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wordsareweapons 's review for:
The Burning
by Laura Bates
Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing a copy for review.
Ok I am honestly torn on how I feel about this book. The author has a lot, and I mean A LOT , of things to say about slut shaming. So much so that I honestly wasn't sure what the plot really was of this book till about the half way point. We follow Anna and her mother as they move from England to Scotland following the death of her father, and a massive social scandal. We don't find out what the issue is until again, about the half way point. Anna makes some new friends at her new school. She is given a history project to research a local person. Anna chooses a girl named Maggie who was burned at the stake for witchcraft in the 1600's. The flashback scenes to Maggie's story were my favorite parts of this book. Their stories coincide quite nicely. Anna's scandal ends up following her, as things do. I honestly started skim reading around 60% to the end because I was just ready to be done.
I had a hard time connecting to the characters. Anna lacked a back bone in my opinion. There really wasn't much character development. Her friends were fine, but scarce. The one boy who had any relevance to the story was, more or less nonexistent. The slut shaming amongst her school mates was in full, almost extreme, force. I think the message is important, and the story fit that, it was just also boring. Too much inner turmoil, and zero action to do anything about it until the last page.
Ok I am honestly torn on how I feel about this book. The author has a lot, and I mean A LOT , of things to say about slut shaming. So much so that I honestly wasn't sure what the plot really was of this book till about the half way point. We follow Anna and her mother as they move from England to Scotland following the death of her father, and a massive social scandal. We don't find out what the issue is until again, about the half way point. Anna makes some new friends at her new school. She is given a history project to research a local person. Anna chooses a girl named Maggie who was burned at the stake for witchcraft in the 1600's. The flashback scenes to Maggie's story were my favorite parts of this book. Their stories coincide quite nicely. Anna's scandal ends up following her, as things do. I honestly started skim reading around 60% to the end because I was just ready to be done.
I had a hard time connecting to the characters. Anna lacked a back bone in my opinion. There really wasn't much character development. Her friends were fine, but scarce. The one boy who had any relevance to the story was, more or less nonexistent. The slut shaming amongst her school mates was in full, almost extreme, force. I think the message is important, and the story fit that, it was just also boring. Too much inner turmoil, and zero action to do anything about it until the last page.