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A review by carnisht
Going Wild by Lisa McMann
3.0
Do you love stories that sound like they were written by a middle schooler? If so, this is just the book for you! As I was reading this, I couldn’t help but compare it to the fictional stories my 7th graders produce. The dialogue was cheesy, the plot was overly convenient, and the pacing was frustratingly weird.
One of the things in the plot that really irked me was the distinct lack of action. The story got quite boring and tedious waiting for Charlie to discover her powers. Then, once she finally had, she didn’t DO anything with them other than run fast and lift dumpsters! It felt like there was no real payoff to this story and her finding the bracelet. There was one exciting scene with the fire where Charlie had to use her powers to rescue a child from a burning house… but other than that, there wasn’t much.
McMann also had a little soccer subplot for Charlie. While that in and of itself was pretty dull and inconsequential, it did serve as a good way of introducing and utilizing Charlie’s powers. It felt more creative than just saying what her powers were and having her discover them for herself mid-game. The other major subplot, though, was Charlie’s theater experience. That served literally no purpose in my mind. Honestly, it just wasted pages for me and gave me more to slog through to get to the ending.
At the VERY end, there was a lot more excitement, and I mean the very end… like the last chapter! I don’t understand why it took an entire book to get to this point! I mean I get that it’s a trilogy, and the event in the final chapter was setting up the rest of the series, but still… it was SO delayed!
In addition to this slow plot, the characters were also pretty poorly written. Charlie was fine enough, but Mac, her techie friend, was weirdly mad about being saved by Charlie? The whole thing reeked of toxic masculinity and I hated that! Then her other friend, Maria, continuously betrayed her trust by testing her powers against her will… and then telling others about the powers! Literally such a shit friend! Then there’s Kelly. Kelly had no real redemption in the story. She did one kind thing in helping save Mac, but throughout all of it, she was still quite selfish and rude. The character development was literally zero, and I hated all of that.
I also disliked the dialogue. It felt super weird and fake. For example, Maria spoke in such awkward stereotypical Spanish. She said ay Dios mío in the middle of a fight. Like, has she never spoken with a Hispanic person before? This felt very microaggression-y and like an episode of Dora the Explorer.
Did I just write a bunch of complaints? Yes. Did I say anything positive? Not really. However, I did like something in this book. My main motivation to read was knowing that my students would like this book. It felt like a superhero origin story, which was intriguing. I am, admittedly, curious about the rest of the trilogy and seeing where the story goes… so stay tuned (or don’t…)!
To read more of my thoughts on this book, check out https://yalitreader.wordpress.com/2022/03/11/going-wild-by-lisa-mcmann/
One of the things in the plot that really irked me was the distinct lack of action. The story got quite boring and tedious waiting for Charlie to discover her powers. Then, once she finally had, she didn’t DO anything with them other than run fast and lift dumpsters! It felt like there was no real payoff to this story and her finding the bracelet. There was one exciting scene with the fire where Charlie had to use her powers to rescue a child from a burning house… but other than that, there wasn’t much.
McMann also had a little soccer subplot for Charlie. While that in and of itself was pretty dull and inconsequential, it did serve as a good way of introducing and utilizing Charlie’s powers. It felt more creative than just saying what her powers were and having her discover them for herself mid-game. The other major subplot, though, was Charlie’s theater experience. That served literally no purpose in my mind. Honestly, it just wasted pages for me and gave me more to slog through to get to the ending.
At the VERY end, there was a lot more excitement, and I mean the very end… like the last chapter! I don’t understand why it took an entire book to get to this point! I mean I get that it’s a trilogy, and the event in the final chapter was setting up the rest of the series, but still… it was SO delayed!
In addition to this slow plot, the characters were also pretty poorly written. Charlie was fine enough, but Mac, her techie friend, was weirdly mad about being saved by Charlie? The whole thing reeked of toxic masculinity and I hated that! Then her other friend, Maria, continuously betrayed her trust by testing her powers against her will… and then telling others about the powers! Literally such a shit friend! Then there’s Kelly. Kelly had no real redemption in the story. She did one kind thing in helping save Mac, but throughout all of it, she was still quite selfish and rude. The character development was literally zero, and I hated all of that.
I also disliked the dialogue. It felt super weird and fake. For example, Maria spoke in such awkward stereotypical Spanish. She said ay Dios mío in the middle of a fight. Like, has she never spoken with a Hispanic person before? This felt very microaggression-y and like an episode of Dora the Explorer.
Did I just write a bunch of complaints? Yes. Did I say anything positive? Not really. However, I did like something in this book. My main motivation to read was knowing that my students would like this book. It felt like a superhero origin story, which was intriguing. I am, admittedly, curious about the rest of the trilogy and seeing where the story goes… so stay tuned (or don’t…)!
To read more of my thoughts on this book, check out https://yalitreader.wordpress.com/2022/03/11/going-wild-by-lisa-mcmann/