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3.83 AVERAGE
3.83 AVERAGE
Read this review on my blog!
The Cavendish Home for Boys and Girls is a middle grade novel in which a precocious and plucky young girl named Victoria tries to solve a mystery involving some children who have gone missing in her town, one of whom is her best and only friend Lawrence. Despite the creepy things that are going on, Victoria takes matters into her own hands and learns some valuable lessons along the way.
This was a really fun read with lots of twists and turns! I was even a little creeped out at some points. This is definitely a book for the fall season. The atmosphere is quite dark, not to mention that Miss Cavendish’s home is more than a little haunted. I also really enjoyed the setting of the novel. While it seems to take place in present day (there are some references to newer technologies), it has a very Mary Poppins-esque, old-fashioned feel to it.
Victoria is a great protagonist. While she is definitely that perfectionist teacher’s pet that we all hated during school, she is still likeable. She could have very easily been annoying, but Legrand provides us with a great glimpse into her inner thoughts and feelings. She definitely develops a lot as the story progresses, making friends with some people she never thought she would.
I thought some of the suspenseful scenes could have been drawn out even more, but I think for middle grade readers the pace would be just fine. I would actually love to see this adapted into an animated movie in the style of the illustrations in the book!
If you like creepy crawly mysteries with surprise endings, I recommend this one!
The Cavendish Home for Boys and Girls is a middle grade novel in which a precocious and plucky young girl named Victoria tries to solve a mystery involving some children who have gone missing in her town, one of whom is her best and only friend Lawrence. Despite the creepy things that are going on, Victoria takes matters into her own hands and learns some valuable lessons along the way.
This was a really fun read with lots of twists and turns! I was even a little creeped out at some points. This is definitely a book for the fall season. The atmosphere is quite dark, not to mention that Miss Cavendish’s home is more than a little haunted. I also really enjoyed the setting of the novel. While it seems to take place in present day (there are some references to newer technologies), it has a very Mary Poppins-esque, old-fashioned feel to it.
Victoria is a great protagonist. While she is definitely that perfectionist teacher’s pet that we all hated during school, she is still likeable. She could have very easily been annoying, but Legrand provides us with a great glimpse into her inner thoughts and feelings. She definitely develops a lot as the story progresses, making friends with some people she never thought she would.
I thought some of the suspenseful scenes could have been drawn out even more, but I think for middle grade readers the pace would be just fine. I would actually love to see this adapted into an animated movie in the style of the illustrations in the book!
If you like creepy crawly mysteries with surprise endings, I recommend this one!
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I wasn't exactly thrilled with this book. Legrand tried too hard for the creep factor and the result was extremely repetitive. I get it, there were creepy roaches. Victoria was uninteresting and, with barely any dialogue in the book, she is about all you get. She was a static character, and her self talk and thinking were incredibly redundant. Nothing she did surprised me and nothing she was able to do was surprising. Having seen Coraline, I felt like this book borrowed too much from Neil Gaiman's story. I did give three stars because there was just enough suspense to keep me reading and I did finish the book.
Welp. That's about as good an explanation as to why rich white people are terrible as I'm probably going to get.
I don't know what to do with this book. Our heroine reflects our villainess. I think by the end of it, though, she learns from looking in that mirror. The thing she learns is that her entire world is awful. She handles this information surprisingly glibly.
I suppose I enjoyed it, but I also suppose that I called just about everything. Vaguely, anyway. Even the epilogue wasn't surprising.
This is the way of scary stories. Le yawn.
I don't know what to do with this book. Our heroine reflects our villainess. I think by the end of it, though, she learns from looking in that mirror. The thing she learns is that her entire world is awful. She handles this information surprisingly glibly.
I suppose I enjoyed it, but I also suppose that I called just about everything. Vaguely, anyway. Even the epilogue wasn't surprising.
This is the way of scary stories. Le yawn.
This was a very well done book. It's perfectly creepy and atmospheric and it's a quick read, which keeps it from getting stale. It reminded me a lot of [b:Coraline|17061|Coraline|Neil Gaiman|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1493497435s/17061.jpg|2834844] but I actually liked it a lot better. Great book for middle graders.
Creepy in a lot of different ways. I enjoyed how independent the hero was, with a nice dash of self-awareness. A little spookier than I expected. I was happy to read something lighter after this but it was a good way to kick off my October.
It's interesting when you run into a bit of book synchronicity. Having read Barker's [b:The Thief of Always|32638|The Thief of Always|Clive Barker|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1309239541s/32638.jpg|1083086] shortly before this one, I couldn't help but see some similar elements in the two books.
Anyway -
The biggest issue I had with this book was that it was about 100 pages too long. It was so repetitive. The whole beginning when Victoria is first noticing people have gone missing, and she starts investigating, is just one big continuous loop.
I did like the bit in the library, though, and it was probably, for me, the one truly suspenseful part of the whole story.
The story really gets started once we get to the Home itself (which takes far too long), but then things also seemed a bit too easy once we got there.
There were some gross bits, to be sure, but I didn't get the fear that some other reviews have mentioned. In fact, I felt like the story was a bit blasé and glossed over some kind of horrific stuff - like kids being tortured.
Anyway -
The one thing I remember strongest is that it does have a good sort of moral lesson about the things that are really important in life. It's the sort of message you see a lot in rom-coms and Lifetime movies, and it seemed a little out-of-place in a horror book for kids... I can't imagine a lot of kids that are actually like Victoria, tbh, but I guess it's a good lesson to instill early on.
I'd originally rated this 2.5 because I think the ending picked up some, after me kind of starting to skim because I didn't feel like it was going to end - but I can't really even remember now, so down to a full 2-stars it is.
Anyway -
The biggest issue I had with this book was that it was about 100 pages too long. It was so repetitive. The whole beginning when Victoria is first noticing people have gone missing, and she starts investigating, is just one big continuous loop.
I did like the bit in the library, though, and it was probably, for me, the one truly suspenseful part of the whole story.
The story really gets started once we get to the Home itself (which takes far too long), but then things also seemed a bit too easy once we got there.
There were some gross bits, to be sure, but I didn't get the fear that some other reviews have mentioned. In fact, I felt like the story was a bit blasé and glossed over some kind of horrific stuff - like kids being tortured.
Anyway -
The one thing I remember strongest is that it does have a good sort of moral lesson about the things that are really important in life. It's the sort of message you see a lot in rom-coms and Lifetime movies, and it seemed a little out-of-place in a horror book for kids... I can't imagine a lot of kids that are actually like Victoria, tbh, but I guess it's a good lesson to instill early on.
I'd originally rated this 2.5 because I think the ending picked up some, after me kind of starting to skim because I didn't feel like it was going to end - but I can't really even remember now, so down to a full 2-stars it is.
definitely not something I usually read but I love Claire Legrand’s writing so I had to give it a go, and I really enjoyed it! it was creepy, had awesome character development, and the friendships were so heartwarming
What starts out as a seemingly normal story quickly becomes quite creepy once the heroine discovers a nasty secret about the orphanage in her town. A little slow in the beginning, but picks up about halfway through.