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A review by mrpitmansgranddaughter
Girl by Edna O'Brien
3.0
This is a tricky one. The subject matter is huge, and surprisingly not been written about (on my radar) yet but I remember so vividly the Bring Back Our Girls movement, the horror stories about kidnapped girls in Nigeria that took over social media and news stories. In January this year (2021) more girls escaped, the kidnappings happened in 2014, it's been 7 years and there is still an estimated 112 girls missing. Not only are these figures horrific, worse still is that mass kidnappings continue to happen, in February and March over 350 students were kidnapped from two different schools in Nigeria. How is this happening and how are we not hearing about it? It's absolutely horrific and heartbreaking.
It's a story that needs to be told, and something that absolutely shouldn't be forgotten but it has to be done right. So the subject matter gets 5 stars straight away and in absolute credit to this author she threw herself into the research, and worked to delicately understand and write a fiction book of one girl's experience based on the conversations and research with many of the girls.
The reason I am rating this book at a 3 and half stars is that it is almost foggy, coming in and out of consciousness, using tenses and time jumps, which worked for the story but just made it a little disjointed. It's fractured, as is the protagonist so there is merit to it, it makes sense why it has been done. However for what is an incredibly horrific and important story I found myself having to focus too much on changing tenses and timelines and characters to be able to be taken over with the horror and emotion I think a book on this topic needs to bring.
I really enjoyed the time span of the book and for a short book of 225 pages it packs a lot in. This book did make me feel, horror, shock, heartbreak and it did have some more positive elements shining through, the friendships featured are done well.
It isn't an easy book to read or review. I really admire the effort made to tell such a harrowing story.
There are rightfully questions about whether Edna O'Brien was the right person to write this book but I will save that for much more educated and eloquent reviews.
It's a story that needs to be told, and something that absolutely shouldn't be forgotten but it has to be done right. So the subject matter gets 5 stars straight away and in absolute credit to this author she threw herself into the research, and worked to delicately understand and write a fiction book of one girl's experience based on the conversations and research with many of the girls.
The reason I am rating this book at a 3 and half stars is that it is almost foggy, coming in and out of consciousness, using tenses and time jumps, which worked for the story but just made it a little disjointed. It's fractured, as is the protagonist so there is merit to it, it makes sense why it has been done. However for what is an incredibly horrific and important story I found myself having to focus too much on changing tenses and timelines and characters to be able to be taken over with the horror and emotion I think a book on this topic needs to bring.
I really enjoyed the time span of the book and for a short book of 225 pages it packs a lot in. This book did make me feel, horror, shock, heartbreak and it did have some more positive elements shining through, the friendships featured are done well.
It isn't an easy book to read or review. I really admire the effort made to tell such a harrowing story.
There are rightfully questions about whether Edna O'Brien was the right person to write this book but I will save that for much more educated and eloquent reviews.