enjoyed it.

If this book was a movie it would have me sitting, preferably not alone, with my hands covering my eyes while peaking through my fingers to see what happens. Stories like this are the reason I don't go swimming a) at night (in any body of water) and b) I avoid the deep end of every body of water, period. I had high hopes for this book (the cover is beautiful!) but unfortunately, it left me with an eery feeling and lots of unanswered questions, like why Ruby is the way she was? Her mother alluded to something later in the book but never clarified. Is there really magic involved or something else?

Chloe frustrated me at times because just when it seems she starts to see her sister for who she really is, she gets sucked right back in again. I also didn't "get" that so many people were under Ruby's "spell" either. Even if there's magic involved it just didn't seem that believable to me. I think the only sane character was Owen and I was thoroughly disappointed in how his part played out. I felt like there was so much more to the relationship he and Chloe were developing, the fact that Ruby's influence didn't work on him, Chloe was beginning to pick up on certain things, etc., that could've served the plot more. I kept hoping that the story would pick up at the end, questions would get answered but they didn't. I was just left with an overall "creepy" feeling. I had a really hard time finishing this book and that almost never happens to me, especially with YA books.

Imaginary Girls was intense, creepy, and mysterious. For a very long time, I had no idea what was happening. On the surface, Chloe found a dead girl floating in the middle of their local reservoir while swimming one night and it freaked her out. But underneath, it was a story about something else altogether.

The book is one of the most unique stories I’ve read in a while. I loved the way it was written because it revealed small pieces of the story lurking under the surface. It was written from Chloe’s point of view, which was obviously skewed in favor of her sister, Ruby. Imaginary Girls was such a sinister story. It was a story about family and the bond between Ruby and Chloe, but it was also a story about control.

It’s difficult to go into too much detail without ruining the plot. It was just one those books you have to read to figure out.

I loved the book and I would recommend it to fans of Megan Abbott’s novels. Like her books, Imaginary Girls was strange, dark, twisted, and sinister, but also beautiful and engaging. While Imaginary Girls is more YA than Megan Abbott’s novels, they share a lot of similar themes. I’m so glad I found the book during my last used bookstore run! I can’t wait to read more of the author’s books.

I had difficulties with this book. Whilst spiritually I am very open this was unhinged on a level I found difficult to connect to.....
Written well, and intriguing but not something I would normally seek out.