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Reviews tagging 'Abandonment'

The Grimrose Girls by Laura Pohl

13 reviews

foreverinastory's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Now that I've read this I can certify that this book is just as wonderful as I thought it would be. queer fairytale characters in a dark academia setting. Like, how perfect is this for me!?

The Grimrose Girls follows four main characters: Yuki, Rory, Ella and Nani. The first three have been going to Grimrose Académie for a year. They're coming back for a new year after losing their best friend Ari, whose death was ruled a suicide. But when Nani uncovers a fairytale grimoire in Ari's old closet, the girls are sure there was foul play involved in Ari's death. As the four begin to investigate, they find that Grimrose has hidden a string of murders at its campus.

Y'all this book was soooo good. I just wanna yell about how much I loved it. Throughout the book we get clues onto the students fairytale fates. I've so far figured out everyone except Nani. So I'm like super curious to find out more.

I loved the murder mystery in this! I had no idea how it would come together, but I absolutely loved it. Seeing how things worked on, I'm sure there are still MANY secrets to be revealed. I can't wait for the sequel. I also loved all the relationships in this book. The friendships, the romances, ugh YES. I'm here for it all. I love that our four main girls also don't pursue romantic relationships with each other. I really loved that we got to see the friendship between these 4. Loved it sooo much.

After reading this, I'm for sure adding Laura to my auto-read list.

Rep: Aroace Japanese MC, white lesbian female MC with fibromyalgia, white biromantic demisexual female MC with anxiety and OCD, fat Black-Hawaiian lesbian female MC. Black sapphic female side character, white sapphic female side character.

CWs: Abadonment, blood, chronic illness, death, grief, injury/injury detail, mental illness (anxiety & OCD), murder. Moderate: Gore, racism.

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I just finished The Last 8 and was curious to see what else the author had written and came across this book coming out November 2021!! AND LOOK AT THIS REP STATEMENT:

The Grimrose Girls has 4 main protagonists: 2 are lesbians (on page), 1 of them is a biromantic demisexual (doesn't use these labels on page, only mentions having no preference of gender as long as she feels a connection), and the fourth is aromantic asexual (written on the page).

AND 

It has:
🌟4 fairytale retellings
❤️f/f romance
🍰an aroace protagonist
🏰boarding school shenanigans
⚔️swords
📚magic and murder mystery

Content warnings include: suicide mention, depiction of anxiety and OCD, parental physical/emotional abuse, mention of parental death, light gore. 

I feel like Laura Pohl has answered my sapphic fairytale dreams. 

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rey_therese07's review against another edition

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medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0


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itshardizzy's review

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

ohhh what a ride. 

the book was very good and I've finished really fast. I really liked how complex the MCs are and how they aren't perfect and have real problems. The book deals with a lot of things, but mostly with grief and with finding ones trueself. It was PLL meets Brothers Grimm but make it Sapphic (and I loved it).

the characters are all relatable and they have real struggles and not just rich people problems. the author really succeed in blend the personal problems of the characters with the main plot and in showing that in the end they are all teenagers that still haven't figure out life. even the side characters have well constructed background and problems that aren't connected with the MCs. and the relationships where really natural and really comfortable to follow.

the plot is very interesting and i saw how PLL heavily influenced the author, literally there was times where I was "am i reading PLL?". there was clues well hidden everywhere and it was fun to put the pieces together.

one thing that I want to talk about is the diversity in here. Although it is a school for the rich and privilege, we also have a few special cases like Ella and Nani, but I didn't really think they tackled those privileges as well as the author could. what the author did well - in my opinion - is to display LGBTQ+ characters without that being the main focus of their stories, being gay is treated normally and that was awesome; but that doesn't mean the author didn't explore the struggles that comes with being yourself and that shows thru Yuki and Svenja.
also I loved Pippa talking with Rory about her being the only black girl in their club and about even though she is rich, black people will never be seen the same as white rich people.


honestly this was a great read, but there was a few parts where i was like ???
like the part where yuki told them about what she had said to Ari right before she died and there wasn't much of a reaction; and like the author was building this secret for chapters and making us anxious about how the others would react, but in the end it wasn't that big of a deal
. I'm really excited to the follow up and to see if some of my predictions will become a reality and to see how they are gonna deal with the new found truths and with the things they've done. 


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