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A review by elisabeth_julia
My Sister Rosa by Justine Larbalestier
3.0
My Sister Rosa is a YA contemporary horror-thriller. Also, there is a romance. It is about Che, a 17 year old teenager who moves to NYC with his family, where he has to build a new life, find friends and ideally love. Then there is his psychopath little sister Rosa he has put on himself to keep under control, which means - among other things - to stop her from killing people.
The genre blend between YA contemporary coming of age and horror-thriller in “My Sister Rosa” did not work here. Granted, this rather curious concept is actually what intrigued me to put this novel up, but the execution was lacklustre. The creepy horror-thriller element suffered because romance and “I want a girlfriend” took a front-seat for most of the time. The creepy atmosphere couldn’t build up in between wet teenager dreams. Vice versa, the in itself well done coming of age story about the main character, Che, couldn’t be focused on and enjoyed as much as it deserved to be, because of the always somehow present horror-element of the story, in the form of Che’s little sister Rosa.
Even so, I flew through the pages and finished the book in less than a day. Its fluent writing and entertaining quality plus my fascination with antisocial personality disorder helped with that.
Reading about Rosa’s twisted morals and thoughts made me shiver, but in a good, entertaining way. Rosa isn’t portrayed as a caricaturist “over-the-top” evil psychopath. The author did a great job carefully drawing each layer of Rosa in a subtle way, which makes her so much more believable and therefore way too real…
All the characters in this novel are well portrayed – and they are interesting too. I found the family dynamics in this book very fascinating. From Che’s parents to his friend Leilani, I enjoyed reading about every little side character, which is quite rare.
A plus point is also the diversity in “My Sister Rosa”, although it did feel a bit forced.
Although it didn’t necessarily bother me too much, the pacing in “My Sister Rosa” is extremely off: The first three quarters of the book are very slow and besides the main character trying to find a girlfriend not a lot happens. This rapidly changes during the last quarter. From that point onward the plot feels very rushed. Everything is a blur and suddenly the last page is there and so many things stay unresolved. I’m assuming the ending is set up for a potential sequel.
If YA Contemporary is more your cup of tea than it is mine, you probably would love “My Sister Rosa”. I primarily enjoyed the reading experience, which is why I’m giving this book a more generous rating than my review might suggest.
The genre blend between YA contemporary coming of age and horror-thriller in “My Sister Rosa” did not work here. Granted, this rather curious concept is actually what intrigued me to put this novel up, but the execution was lacklustre. The creepy horror-thriller element suffered because romance and “I want a girlfriend” took a front-seat for most of the time. The creepy atmosphere couldn’t build up in between wet teenager dreams. Vice versa, the in itself well done coming of age story about the main character, Che, couldn’t be focused on and enjoyed as much as it deserved to be, because of the always somehow present horror-element of the story, in the form of Che’s little sister Rosa.
Even so, I flew through the pages and finished the book in less than a day. Its fluent writing and entertaining quality plus my fascination with antisocial personality disorder helped with that.
Reading about Rosa’s twisted morals and thoughts made me shiver, but in a good, entertaining way. Rosa isn’t portrayed as a caricaturist “over-the-top” evil psychopath. The author did a great job carefully drawing each layer of Rosa in a subtle way, which makes her so much more believable and therefore way too real…
All the characters in this novel are well portrayed – and they are interesting too. I found the family dynamics in this book very fascinating. From Che’s parents to his friend Leilani, I enjoyed reading about every little side character, which is quite rare.
A plus point is also the diversity in “My Sister Rosa”, although it did feel a bit forced.
Although it didn’t necessarily bother me too much, the pacing in “My Sister Rosa” is extremely off: The first three quarters of the book are very slow and besides the main character trying to find a girlfriend not a lot happens. This rapidly changes during the last quarter. From that point onward the plot feels very rushed. Everything is a blur and suddenly the last page is there and so many things stay unresolved. I’m assuming the ending is set up for a potential sequel.
If YA Contemporary is more your cup of tea than it is mine, you probably would love “My Sister Rosa”. I primarily enjoyed the reading experience, which is why I’m giving this book a more generous rating than my review might suggest.