A review by readwithcatriona
The Blessed Girl by Angela Makholwa

1.0

Bontle Tau lives a glamorous life from her Instagram feed. The expensive bags, the fancy hotels, meals out, exotic holidays.... she thrives on wealth. Luckily she has “a degree in MENcology” to manipulate her “blessers” to pay for it all. She has multiple men on the go, an ex husband that won’t let go and a friend group that’s built on outshining the other

Honestly don’t think I’ve read something that literally has no plot??? Like for starters, the book is written as if it’s Bontle’s diary, very informal and self absorbed. The story just felt boring and nothing exciting stood out. For the first quarter it’s literally her describing how she knows all these different men and what they’ve contributed to her life of luxury. Theres far too many mini storylines that are wrapped up too quickly without any proper clarification or depth. It gives a very “sex and the city” vibe but over exaggerated events and even bigger self absorbed characters. The people in Bontle’s life is given no focus and therefore are felt like accessories in her life rather than important people.

One thing I enjoyed was that it used cultural terminology which thankfully you are given a glossary list in the back for so I was able to connect better to the setting and understand the characters surroundings better. The author attempted to include difficult themes like drug abuse, sexual assault of a minor and HIV, but it was thrown in at the end and was given no chance to properly be developed into the story.

Overall I didn’t really like the book and I very rarely rate a book lower than 3 stars. The synopsis on Amazon didn’t give much away other than Instagram and fake was and I guess I was drawn to the pretty cover. But to be honest, Instagram is barely mentioned at all and it’s rather a sugar daddy focussed book.