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A review by michelleheegaard
The Lost Girl by Sangu Mandanna
2.0
started out so great and then.... it went bad
The Plot/the world
I really, really love dystopia. Throughout time people have tried several ways to cheat death and the idea about an echo taking your place when you are gone that was a new one I had not heard about before. So naturally I was hooked. I expected a real true battle for trying to convince everyone that she was Amarra and in the end maybe fail. Well... that did happen. But what also happened was that the whole school found out what Eva was, and instead of going to the police (echoes are illegal in India, where she lives as Amarra) they start bullying her. This was just weird and not what you would have expected. Theee kids have been brought up their whole life believing echoes are a abormanation and illegal. Yet noone turns her in.
Also, something happens in Evas life that makes her run away. But very soon the weavers catch. She is offered an alternative to death from the weavers. She accepts, but very soon she tries to run again. And then she does not want to run but want to hold her ground and fight. All of this is really ignoring. It seems as if teh author had all of these really great ideas and then just threw them all in on those 40 pages. It makes it so unrealistic and ruins the reading experience. Instead of threwing them all in to one book, she could have spread them all out more...
But I liked the idea that started it all; create another that takes over your role in life when you are gone. That was a great idea that got lost in all of the other.... stuff.
2 out of 5
The Characters
Eva
I liked that Mandanna made Eva different from Amarra. What i did not like was that Eva just seemed to forgive everyone that was mean to her. She was always so understanding about other peoples feeling and why they did what they did. That really pissed me off. You do not just forgive people that bullies you everyday, and you do not just forgive people that order you dead. You just don't. God, I hated that.
Also, this story really tries to make you question wheter echoes are humans and have a sould or are a abormanation and are soulless. The author could ahve gone more into that. She makes Eva so human-like that she kinda erases her own question; do echoes have a soul? Not good. She could have made her more non-human. Eva could at some point had acted totally different from what a human being what have done, or not have had that many emotions. Something...
The Guardians
Echoes are still not accepted and some people called the hunters hunt down echoes and kill them. They call them a abormanation to God.
Because of that every echo has some guardians to watch over him or her.
Evas guardians are called Erik, Ophelia and Jonathan and she is being raised by a woman called Mina Ma.
Jonathan dies at some point and his son, Sean, takes his place.
Now, what is all so wonderful about these guardians is that they are all just so good to her. Their job is partly to keep her save, and partly to tell the weavers whenever she does something that is not something Amarra would have done. They do the first part but forget the second. That is really unrealistic. We are talking about 5 people who are all working for the weaver and none of them tell on Eva.
Opehlia is the daughter of one of the three weavers and not even she tells them about Eva. Erik is a really good friend to another weaver and he does not tell them either. Is that realistic? I mean Eva does quite a lot of things that are not Amarra-like and noone tells them! Why? Because of love..... I really ahted that part. Really, really unrealistic.
Sean
Sean takes as Evas Guardian after his father, Jonathan, dies. Sean is around Evas age and (big spoiler) they fall in love. Their little love story is one of those really unrealistic ones, where the couple from one day to another just falls in love. The exception here is that they do not even kiss before at the very end. They have not even explored there feelings and yet they are still madly in love with each other. Sigh...
Ray
Ray is Amarras boyfreind and one of the only characters I relly really like. We both see his good side and his really mean and bad side. We see him being conflicted about Eva, because she looks and acts like his dead girlfriend Amarra, but still he knows that it is not her. For me he really represented the whole issue of grieve. At one point you want to hold on as tight as you can and at another point you just have to let go and tell your goodbuys somehow.
He was awesome eventhough he pissed me off sometimes.
Amarras familie
Amarra lived with her parents and younger brother and sister in India.
Amarras mother is the only one, who actually believed that Amarra had walked in the Eva and Eva was just some kind of 'backup-body'. The rest of the family, the father and the siblings does not. That was really unrealistic as well. The parents has been paying for this echo all of Evas life and yet the father does not believe what he pays for?
Also, the younger brother are around 13 years old and he is described as wiser for his age... First of all the only thing that indicates that he wiser than his age is that he does not believe Eva is Amarra. That's it.
The youngest girl is about 5 years old and she instantly knew that Eva was not Amarra either. I don't really know if I would call that realistic but I actually really liked that. You say that small children can sense some things without really know what is going on and I liked that this story had that. I liked that little touch.
