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brianne_k's review against another edition
3.0
*3/5*
This was a bizarre fast little read.. I am still trying to wrap my head around it.
I didn't like the epilogue.
This was a bizarre fast little read.. I am still trying to wrap my head around it.
I didn't like the epilogue.
purplepaste's review
adventurous
emotional
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
sienaro's review against another edition
3.0
Morbid, but definitely unpredictable. Truly a book I couldn’t put down but also wanted to. Almost a Darkly, Dreaming Dexter meets Alice in Wonderland
sammybee's review
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.5
Boring and the ending was weird.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, and Mental illness
jasminx's review
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
1.75
ladytiara's review against another edition
5.0
"She did not want Ben to kiss her because if he did that, he might get the wrong impression: that she was the type of girl who should be kissed. And she wasn't. She was the type of girl who should be run from."
After reading Summer of Salt last year, I became a big fan of Katrina Leno's work. I'm making my way through her back catalog, and I grabbed at the chance to read an ARC of her latest book, You Must Not Miss. It's a very different book than her previous work. Her books have a slightly cozy, magical feel, but You Must Not Miss is all sharp edges.
Magpie's life has fallen apart. She caught her father in bed with her mother's sister, her sister took off, and something terrible happened at a party the same night. Now her best friend hates her, everyone at school calls her a slut, and she's stuck in a house with her alcoholic mother. Her life is a mess, and the only thing she can control is what she writes in her notebook. Her notebook is her constant companion. She writes about a place called Near, a world where her life is still good, where her father didn't cheat, where her best friends still likes her. Near is a perfect world, and Magpie wills it into existence.
"Then he saw the yellow notebook that she had hurriedly closed when he walked into the classroom. He touched its cover and Magpie felt the touch on the inside of her body. The notebook as as much a part of her as her blood, her soft tissues, her large intestines. It was as if he'd run his fingernails across her heart. It wasn't a nice feeling."
You Must Not Miss is a gripping, creepy little book, and I'm still thinking about, weeks after I finished it. Magpie isn't a nice character, but she is a compelling one. The force of her rage makes a whole other world. Her rage is a palpable thing, big enough to create something magical and also terrifying. Teenage girls are so often belittled, disregarded, and ignored. Consider what rage can do, and there you have Magpie. You Must Not Miss is a difficult read in some ways. There will be times that you cringe and rage and feel so much for Magpie. It's dark and weird, and it's the kind of book I wish had been around when I was a teen.
I received an ARC from another blogger.
After reading Summer of Salt last year, I became a big fan of Katrina Leno's work. I'm making my way through her back catalog, and I grabbed at the chance to read an ARC of her latest book, You Must Not Miss. It's a very different book than her previous work. Her books have a slightly cozy, magical feel, but You Must Not Miss is all sharp edges.
Magpie's life has fallen apart. She caught her father in bed with her mother's sister, her sister took off, and something terrible happened at a party the same night. Now her best friend hates her, everyone at school calls her a slut, and she's stuck in a house with her alcoholic mother. Her life is a mess, and the only thing she can control is what she writes in her notebook. Her notebook is her constant companion. She writes about a place called Near, a world where her life is still good, where her father didn't cheat, where her best friends still likes her. Near is a perfect world, and Magpie wills it into existence.
"Then he saw the yellow notebook that she had hurriedly closed when he walked into the classroom. He touched its cover and Magpie felt the touch on the inside of her body. The notebook as as much a part of her as her blood, her soft tissues, her large intestines. It was as if he'd run his fingernails across her heart. It wasn't a nice feeling."
You Must Not Miss is a gripping, creepy little book, and I'm still thinking about, weeks after I finished it. Magpie isn't a nice character, but she is a compelling one. The force of her rage makes a whole other world. Her rage is a palpable thing, big enough to create something magical and also terrifying. Teenage girls are so often belittled, disregarded, and ignored. Consider what rage can do, and there you have Magpie. You Must Not Miss is a difficult read in some ways. There will be times that you cringe and rage and feel so much for Magpie. It's dark and weird, and it's the kind of book I wish had been around when I was a teen.
I received an ARC from another blogger.
farmerkristyn's review
3.0
Told with wit and perception that shows Leno’s deep resonance with the disturbed nature of a traumatized teenage mind, You Must Not Miss unfortunately misses the mark for me, despite its gripping prose that underlines the raw tragedy of Magpie’s reality.
For all my praise of Leno’s beautifully crafted writing, I have just as much criticism for the faults of the story’s characters and its hopeless and dreary plot.
