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3.34 AVERAGE
3.34 AVERAGE
This book was very good. It not only depicts what it is like to be at an all girls school, but also what it means to be a teenage girl today.
This book left me feeling empty. The story just felt so real and I could of placed at my school, or any other private institution.
I go to an all girls boarding school my self and I saw a little piece of myself in most of the characters. I loved the book it just hurt how real it was and could be.
The things I didn’t like are that a few of the POVs felt very empty like we just had their perspective to further the mystery part of the plot. And the ending fell a bit flat for me. However, I loved the writing and how it never returned to the same POV.
All in all great book!
This book left me feeling empty. The story just felt so real and I could of placed at my school, or any other private institution.
I go to an all girls boarding school my self and I saw a little piece of myself in most of the characters. I loved the book it just hurt how real it was and could be.
The things I didn’t like are that a few of the POVs felt very empty like we just had their perspective to further the mystery part of the plot. And the ending fell a bit flat for me. However, I loved the writing and how it never returned to the same POV.
All in all great book!
A little bit of mystery, nine different points of view, and a lot of struggles females work through on their path to adulthood. The plot focuses on sexual assault and consent without the sole focus being sexual assault and consent. The author did a fantastic job weaving in various "issues" young women face today in a sensitive light without a condescending tone. She does an excellent job building character and, in some cases, making you unhate a character you committed to disliking through half of the book. Overall, well written, very thoughtful, and well-executed.
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
All Girls begins with a series of signs on the road to Alwater, an all girls boarding school, accusing a male member of the faculty of rape in 1995. We go through a year at Alwater, from the perspective of nine different girls (each with their own chapter) as events relating to this accusation unfold.
The sexual assault allegations aren't really the main storyline, though it is definitely the thread linking all the chapters. Each girl has their own experiences with sexuality, consent, friendships, morality, racism, and mental health.
Yet somehow the book manages to be cohesive. You could read one chapter without reading the others I think, and not be too confused, but each chapter compliments the others.
For example, you read a chapter from Lauren's perspective that mentions her roommate, and other students, and then find later in the book there is a chapter from their perspective in which Lauren might be mentioned. It's this that makes me want to re read it, as by the end of the book you have new information that you didn't when you read their chapter! You don't need to read it twice though, that's just my curiosity I think.
I also really enjoyed the brief glimpses of the girls futures and how their perspectives on some of the events and conversations will change when they are older and understand more about the world.
My only quibble was that because each girl only had one chapter, it left me wanting to know more, and I had lots of things left unanswered. The ending was kind of anticlimactic because all the chapters sort of had their own endings. This didn't take away from my enjoyment, I think it was just unexpected (and when I think about it, more realistic!).
The sexual assault allegations aren't really the main storyline, though it is definitely the thread linking all the chapters. Each girl has their own experiences with sexuality, consent, friendships, morality, racism, and mental health.
Yet somehow the book manages to be cohesive. You could read one chapter without reading the others I think, and not be too confused, but each chapter compliments the others.
For example, you read a chapter from Lauren's perspective that mentions her roommate, and other students, and then find later in the book there is a chapter from their perspective in which Lauren might be mentioned. It's this that makes me want to re read it, as by the end of the book you have new information that you didn't when you read their chapter! You don't need to read it twice though, that's just my curiosity I think.
I also really enjoyed the brief glimpses of the girls futures and how their perspectives on some of the events and conversations will change when they are older and understand more about the world.
My only quibble was that because each girl only had one chapter, it left me wanting to know more, and I had lots of things left unanswered. The ending was kind of anticlimactic because all the chapters sort of had their own endings. This didn't take away from my enjoyment, I think it was just unexpected (and when I think about it, more realistic!).
All Girls rings with authenticity. Having worked at an all girls boarding school, this book rang true in terms of girl culture and boarding school culture and traditions. I often wondered if the author was a student or teacher at the school where I worked at a different time! Well done!
This book took on a very trendy topic - sexual assault on a boarding school campus - and somehow did very little with it. It’s hard to enjoy a meandering, character-driven, bureaucratic story about this important issue when other books - namely, Notes on a Silencing in the nonfiction space and My Dark Vanessa in the fiction realm - did it so much better! I did not understand or like how the story was told from the perspective of nine different girls - all of whom you meet exactly one time and then promptly forget because you never really see them again. The only enjoyment I got from this were the nostalgic references to boarding school traditions (white graduation dresses, anyone?) that I myself experienced. All in all, it missed the mark.
This book is a hard one to review. It definitely kept me hooked (until the last chapter) and I felt like we really got to know the girls in the story however it seemed disjointed to me. There were so many characters that I was never sure who was who and which grade characters were in. It was confusing at times and while each chapter had a lot to it, after each finished the girls weren’t really revisited again properly. I would rather the author had focused on a handful of the girls across the school and had come back to them again rather than giving each of the many chapters to an entirely different person.
I enjoyed the running ‘mystery’ of who was carrying out the ‘pranks’ however the explanation and resolution towards the end didn’t make that much sense. Finally, the ending was the weakest part of this book. Up until the last two chapters I was really in to it and would’ve forgiven the wide range of narrators and the dropping of stories at the end of each chapter because they were all interesting, however it just seemed to peter out. Sadly although I think the concept was a good one and the original storyline was intriguing, because it was stretched across too many characters and it didn’t really go anywhere I think it missed the mark overall.
I enjoyed the running ‘mystery’ of who was carrying out the ‘pranks’ however the explanation and resolution towards the end didn’t make that much sense. Finally, the ending was the weakest part of this book. Up until the last two chapters I was really in to it and would’ve forgiven the wide range of narrators and the dropping of stories at the end of each chapter because they were all interesting, however it just seemed to peter out. Sadly although I think the concept was a good one and the original storyline was intriguing, because it was stretched across too many characters and it didn’t really go anywhere I think it missed the mark overall.
emotional
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I REALLY wanted to like this book. It landed as mediocre for me.
It felt like the author had this TV series planned out in her head where following 9? main characters can be done. This was not the book to do that in. To truly be able to delve into the plot of the story, there needed to be way less characters. It really just felt like each chapter was an overview of one of the girls with A LOT of extra fluff and unnecessary happenings completely irrelevant to the story.
I couldn’t connect with a single one of the girls because there just wasn’t enough time or background to do so. Overall fell very short for me.
It felt like the author had this TV series planned out in her head where following 9? main characters can be done. This was not the book to do that in. To truly be able to delve into the plot of the story, there needed to be way less characters. It really just felt like each chapter was an overview of one of the girls with A LOT of extra fluff and unnecessary happenings completely irrelevant to the story.
I couldn’t connect with a single one of the girls because there just wasn’t enough time or background to do so. Overall fell very short for me.