The Girl in the Well is Me - Karen Rivers

02:32 Unknown 0 Comments

The whole thing feels like a prank at first, like something they planned - a joke with a punch line. Maybe, before I know it, one of the girls will tell me it’s really a joke and then they get me out of here. 

But then again, maybe not. 
I have a bad, bad feeling about this. I try not to panic. The first thing everyone says to do in emergencies - earthquakes or house fires of if, say, you fall down an abandoned well out in the wasteland behind town - is to stay calm. 

“Stay calm, Kammie” I tell myself. My voice echoes up the dusty shaft to where the girls are, safe on high ground. I kind of think of them as The Girls, with capital letters like that. I think that’s how they think of themselves. 

How pretty is this cover?!

Karen River’s novel is truly inspiring. It’s not something I would immediately have chosen to pick up but the cover definitely intrigued me and the plot even more so (quick thanks to NetGalley for giving me the chance to read this). The way I took to describing it to my friends at university was as a 127 hours-esque plot for children. I wouldn’t say this is a kids book exactly, it definitely reads very well for someone my age and it definitely would relate to someone I think much older. River’s writing style is incredibly engaging and therefore the story really resonates with whomever might choose to pick it up. 

The plot follows Kammie who has moved to Texas and is hoping to make new friends. At the beginning of the novel we aren’t really sure why she’s moved but this is later unfurled in an almost heart wrenching way. Kammie tries to make friends with The Girls, the popular group of Mandy, Kandy and Sandy, and they say that of course she can join, if she passes an initiation, one act of which is the reason Kammie ends up in an abandoned well. 

I really like our narrator Kammie. She’s 11 and moved to a new school and I think that River’s really captured that 11 year old mindset and it really made me think about how when I joined a new school and had to make new friends and it was a really relatable situation that she put our main character in which made us really care about her right from the start. I like how River’s jumps between Kammie’s understanding of her situation and the rational, with the irrational and the imaginative speculative part of the 11 year old mind. It really captures the sort of wondrousness of being a child whilst also being incredibly claustrophobic. 

The setting is pretty much what it says on the tin. Kammie is stuck in a well. She’s fallen into a well and throughout the novel she does slide further and further down into the well and the light above her becomes smaller and smaller. This almost matches her level of hope that she may be rescued. It can also be seen as almost an extended metaphor as, whilst Kammie slides further down, we learn deeper things about her as a character. We learn about why she’s moved to Texas, her relationships with her parents and her brother, and then her relationship with herself and what she thinks of herself. There is a wonderful exploration with this novel about how parents actions can affect a child. It’s not too psychologically charged. In fact it’s quite subtle. But what I think River’s does really well is make us connect so closely with Kammie as a character that when we find out what she has been a victim of, we automatically want what is best for her; ultimately we want her out of the well. 

I would’ve liked The Girls to be a little more well rounded as characters. They have physical flaws described by Kammie but their demeanours seem inherently mean, to the point where they leave her and Kammie believes that they won’t come back. However this could be a stylistic choice on behalf of River’s because Kammie hasn’t really known them very long. I think with this being a “middle-grade” aimed novel, character development away from stereotypical tropes isn’t always necessary but I feel like this would’ve simply added something else to this already enjoyable read. Another thing I would’ve liked a little better explained was her daydreams/hallucinations. As she starts to lose oxygen she begins to see a coyote who can speak french and believes that there are zombie goats beneath her. It was just a little confusing at times as i wasn’t sure if she could actually see these things or if she was just imagining them. 

Overall I think this is a really interesting concept for a novel. It has a very short timeframe with a really engaging narrative voice, good use of time and how the space is used, or lack of it for that matter. I think River’s has created a really enjoyable novel for people of all ages. Pick up “The Girl in the Well is Me” on March 13th. 

Total pages - 224
Total read time -  Untimed
Rating /10 - 6

Recommend - Maybe

0 comments :

The Ask and the Answer - Patrick Ness

09:39 Unknown 0 Comments

I won’t be starting this blog post off with a piece from the book’s beginning because this is book 2 of 3 from Ness’ rather spectacular Chaos Walking trilogy. Some of the things I may mention in this could be seen as spoilers so if you’ve not read the book or are dying to, like I was after finishing The Knife of Never Letting Go, thank you for stopping by but I wouldn’t recommend reading any further. 

