Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.38 AVERAGE
3.38 AVERAGE
This one was really hard to rate.
It took a while for me to get into the writing style, but once I did, I loved all the references to places in Melbourne that I know and could visualise as I was reading. And I thought the tale of Susie was very interesting indeed. No matter how I tried, though, I couldn't get into Miss Kaye's chapters at all - I also felt like I didn't get enough exposure to her to have any opinion of her. As a result, I didn't really get much of an impact from, nor did I care about, the storyline around Miss Kaye and how it all comes together at the end. I also thought that the "significant event" was a bit too abrupt... It didn't engage me and the end left me wanting.
So, I decided to give this part autobiographical/part fiction work a middle of the road 3... I liked some of it and didn't really like some of it.
It took a while for me to get into the writing style, but once I did, I loved all the references to places in Melbourne that I know and could visualise as I was reading. And I thought the tale of Susie was very interesting indeed. No matter how I tried, though, I couldn't get into Miss Kaye's chapters at all - I also felt like I didn't get enough exposure to her to have any opinion of her. As a result, I didn't really get much of an impact from, nor did I care about, the storyline around Miss Kaye and how it all comes together at the end. I also thought that the "significant event" was a bit too abrupt... It didn't engage me and the end left me wanting.
So, I decided to give this part autobiographical/part fiction work a middle of the road 3... I liked some of it and didn't really like some of it.
Book # 68 | Rating: 4 Stars!
What a story! In the debut novel of the Australian writer Hilde Hinton, we witness the coming of age story of "Susie Shoes", a 14-year old girl who was dealt a very difficult hand of cards. Susie's mum suffers from mental health problems that regularly take her to The Institute, a place that Susie doesn't like that much but where she has made friends.
So, from the get-go, we understand how hard and challenging Susie's childhood has been but despite everything, she is a kind, friendly, optimistic and with a wild imagination teenager, qualities that take her on several adventures and situations during her teenage years.
I really connected with the first half of the book as the things she is going through are heart-breaking but, sadly, highly possible. This book makes you wonder how many children and teenagers are going through something similar right in this moment, and how they are dealing with it.
Unfortunately, I feel that we slowed way down in the second half of the book and by the time we got to the final page I felt that the story was somehow incomplete. There is a massive jump in time towards the end, but we are not filled in on what happened during those years - I really wanted to hear more about her life.
Very interesting book, looking forward to reading her future novels.
What a story! In the debut novel of the Australian writer Hilde Hinton, we witness the coming of age story of "Susie Shoes", a 14-year old girl who was dealt a very difficult hand of cards. Susie's mum suffers from mental health problems that regularly take her to The Institute, a place that Susie doesn't like that much but where she has made friends.
So, from the get-go, we understand how hard and challenging Susie's childhood has been but despite everything, she is a kind, friendly, optimistic and with a wild imagination teenager, qualities that take her on several adventures and situations during her teenage years.
I really connected with the first half of the book as the things she is going through are heart-breaking but, sadly, highly possible. This book makes you wonder how many children and teenagers are going through something similar right in this moment, and how they are dealing with it.
Unfortunately, I feel that we slowed way down in the second half of the book and by the time we got to the final page I felt that the story was somehow incomplete. There is a massive jump in time towards the end, but we are not filled in on what happened during those years - I really wanted to hear more about her life.
Very interesting book, looking forward to reading her future novels.
The book is charming and sad in parts but the overall story felt disjointed and consequently didn't make much of an impression. Hinton's style of writing is very vivid but lacks sophistication and feels a bit amateur, though she does a great job of capturing the mind of a young Susie.
wow i don’t know where to begin with with this one. the writing was great, there are some themes in there that really hit home and I’ve taken multiple screen shots of quotes. especially those of the “mind hospital” that is what susie calls a psychiatric hospital. i read a couple of reviews where they say susie is an unlikeable character, but i disagree. i think she’s a child and then teen navigating a massive trauma. and when you don’t talk about things they lead to people acting certain ways to cope. something was off for me until about 150 pages in though. after that it clicked. but it was also missing something, there’s a jump of quite a few years and i guessed some of the plot which is never fun. i am left wanting more, what happened to susie in the years that aren’t written. there’s a gap. in my heart too, i feel a soft spot for absolutely all of the characters. maybe it hit a bit too close to home for me and connected a bit more with her mother and the people in that section, but that’s not a big section. i could have easily read another 200 pages, which is a testament to the writing because that doesn’t happen often to me.