You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.
Take a photo of a barcode or cover
ghostlydreamer 's review for:
The Casquette Girls
by Alys Arden
adventurous
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I don't even know where to begin with this book. Maybe with a little storytime? So the year is 2022. I'm in New Orleans with my friend for the first time. It's our first full day, it's my birthday, and we visit the vampire Cafe in the french quarter. Off to the side is this little vampire-themed store, the name of which I forget, where I'm absolutely enamored with everything I see. And then I turn around, and being the bookworm that I am, I see books! Lots of books. Mostly vampire books. Which is to be expected, given where we are. So first thing I see, actually, is another Alys Arden book. Her Zatanna graphic novel. I'm immediately enamored with it because of the colors. It's also small enough that it'll fit in my duffel bag, and I was on a graphic novel kick so that seemed right up my alley. Then my eyes landed on this book just above it. And, naturally, I was enamored with these colors too! I took a closer look at it, surprised that it was so thick. That definitely wouldn't fit in my duffel. I remembered looking it up on here to see if it had any decent reviews, and wasn't mad at what I saw. But as I read the synopsis, I grew hesitant. That was kind of the final nail in the coffin, so to speak. It's YA. And I don't feel particularly drawn to YA, apart from their magnificent, eye-catching covers. So, because it was too big and I wasn't sure I'd like it after all, I put that book down and stuck with Zatanna, because even if that was YA, I had a better chance with a graphic novel than a 500+ page book with multiple sequels.
Anyway, after I left New Orleans, I got to reading Zatanna immediately and adored it. And maybe because of that, I was still wondering about this book. The name was intriguing. The cover was gorgeous. If I liked one book by the author, wasn't it likely I'd enjoy another? But I needed some distance from NOLA, so it wasn't for another month or so that I finally bought it. And then it sat, unread, for months.
Now I think I knew going into this story that it probably wouldn't be my favorite book in the world. But I thought I'd at least like it a little. And honestly, for most of the book, I was expecting to continue with the series. I thought I'd keep going, just to see what happened. It was moderately intriguing, after all.
And then I got to the end, and that blew EVERYTHING. And worse still, I ended up reading a book I thought was exceptional right after, making this book feel even less enjoyable by comparison. So not only did I drop my rating, but I'm not even sure I want to keep this book on my shelves anymore. I have a few reasons why.
But first, I'm aware that because this book is YA, it's probably not going to be entirely for me. I was kind of over YA back when I was still the targeted audience, and I am much older than that now. It's very rare that I find a YA book that appeals to me, because a lot of the tropes and the immaturity demonstrated by the characters is irksome and gets in the way of my enjoyment despite an otherwise perfectly acceptable plot. So recognize that my views may be biased or skewed because of this.
I guess I will start with the positives though, because this book wasn't all bad.
Arden knows her city. I can tell how much she loves it. And while at first it was a bit interesting to me that this book would be described as a love letter to New Orleans when the entire place is in absolute shambles after a massive hurricane (simply dubbed The Storm), it started to make sense to me after a while. Sure, the author mentioned often how bad the crime and murder rates were going up. The looters and the tragedy and the loss and so many other things that might make New Orleans seem unappealing to outsiders. But she manages to capture the heart of New Orleans despite that. Now, after my visit, I quickly realized that New Orleans was not for me and I would never be living there in the future, despite all my earlier proclamations that that's where I truly belonged. NOLA lost a bit of that glamor for me when I came home. But this book brought some of that magic back. I still know it's not the place for me, but the way it was described made me WANT it to be. Despite the tragedy that struck NOLA, there was still something beautiful about the place, it's culture, that I wanted to be a part of somehow. The author knows how to set a scene, and her descriptions of the food, the music, the people, and the places in the french quarter really stuck out to me. I think that's partly why I wanted to read this book to begin with. I wanted to be immersed in it's setting. And Arden delivered on that expectation. And what's cool is I could picture some of the places she discussed. I knew of some of the things she had described from having briefly been there before, which I'd never been able to do with a book before. So that was pretty cool and made up for a lot of my earlier doubts with the book. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough to save it by the end of incline me to read more.
