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Book Review: Wilder Girls

WILDER GIRLS by Rory Power

5 Stars

Verdict: Dark, gritty, beautiful. 

An infection has taken over the Raxter School for Girls, and the survivors are each damaged in different, gruesome ways. Quarantined on the island, all they can do is wait for the outside world to find a cure. When Hetty's friend goes missing, she breaks the rules to find her. 

I listened to the audiobook, and the voice actor was superb. It's also a fairly short listen, too, and well suited to the format.  

There's a content warning for body horror. The book generally has a spooky, apocalyptic feel to it, but I wouldn't personally call it scary. A little gruesome in places, but not too gross, which is how I like it. It's also not the happiest story, so I wouldn't call it a book for everyone.  

That said, I really loved it. 

The pace is gradual and steady, and the POV flips a couple of times to give a better overview of what's going on inside Raxter. The plot leans towards predictable, so for me, the story became more about enjoying the other things: the characters, the complex relationships, and the beautiful writing. It has lots of girl power too, friendships, romance, and feminism to boot. 

What I really loved is the honesty behind some of the characters. There's a bit about feeling like the third wheel of the friendship group, and another snippet about loving a parent but being distant. These are things which other YA books tend to 'tidy' away, usually with a good orphan backstory or easy friendships - they're complex issues which don't get mentioned often, and so it was interesting to hear them explored. The messiness is what really drew me into this book. 

It's also a novel to one I wrote years ago. I won't mention anything more on that yet...

Anyway, I've given it 5 stars, but my real rating would be 4.5. It's easier to get through the lulls of a story via audiobook, and I don't think I would have enjoyed reading it as much as listening while multitasking. I was also kind of expecting more from the ending...but I guess I'll need to keep going with this series. I would highly recommend it as a short, unique book. 

Source: Bought it.

Affiliate link: Buy Wilder Girls on Amazon.

Video: https://youtu.be/0YtRAs6EPh8

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