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3.28 AVERAGE
3.28 AVERAGE
dark
emotional
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
oh wow… this is the exact type of weird that i want from YA. this book is trippy and a little creepy and i loved it. it took a little while to get going, and the ending was a little too drawn out which kind of dulled the shine, but the bulk of this book was phenomenal. i love these weird obsessive freakish sisterly relationships.
This book was a bit hard to get into, things shifted very quickly, and some of the plot was hard to follow. IE, at the beginning of the book, two years pass but it's not clear for a bit that it has.
There are some plot holes, but they could be filled by looking at the ending as showing it could have all been in Chloe's mind, her way of dealing with the death of her sister. Or it is a ghost story/story of a girl with powers that aren't explained because no one who knew her could understand how she did what she did.
Overall I enjoyed the book, but it's not one that I'm going to be rushing to read again.
There are some plot holes, but they could be filled by looking at the ending as showing it could have all been in Chloe's mind, her way of dealing with the death of her sister. Or it is a ghost story/story of a girl with powers that aren't explained because no one who knew her could understand how she did what she did.
Overall I enjoyed the book, but it's not one that I'm going to be rushing to read again.
This was interesting and sort of creepy, but ultimately unsatisfying.
challenging
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
If we were allowed to judge books solely on their cover, Imaginary Girls would be the most beautiful, intriguing book I’ve read all year. But books are more than that and this one doesn’t live up to the cover’s promise.
A blend of magical realism and mystery, Imaginary Girls is the story of sisters Chloe and Ruby and the sacrifices women will make for the people they love. Though Ruby is technically her half sister, (“but we don’t count by halves,” Chloe says at one point in the book which made me cheer) Chloe wholly trusts her older sister and is willing to go to any length to make her happy. In this case, that length is swimming the old reservoir one night in an attempt to prove Ruby right in front of their gang of friends. The reservoir was created after the town of Olive was flooded like 100 years ago. Ruby loves to tell stories about the people who still live in Olive, the ones who refused to leave their homes even when the waters rose. She tells Chloe fairy tales of how they grew webbed fingers and learned to breath water.
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A blend of magical realism and mystery, Imaginary Girls is the story of sisters Chloe and Ruby and the sacrifices women will make for the people they love. Though Ruby is technically her half sister, (“but we don’t count by halves,” Chloe says at one point in the book which made me cheer) Chloe wholly trusts her older sister and is willing to go to any length to make her happy. In this case, that length is swimming the old reservoir one night in an attempt to prove Ruby right in front of their gang of friends. The reservoir was created after the town of Olive was flooded like 100 years ago. Ruby loves to tell stories about the people who still live in Olive, the ones who refused to leave their homes even when the waters rose. She tells Chloe fairy tales of how they grew webbed fingers and learned to breath water.
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notes from Mock Printz Discussion -- evil magic of Ruby. Why does everyone in the town love Ruby?
The prose is frequently lovely, and the central relationship between the sisters is well-drawn, but this is a muggy, mushy, slog for the most part; the actual story is a mess, sacrificing clarity for lazy eeriness, and the lack of identifiable characters beyond the two leads becomes increasingly tedious. Often, a gripping plot can help you overlook some clunky writing, but this felt like the opposite: elegant style covering for a fundamental lack of structure and craft.
September 2021. Really liked this a ton. A mix of magical realism, horror, and coming of age story about a teen girl that idolizes her older sister. Made some unexpected decisions and kept me enrapt, avoided over explaining but told you enough to believe and be spooked as appropriate.
“Imaginary Girls” by Nova Ren Suma.
“Imaginary Girls” by Nova Ren Suma.
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Ruby is one of my least favorite characters of all time to the point that I was rooting for her downfall pretty much the whole time.