As far as characters go, I can't say I was particularly fond of most of them. I can barely even remember most of their names. The one that seems to stick out the most to me though was Ren. I loved Ren, and felt that if I could get along with or be friends with anyone, it would've been him. That may be because he's an adult, granted, so I'll automatically relate to him better, but he just had such a fun presence, and every time he came up (which was sadly not all that often since he is just a side character), I got pretty excited about it. I could absolutely read a book just about him.
I also really liked how the author wrote in New Orleans history. Apart from the diary entries, which I wouldn't really count anyway, every time Ren gave our characters a little history lesson, I was rapt with attention. In fact, one of the few scenes that still manages to stand out so well is the one where he is giving a night tour. I still wish I'd done one of those myself while in NOLA.
Last among the good things list is I really liked that we got to see Halloween night with the parade. That's the kind of NOLA thing that I want to read about. It wasn't Mardi Gras via the eyes of a NOLA native, but it was probably even better that it wasn't since Halloween is my favorite holiday, and I love reading about any celebration of it anywhere.
But then we have the not so great things.
One of the worst offenders was the pacing of the book. I know the book is long, but this took me what felt like an absurd amount of time to read, and I didn't even really have that many things going on this time around that would've prevented me from reading, bar the fact that some days it was so slow that I didn't feel like reading at all. That's the issue. I felt like too little was happening for too long, or it was creeping by at a snail's pace, when I'm not sure that it needed to. I wouldn't sacrifice the attention to detail the author utilized in order to shorten it. I just wish it didn't feel so slow. I understand there's a mystery here, and some creeping dread isn't a bad thing, but sometimes, the story was borderline losing me because of the pacing. Events could have been executed a bit differently. Even during the climax, it felt oddly drawn out even though so much was happening. But the thing that slowed this book down the most were the journal entries. They didn't read like normal journal entries. They were stiff and boring and I understand what their point was, but I don't think we needed quite so many, or for them to be as long. I usually love journal entries, but I was so bored by these.
But honestly my biggest criticism are some of the tropes involved. I know I should've known going into this book that it would be about vampires (especially given what store I found it in), and I didn't, so that's my bad. I'm not very drawn to vampires. But my god, I am DEFINITELY not drawn to vampires in teen novels. I think what bothered me most is how these vampires...lacked originality. It felt like every other YA vampire I'd read about in the past. And these ones felt like they were on the cusp of toxicity. Our main character seems to have this weird love triangle thing going on involving one of the vampires. She just can't seem to get him out of her head. But what bothered me was that, SPOILER,even when he hurts people whom she loves, she's still enamored by him! It's like every time she finally thinks she's done with him, she's thinking about him all over again, and it got old very quickly. This book just screamed "toxic, brooding, hot vampire" in the worst way. Now maybe that's just me, but there were some moments where this vamp in particular did something and the main character would still want him and I just...rolled my eyes so far back into my head, outwardly groaned, and wanted to quit the book. Some of it was so unnecessary. I'm sure this is the kind of stuff teens still like, because this is what teens liked when I was that age. But seriously? This is getting into some ugly shit that wasn't really glamorized or demonized. It was just...pointlessly there.
Now I'd already come to terms when I started the book that YA books are different. They can get away with unrealistic behaviors, or magic systems that don't quite make sense, and it's fine because that's not the main emphasis of the story anyway. It's not like adult novels. But my god. It was so hard to believe that some of this was happening! Like the fact that our main character can just get into an illegal speakeasy that her dad has created and all the people he works with are like "yeah this is fine, I'll let his 16 year old daughter who's practically in her underwear come in and offer her a drink with absolutely no problems, AND not tell her dad she's there or ask if it's okay she be there." I don't know. That's just one example. But additionally, there were just a lot of supernatural things that didn't feel like they were explained in this book. Maybe they will be in future installments, and maybe we aren't supposed to know everything. It's supernatural after all. But the lack of an explanation sometimes felt like a cheap cop out... Because of this, there seemed to be a lot of things happening just because it was convenient.
My last couple of points aren't as long. But I did feel like there were too many characters. I'm sure they all play a role in future installments, so I'm not saying they should be cut, necessarily. But it got very confusing very quickly because there were so many of them. Especially at the end, when the climax was happening. I think that partially made it hard for me to understand what was happening. As a result, I felt confused, and a bit bored too, if I'm being honest. That made the climax feel very...anticlimactic, in addition to how drawn out I felt it was.
