You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.
Take a photo of a barcode or cover
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
challenging
medium-paced
Pros: collective narrative was fucking amazing! relatable depiction of intense and fierce and ugly girlhood and clingy friendships and idolization of older girls and celebrities.
Cons: super vague and confusing metaphors, short cut-off chapters and lots of loose ends left me wondering about wtf was going on, wish there was more explanation of things and follow-through on where they’re at now. I really wanted more, so many questions were left unanswered, short chapters almost like vignettes with no endings. This could have been a much longer book and I probably would’ve given 5 stars.
Cons: super vague and confusing metaphors, short cut-off chapters and lots of loose ends left me wondering about wtf was going on, wish there was more explanation of things and follow-through on where they’re at now. I really wanted more, so many questions were left unanswered, short chapters almost like vignettes with no endings. This could have been a much longer book and I probably would’ve given 5 stars.
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
emotional
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
adventurous
dark
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
We would not be born out of sweetness, we were born out of rage, we felt it in our bones.
I am so unsure of what I think of this book and whether I liked it or not and I have so many thoughts and feelings that are hard to put into words, but I'll try. First of, the writing style is absolutely genius and I loved it right from the beginning. Yes, it was maybe a little hard to get into, but for this story it made so much sense. That it was told from a "we" perspective really captured how the girls all blended into one another so much, and how at that age you define yourself by, and depend so much on your friends. That's why, at first, I didn't mind that you barely knew or could connect to the characters, but at the halfway point I still felt like I barely knew any of the characters, it was just a blur of names without much further description. For a long time I didn't even know how many girls there were. Maybe the author was doing that on purpose, but without strong characters it's so hard to be fully invested in the story and it kind of felt like lazy writing. The chapters about the characters alone from their adult lives also didn't help with character building, they actually really threw me off everytime. It felt like an attempt at character building, but it was done way too little and not in a good way. It only made the already confusing plotlines more confusing.
And I don't even know where to start with the plot. The plotline about Stone and the girls desire for fame, glory and being discovered was by far the most interesting one and I wish it would've been explored further. The lake and the "monster" however were brought up so much it was almost annoying, but it still felt surface level.
About the ending... look I can really love an open ending when it's done right. This one felt super rushed and once again lazy.
Overall I loved the vibes of "Brutes" and I loved the writing style. There were lots of things I wrote down, because I thought they were so poetic and beautiful, but the plot and the characters unfortunately lacked substance. I really wanted to love this and I wouldn't say I hate it, but it did let me down.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child abuse, Sexual violence, Death of parent
challenging
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
“We would not be born out of sweetness, we were born out of rage, we felt it in our bones”
This book captures the feral experience of girlhood so well; behind bony limbs and scratched up knees, behind delicate eyelashes and ivory skin, behind lipstick smiles and freckled cheeks, lives a bloodthirsty creature who understands what death is. The plural that the girls used of “we” was so haunting for some reason, like they were some living breathing entity that just watched, always on the other side of a veil to the rest of the world. This book shows that girlhood is both beautiful and ugly, both carnivorous and gentle, both horror filled and incandescent.
This book captures the feral experience of girlhood so well; behind bony limbs and scratched up knees, behind delicate eyelashes and ivory skin, behind lipstick smiles and freckled cheeks, lives a bloodthirsty creature who understands what death is. The plural that the girls used of “we” was so haunting for some reason, like they were some living breathing entity that just watched, always on the other side of a veil to the rest of the world. This book shows that girlhood is both beautiful and ugly, both carnivorous and gentle, both horror filled and incandescent.