Once again a gorgeous cover for Ness' book! Love how it links so well with the story too
As I’ve mentioned already, this book is the second in the trilogy and follows on from Todd and Viola arriving at Haven, the army closing in on them. And boy does Ness just pile on the feelings onto my poor little heart from the very beginning to the end of this novel. The relationship between these two protagonists is tested throughout and the fact that they have been split up despite needing each other so badly is just heart wrenching but such a wonderful plot device. By splitting the two apart we get to see the two different sides to Haven, or New Prentisstown as it becomes, and it also gives us a chance to really get to know these characters on an individual basis. 

What I really liked about this novel in comparison to the first was that Ness changed from having Todd’s singular perspective to the dual narrative of him and Viola. Each chapter reads with a very different voice and the style is very different; Viola’s obviously more educated, reflected in the spelling and structure, whilst Todd is less so and the spelling that I found rather difficult to grasp came back to the second book but was actually a lot easier to get my head around. What I think having the dual narrative really does is show us how dependent the characters are on one another. Frequently we come back to the same questions like where is the other? What are they doing? Are they looking for me? Are they even still alive? I think seeing this really makes it so much sweeter when they are reunited briefly, and so much more heart breaking when they are torn apart. 

I didn’t think it would be possible for Ness to put any more action into this series after the tormenting travels of the first novel, but this holds its own in that department. Sometimes middle books to trilogies can feel like building blocks for a final fight but this novel is no such thing. Yes it provides information that is very important for the final book, which I am desperate to get my hands on when I’ve got some more money, but also it has it’s own story and its own conflicts within which are incredibly complex. Ness’ introduction of the women into society is really interesting to me, seeing as the first book is so heavily male. The new female characters are well rounded and well thought out, Mistress Coyle being a complete badass of a woman who I debate between loving and hating throughout. When I think about some of the actions in this book I can’t help but think of the Suffragettes and their violent response to wanting the vote. There seem to be some similarities between the women of this novel and their rebellion against Mayor, now President, Prentiss and the suffragettes, even if the actions in this novel are bigger and definitely more dangerous. It’s very clever and interesting and you are instantly drawn into the work that these women are doing, whilst also questioning if it is the right way to be going about things; going from being healers and nurses to being rebel activists, verging on terrorism, who set off bombs. 

Mayor Prentiss makes a return in this novel; and he’s still just as terrifying. I think what makes Prentiss such a good villain is the fact that you can almost see what he’s trying to do. It is possible to see how he thinks what he’s doing is a good idea, which then makes you think about if it is a good idea or not. He’s an incredibly complex character who I really like to examine when I’m reading scenes with him in. He can very quickly switch from warm to cold hearted in an instant which makes him unpredictable and therefore definitely more scary than a man like that should be. Also the amount of power and control he has doesn’t help with making him seem less scary. He’s definitely frightening, if only because you realise that people like him do actually exist in the world. 

His actions in this novel however are definitely frightening, especially towards the end where he finally allows Todd to see what happens with their prisoners. Yet even from the start we are wary of him as he convinces Todd that he’s not about to hurt Viola if he does what he wishes. And as Todd works for him throughout the novel we start to see real emotion coming from Mayor Prentiss. He even calls him his son, in front of his actual son Davy. 

Davy is not a character to be left out. I remember being a little frightened of the threat of Davy Prentiss in the first novel of this series, purely because it was his army that were following Todd and Viola and there was always that constant threat of him. Also what happened to Ben in the first book really can’t be forgiven. However throughout The Ask and the Answer, Ness really shows us another side to Davy. He seems to be a character pining after his father’s affection and this is something that I can see being really relatable. Also he doesn’t seem to have any friends of his own age so as the novel progresses and his and Todd’s relationship grows, you really start to get attached to him as a character. Especially when he brings back his mother’s book and tries to apprehend Mayor Prentiss for Viola’s sake. 

The Ask and The Answer is definitely a novel about free will under strict regimes, battling against what you believe to be wrong with underlying tones of rebellion and what happens to those who don’t wish to follow a new structure or order. It’s definitely worth a read if only for the, once again, spectacular cliff hanger that Ness leaves you on for the third and final instalment. 