2 out of 5
The Plot/the world
I really, really love dystopia. Throughout time people have tried several ways to cheat death and the idea about an echo taking your place when you are gone that was a new one I had not heard about before. So naturally I was hooked. I expected a real true battle for trying to convince everyone that she was Amarra and in the end maybe fail. Well... that did happen. But what also happened was that the whole school found out what Eva was, and instead of going to the police (echoes are illegal in India, where she lives as Amarra) they start bullying her. This was just weird and not what you would have expected. Theee kids have been brought up their whole life believing echoes are a abormanation and illegal. Yet noone turns her in.
Also, something happens in Evas life that makes her run away. But very soon the weavers catch. She is offered an alternative to death from the weavers. She accepts, but very soon she tries to run again. And then she does not want to run but want to hold her ground and fight. All of this is really ignoring. It seems as if teh author had all of these really great ideas and then just threw them all in on those 40 pages. It makes it so unrealistic and ruins the reading experience. Instead of threwing them all in to one book, she could have spread them all out more...
But I liked the idea that started it all; create another that takes over your role in life when you are gone. That was a great idea that got lost in all of the other.... stuff.
2 out of 5
The Characters
Eva
I liked that Mandanna made Eva different from Amarra. What i did not like was that Eva just seemed to forgive everyone that was mean to her. She was always so understanding about other peoples feeling and why they did what they did. That really pissed me off. You do not just forgive people that bullies you everyday, and you do not just forgive people that order you dead. You just don't. God, I hated that.
Also, this story really tries to make you question wheter echoes are humans and have a sould or are a abormanation and are soulless. The author could ahve gone more into that. She makes Eva so human-like that she kinda erases her own question; do echoes have a soul? Not good. She could have made her more non-human. Eva could at some point had acted totally different from what a human being what have done, or not have had that many emotions. Something...
The Guardians
Echoes are still not accepted and some people called the hunters hunt down echoes and kill them. They call them a abormanation to God.
Because of that every echo has some guardians to watch over him or her.
Evas guardians are called Erik, Ophelia and Jonathan and she is being raised by a woman called Mina Ma.
Jonathan dies at some point and his son, Sean, takes his place.
Now, what is all so wonderful about these guardians is that they are all just so good to her. Their job is partly to keep her save, and partly to tell the weavers whenever she does something that is not something Amarra would have done. They do the first part but forget the second. That is really unrealistic. We are talking about 5 people who are all working for the weaver and none of them tell on Eva.
Opehlia is the daughter of one of the three weavers and not even she tells them about Eva. Erik is a really good friend to another weaver and he does not tell them either. Is that realistic? I mean Eva does quite a lot of things that are not Amarra-like and noone tells them! Why? Because of love..... I really ahted that part. Really, really unrealistic.
Sean
Sean takes as Evas Guardian after his father, Jonathan, dies. Sean is around Evas age and (big spoiler) they fall in love. Their little love story is one of those really unrealistic ones, where the couple from one day to another just falls in love. The exception here is that they do not even kiss before at the very end. They have not even explored there feelings and yet they are still madly in love with each other. Sigh...
Ray
Ray is Amarras boyfreind and one of the only characters I relly really like. We both see his good side and his really mean and bad side. We see him being conflicted about Eva, because she looks and acts like his dead girlfriend Amarra, but still he knows that it is not her. For me he really represented the whole issue of grieve. At one point you want to hold on as tight as you can and at another point you just have to let go and tell your goodbuys somehow.
He was awesome eventhough he pissed me off sometimes.
Amarras familie
Amarra lived with her parents and younger brother and sister in India.
Amarras mother is the only one, who actually believed that Amarra had walked in the Eva and Eva was just some kind of 'backup-body'. The rest of the family, the father and the siblings does not. That was really unrealistic as well. The parents has been paying for this echo all of Evas life and yet the father does not believe what he pays for?
Also, the younger brother are around 13 years old and he is described as wiser for his age... First of all the only thing that indicates that he wiser than his age is that he does not believe Eva is Amarra. That's it.
The youngest girl is about 5 years old and she instantly knew that Eva was not Amarra either. I don't really know if I would call that realistic but I actually really liked that. You say that small children can sense some things without really know what is going on and I liked that this story had that. I liked that little touch.
2 out of 5