Lastly, while I loved the attention to detail, the history lessons, and the descriptions, I was not a fan of the first person narrative here. I'm not usually a fan of first person anyway, but this one read kind of awkwardly. Almost like that's not really how people sound in their heads. I don't know. I wasn't impressed with it and it took a bit of adjustment to get used to it. I definitely would not say this was poorly written. Just...maybe not how I'd prefer it.
I do think this book is overall decent, but it didn't give me what I wanted. The things I liked about it were lovely, but it wasn't enough to keep me entertained. I was impatient by the end, and some of the toxic vampire relationship tropes in that last quarter really ruined things. It's not the most problematic book in the world, but it rubbed me the wrong way. I was initially still thinking about continuing with the books after I finished it, but having read other books I've enjoyed more since then, I don't think I will. I do, however, think that I would have LOVED this book if I were in middle school, if this had been out around the time that Beautiful Creatures first came out. It's just not for me as an adult, I guess.
Anyway, after I left New Orleans, I got to reading Zatanna immediately and adored it. And maybe because of that, I was still wondering about this book. The name was intriguing. The cover was gorgeous. If I liked one book by the author, wasn't it likely I'd enjoy another? But I needed some distance from NOLA, so it wasn't for another month or so that I finally bought it. And then it sat, unread, for months.
Now I think I knew going into this story that it probably wouldn't be my favorite book in the world. But I thought I'd at least like it a little. And honestly, for most of the book, I was expecting to continue with the series. I thought I'd keep going, just to see what happened. It was moderately intriguing, after all.
And then I got to the end, and that blew EVERYTHING. And worse still, I ended up reading a book I thought was exceptional right after, making this book feel even less enjoyable by comparison. So not only did I drop my rating, but I'm not even sure I want to keep this book on my shelves anymore. I have a few reasons why.
But first, I'm aware that because this book is YA, it's probably not going to be entirely for me. I was kind of over YA back when I was still the targeted audience, and I am much older than that now. It's very rare that I find a YA book that appeals to me, because a lot of the tropes and the immaturity demonstrated by the characters is irksome and gets in the way of my enjoyment despite an otherwise perfectly acceptable plot. So recognize that my views may be biased or skewed because of this.
I guess I will start with the positives though, because this book wasn't all bad.
Arden knows her city. I can tell how much she loves it. And while at first it was a bit interesting to me that this book would be described as a love letter to New Orleans when the entire place is in absolute shambles after a massive hurricane (simply dubbed The Storm), it started to make sense to me after a while. Sure, the author mentioned often how bad the crime and murder rates were going up. The looters and the tragedy and the loss and so many other things that might make New Orleans seem unappealing to outsiders. But she manages to capture the heart of New Orleans despite that. Now, after my visit, I quickly realized that New Orleans was not for me and I would never be living there in the future, despite all my earlier proclamations that that's where I truly belonged. NOLA lost a bit of that glamor for me when I came home. But this book brought some of that magic back. I still know it's not the place for me, but the way it was described made me WANT it to be. Despite the tragedy that struck NOLA, there was still something beautiful about the place, it's culture, that I wanted to be a part of somehow. The author knows how to set a scene, and her descriptions of the food, the music, the people, and the places in the french quarter really stuck out to me. I think that's partly why I wanted to read this book to begin with. I wanted to be immersed in it's setting. And Arden delivered on that expectation. And what's cool is I could picture some of the places she discussed. I knew of some of the things she had described from having briefly been there before, which I'd never been able to do with a book before. So that was pretty cool and made up for a lot of my earlier doubts with the book. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough to save it by the end of incline me to read more.
As far as characters go, I can't say I was particularly fond of most of them. I can barely even remember most of their names. The one that seems to stick out the most to me though was Ren. I loved Ren, and felt that if I could get along with or be friends with anyone, it would've been him. That may be because he's an adult, granted, so I'll automatically relate to him better, but he just had such a fun presence, and every time he came up (which was sadly not all that often since he is just a side character), I got pretty excited about it. I could absolutely read a book just about him.