Total pages - 517
Total read time -  Untimed
Rating /10 - 8
Recommend - Yes 

0 comments :

Your Heart is a Muscle the Size of a Fist - Sunil Yapa

12:52 Unknown 0 Comments

The match struck and sputtered. Victor tried again. He put match head to phosphate strip with the gentle pressure of one long finger and the thing sparked and caught and for the briefest of moments he held a yellow flame. Victor - curled into himself like a question mark, a joint hanging from his mouth; Victor with his hair natural and braided, two thick braids and a red bandanna folded and knotted to hold them back; Victor - with his dark eyes and his thin shoulders and his cafecito con leche skin, a pair of classic Air Jordans on his oversized feet, the leather so white it glowed - imagine him how you will because he hardly knew how to see himself. 



In his debut novel, Sunil Yapa portrays the 1999 Seattle protests against the World Trade Organisation. There were over 40,000 protesters who gathered outside the Sheraton Hotel, where in delegates were waiting to be transported to the convention centre, a once peaceful protest became violent and lead to hundreds of injuries and over 150 arrests. The protesters were a mix of those rejecting cheap foreign labour, environmentalists worried about the pollution involved in shipping outsourced products and labour rights groups worried about foreign countries unsafe working conditions all mixed in with various people who simply wanted to vent about capitalistic actions. 

The plot of the novel follows seven characters over the course of this one day outside the hotel. Victor is probably who I would call the central protagonist. He is a 19 year old runaway intent on selling drugs when he comes across the rioters in the street. He is the step son of another character Bishop who is the chief of police, who is leading the police operation to apprehend the rioters. With Bishop are Ju and Park, two officers; one latina and one a typical american cop. Both have very different methods of dealing with rioters. Rioters like King and John-Henry, peaceful protesters with a romantic past between them, who take Victor in as one of their own. Between intense scenes is introduced Charles Wickransinghe, a delegate from Sri Lanka, trapped inside the hotel and impatient to get to his meeting with Bill Clinton. What Yapa does incredibly well with this is include all groups from all sides of the protest, all of whom are flawed but who have some redeemable qualities. Well some more than others. 

This novel is not for the faint of heart however. There are some dark scenes of real brutality which can really make you think that there is no good in the world. The treatment of the peaceful protesters by the police is unnecessary and yet the way that Yapa deals with such a dark situation is by showing the remorse that is felt by some of the police officers. For me this was incredibly important to know that some of the actions were not necessarily the ones they wanted to make. Even some of the actions of the protesters can be seen as poor decision making. King’s life is shown to be a little darker than her peaceful protester outset might seem, and Victor cannot be said to be completely without fault after running away from his stepfather. However I think giving characters flaws makes them all the more human and makes this novel even more thought provoking. There is no real saying in this novel who is right and who is wrong because there is pretty much no redemption for anyone. 

I think where this book failed to grasp me in the beginning of the novel was through the character descriptions. Some were lengthy, every action attached to an unnecessary adjective which really slowed down my reading time. I did however really start to get into it when the real action began and I felt like I was able to engage with all of the characters. The pace is really what I think makes this novel. It’s heart stopping and breath taking and it’s incredibly well paced. In the beginning it feels long but as Victor joins the protest the pace picks up and it’s truly inspiring to read. In addition to that the best thing about this book is the amount it made me think. I knew nothing about the riots but really you don’t need to to start this novel. There is enough written for you to understand it but really, you can transpose any riot that you know of onto the story. The police brutality and the idea of a peaceful protest turning violent is something that is becoming more and more universal. This novel is a really interesting look into the way the police deal with riotous situations as well views from within the situation, without looking too much at the political or economic issues surrounding it. 

Yapa’s debut novel is a triumph if not for its character development but as it’s ability to start discussions about our culture, our nature as a globalising world and about the ways that we deal with situations in our society that we are not happy with. 

Total pages - 320
Total read time -  Untimed
Rating /10 - 6.5

Recommend - Yes if you’re interested in a story based off true life events

(Book received through Net Galley as an advanced reader copy)

0 comments :