Witnessing Magpie’s downward spiral was far from the rewarding tale of a young girl’s healing journey through the proxy of an imaginary world, which of course becomes very uncomfortably real. Rather, I was met with a disturbing blend of Carrie and Narnia.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I knew I was signing up for a revenge tale. But in many revenge tales (think Sweeney Todd, Mean Girls, Kill Bill) there is an underlying moral at the end. Our hero has learned something. It’s normally a cautionary tale. An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind, etc etc.
But Magpie seemingly learns nothing. She kills her enemies and floats away forever in a never-ending pool, no different than she was at the peak of her trauma. One could speculate that the return of Mr.
James and her father symbolizes how her time at “sea” (time which, as we know, passes very differently from the real world. Seven months of real time could very well be decades in Near) has changed her perspective on the events of her life and trauma, and caused her to forgive the people that have wronged her in turn.
But this speculation is far too flimsy for my liking, and I would have much preferred a more solid change in Magpie that we actually see, instead of merely infer through second-hand sources, and through the eyes of Allison, of all people.
I’m all for having unlikeable heroes and heroines. I personally did not like Magpie. But when those heroes and heroines have zero redeeming qualities and don’t eventually learn from their mistakes or have any sort of moral eureka? It becomes unsatisfying.
For these reasons alone, I would leave this review with one star. But I tacked on two more, simply for the beautiful writing. To me, Magpie was unlikeable because she was written well, not in spite of it. Her pain, her listlessness, her depression, her emptiness... they were all so palpable. So real. It was uncomfortable to witness. And that’s what made it good writing. Plus, I really loved the tenuous rules of Near, and the creepiness and vast emptiness of it. Any normal person would have been set on edge at such a world. But for Magpie to have been so drawn in, so enamored.... That’s truly what first caused me to become wary of Magpie. That’s what clued me in. Something had broken inside Magpie seven months ago, and it had grown to a crescendo of shattering glass inside her, a poetic destruction so eloquently detailed by Leno. Truly my hat goes off to her for such haunting prose.
Three stars, in the end. Despite my issues, it was worth the read.
For all my praise of Leno’s beautifully crafted writing, I have just as much criticism for the faults of the story’s characters and its hopeless and dreary plot.
Witnessing Magpie’s downward spiral was far from the rewarding tale of a young girl’s healing journey through the proxy of an imaginary world, which of course becomes very uncomfortably real. Rather, I was met with a disturbing blend of Carrie and Narnia.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I knew I was signing up for a revenge tale. But in many revenge tales (think Sweeney Todd, Mean Girls, Kill Bill) there is an underlying moral at the end. Our hero has learned something. It’s normally a cautionary tale. An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind, etc etc.
But Magpie seemingly learns nothing. She kills her enemies and floats away forever in a never-ending pool, no different than she was at the peak of her trauma. One could speculate that the return of Mr.
James and her father symbolizes how her time at “sea” (time which, as we know, passes very differently from the real world. Seven months of real time could very well be decades in Near) has changed her perspective on the events of her life and trauma, and caused her to forgive the people that have wronged her in turn.
But this speculation is far too flimsy for my liking, and I would have much preferred a more solid change in Magpie that we actually see, instead of merely infer through second-hand sources, and through the eyes of Allison, of all people.
I’m all for having unlikeable heroes and heroines. I personally did not like Magpie. But when those heroes and heroines have zero redeeming qualities and don’t eventually learn from their mistakes or have any sort of moral eureka? It becomes unsatisfying.
For these reasons alone, I would leave this review with one star. But I tacked on two more, simply for the beautiful writing. To me, Magpie was unlikeable because she was written well, not in spite of it. Her pain, her listlessness, her depression, her emptiness... they were all so palpable. So real. It was uncomfortable to witness. And that’s what made it good writing. Plus, I really loved the tenuous rules of Near, and the creepiness and vast emptiness of it. Any normal person would have been set on edge at such a world. But for Magpie to have been so drawn in, so enamored.... That’s truly what first caused me to become wary of Magpie. That’s what clued me in. Something had broken inside Magpie seven months ago, and it had grown to a crescendo of shattering glass inside her, a poetic destruction so eloquently detailed by Leno. Truly my hat goes off to her for such haunting prose.
Three stars, in the end. Despite my issues, it was worth the read.
monstersinspace's review
dark
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
vavocado's review against another edition
dark
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
1.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Rape and Death