I also really liked how the author wrote in New Orleans history. Apart from the diary entries, which I wouldn't really count anyway, every time Ren gave our characters a little history lesson, I was rapt with attention. In fact, one of the few scenes that still manages to stand out so well is the one where he is giving a night tour. I still wish I'd done one of those myself while in NOLA.
Last among the good things list is I really liked that we got to see Halloween night with the parade. That's the kind of NOLA thing that I want to read about. It wasn't Mardi Gras via the eyes of a NOLA native, but it was probably even better that it wasn't since Halloween is my favorite holiday, and I love reading about any celebration of it anywhere.
But then we have the not so great things.
One of the worst offenders was the pacing of the book. I know the book is long, but this took me what felt like an absurd amount of time to read, and I didn't even really have that many things going on this time around that would've prevented me from reading, bar the fact that some days it was so slow that I didn't feel like reading at all. That's the issue. I felt like too little was happening for too long, or it was creeping by at a snail's pace, when I'm not sure that it needed to. I wouldn't sacrifice the attention to detail the author utilized in order to shorten it. I just wish it didn't feel so slow. I understand there's a mystery here, and some creeping dread isn't a bad thing, but sometimes, the story was borderline losing me because of the pacing. Events could have been executed a bit differently. Even during the climax, it felt oddly drawn out even though so much was happening. But the thing that slowed this book down the most were the journal entries. They didn't read like normal journal entries. They were stiff and boring and I understand what their point was, but I don't think we needed quite so many, or for them to be as long. I usually love journal entries, but I was so bored by these.
But honestly my biggest criticism are some of the tropes involved. I know I should've known going into this book that it would be about vampires (especially given what store I found it in), and I didn't, so that's my bad. I'm not very drawn to vampires. But my god, I am DEFINITELY not drawn to vampires in teen novels. I think what bothered me most is how these vampires...lacked originality. It felt like every other YA vampire I'd read about in the past. And these ones felt like they were on the cusp of toxicity. Our main character seems to have this weird love triangle thing going on involving one of the vampires. She just can't seem to get him out of her head. But what bothered me was that, SPOILER,
Now I'd already come to terms when I started the book that YA books are different. They can get away with unrealistic behaviors, or magic systems that don't quite make sense, and it's fine because that's not the main emphasis of the story anyway. It's not like adult novels. But my god. It was so hard to believe that some of this was happening! Like the fact that our main character can just get into an illegal speakeasy that her dad has created and all the people he works with are like "yeah this is fine, I'll let his 16 year old daughter who's practically in her underwear come in and offer her a drink with absolutely no problems, AND not tell her dad she's there or ask if it's okay she be there." I don't know. That's just one example. But additionally, there were just a lot of supernatural things that didn't feel like they were explained in this book. Maybe they will be in future installments, and maybe we aren't supposed to know everything. It's supernatural after all. But the lack of an explanation sometimes felt like a cheap cop out... Because of this, there seemed to be a lot of things happening just because it was convenient.
My last couple of points aren't as long. But I did feel like there were too many characters. I'm sure they all play a role in future installments, so I'm not saying they should be cut, necessarily. But it got very confusing very quickly because there were so many of them. Especially at the end, when the climax was happening. I think that partially made it hard for me to understand what was happening. As a result, I felt confused, and a bit bored too, if I'm being honest. That made the climax feel very...anticlimactic, in addition to how drawn out I felt it was.
Lastly, while I loved the attention to detail, the history lessons, and the descriptions, I was not a fan of the first person narrative here. I'm not usually a fan of first person anyway, but this one read kind of awkwardly. Almost like that's not really how people sound in their heads. I don't know. I wasn't impressed with it and it took a bit of adjustment to get used to it. I definitely would not say this was poorly written. Just...maybe not how I'd prefer it.
I do think this book is overall decent, but it didn't give me what I wanted. The things I liked about it were lovely, but it wasn't enough to keep me entertained. I was impatient by the end, and some of the toxic vampire relationship tropes in that last quarter really ruined things. It's not the most problematic book in the world, but it rubbed me the wrong way. I was initially still thinking about continuing with the books after I finished it, but having read other books I've enjoyed more since then, I don't think I will. I do, however, think that I would have LOVED this book if I were in middle school, if this had been out around the time that Beautiful Creatures first came out. It's just not for me as an adult, I guess.