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ksbrooks98's review against another edition
challenging
dark
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
I really enjoyed Wilder Girls. Rory Power’s ability say something incredibly impactful without dragging it out. It’s a YA novel but very high level and interesting for anyone. The end is very open, but I like that it leaves what happens completely open for interpretation.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Self harm, Suicide, Terminal illness, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Grief, Death of parent, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, and Pandemic/Epidemic
jebrollier's review against another edition
dark
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
I feel like the author was too preoccupied with writing the next great horror Sci Fi novel along the lines of Lord of the Flies or The Island of Dr Moreau, but not occupied enough with just making sure it was well-written. The plot was engaging enough for me to want to finish the book, but the horror was egregious, the ending felt rushed, and there were number of inconsistencies and plot holes. Fine concept, poor execution.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Confinement, Gore, Self harm, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Blood, Medical trauma, Injury/Injury detail, and Pandemic/Epidemic
Moderate: Animal death
anahilgert's review against another edition
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror
Moderate: Self harm and Suicide
ray149's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
Gorgeous dystopian horror with a light queer spin. Enjoyed it the whole way through!
Content Warnings
Moderate: Gore, Suicide, and Suicide attempt
Minor: Torture
dayvyjones's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
I went into Wilder Girls almost totally blind, unsure if I would like the book at all. But as soon as I started, I was immediately enthralled by its mystery. I found myself deeply appreciating the characters and their flaws, as well as their dynamics with each other. With each page, I became more and more interested in how this could possibly turn out. I will say that it is pretty graphic with its gore, but it was manageable and I’d say more fantastical than anything, sans a couple scenes.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Death, and Suicide
0lli_e's review against another edition
3.5
It's amazing. But it left me wishing for more answers, and an ending with a bit more finality to it.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Death, Gore, Blood, and Death of parent
Moderate: Abandonment
Minor: Suicide
thebetterstory's review against another edition
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.75
I wish this lived up to its premise. "Boarding school girls go full Lord of the Flies, with bonus body horror" has tons of potential as a concept, and for the first half of the book or so while it's setting up its mysteries I was hopeful it would deliver.
Unfortunately, the book didn't seem to have any real themes to tie its plot together. The Tox seems perfectly designed to be a meaningful metaphor: it's only survivable by cis girls (or presumably AFAB folks in general, which is addressed), it only hits during or after puberty, and in at least some of its forms it causes the victims to develop bestial features, animalistic rage and merge with sentient plant life. At times the book seems to suggest it frees the girls from the confines of their social and gender roles, but most of the time it's just played straightforwardly as an uncomplicated horror-flavoured problem with no greater meaning. It works that way because it works that way.
Without particularly strong prose or ideas to fall back on, the plot meanders around and becomes just a series of things happening. Often bad things happening, often directly as the result of poor decisions made by the main trio of girls. I frequently had the urge to reach through the book and shake them.Why deliver the obvious can of euthanasia gas to the Headmistress you know you can't trust? Why lie to a boy to get him to kiss you when you have Deadly Body Horror Plague if you're going to feel bad when he inevitably contracts it, especially if that's then going to be played for angst as though you couldn't have known? Logic is thin on the ground, both with the girls and with the actual plot itself, and when the answers to the latter's mysteries are revealed they're both poorly explained and incredibly dull. Parasite worms as the results of melting polar ice? Really? This would perhaps work if the book had been going hard on ecological themes, but it really doesn't.
So with all that said, do the characters and their relationships manage to carry the book? Nope. The characterization is wildly inconsistent. We're introduced to Byatt as someone caring and good at holding herself together for other people's sake, and the way the book rips that away isn't so much interesting as baffling because there was little to no foreshadowing. Reese is established as a cold, harsh determinator with a temper who wants to survive and win no matter what, but she spends most of the second half of the book being the opposite of pragmatic, while Hetty steps in to take that role. Meanwhile, a ton of emphasis is placed on Hetty's guilt and feelings of camaraderie towards the other girls,only for her to abandon them all to die at the end without a second thought. Shortly after criticizing the Headmistress and Taylor for wanting to do the same thing. Make it make sense!!!
The weak, half-hearted ending is just the final straw. If you want a first-person book about a clever group of women in isolated circumstances dealing with mystery and excellent eco-horror, I'd recommend you bypass this entirely and go for Annihilation instead.
Unfortunately, the book didn't seem to have any real themes to tie its plot together. The Tox seems perfectly designed to be a meaningful metaphor: it's only survivable by cis girls (or presumably AFAB folks in general, which is addressed), it only hits during or after puberty, and in at least some of its forms it causes the victims to develop bestial features, animalistic rage and merge with sentient plant life. At times the book seems to suggest it frees the girls from the confines of their social and gender roles, but most of the time it's just played straightforwardly as an uncomplicated horror-flavoured problem with no greater meaning. It works that way because it works that way.
Without particularly strong prose or ideas to fall back on, the plot meanders around and becomes just a series of things happening. Often bad things happening, often directly as the result of poor decisions made by the main trio of girls. I frequently had the urge to reach through the book and shake them.
So with all that said, do the characters and their relationships manage to carry the book? Nope. The characterization is wildly inconsistent. We're introduced to Byatt as someone caring and good at holding herself together for other people's sake, and the way the book rips that away isn't so much interesting as baffling because there was little to no foreshadowing. Reese is established as a cold, harsh determinator with a temper who wants to survive and win no matter what, but she spends most of the second half of the book being the opposite of pragmatic, while Hetty steps in to take that role. Meanwhile, a ton of emphasis is placed on Hetty's guilt and feelings of camaraderie towards the other girls,
The weak, half-hearted ending is just the final straw. If you want a first-person book about a clever group of women in isolated circumstances dealing with mystery and excellent eco-horror, I'd recommend you bypass this entirely and go for Annihilation instead.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Child death, Death, Forced institutionalization, and Murder
Moderate: Gun violence, Suicide, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Self harm and Vomit
spadefootfrog's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
I enjoyed this quite a bit, but it also disappointed me. The relationship building was sparse, there were some confusing loose ends, and the ending was a let down.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Gore, Suicide, and Murder
zmeiat's review against another edition
challenging
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.25
Very interesting and engaging story. It could however have fleshed out the Tox and its properties more since It felt like it was doing a lot of things at once.
Nevertheless it was a good read.
Nevertheless it was a good read.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Body horror, Death, Gore, Self harm, Suicide, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Medical content, Death of parent, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Vomit
beeboy03's review against another edition
dark
emotional
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
2.0
i think the concept of this book is really intriguing and had the potential to be great but the story was strongly lacking. the characters relationships are so confusing and i feel like we never got to see them properly interact. hetty and reese have zero chemistry and reese seems to only exist to support hetty, having no character traits of her own. byatt’s intentions are also so confusing, why the heck did she kiss that man?! i have no idea. and them finding her initials in the tree as proof of her being alive makes no sense since we never see byatt do this. i guess we can assume she was there when taken to be tested but it’s too disconnected when not seeing it from hyatt’s perspective. another inconsistency is hetty saying she’s never seen byatt off the island, “when i see her on the mainland, will she still be my byatt?” but we’ve been told that they have gone to the mainland together before! also hetty and reese seem to care about everyone but at the same time they don’t? and they just leave them all to die? and why the HECK is the only explanation for the tox climate change? it definitely needed more explaining than just that. overall this book was wildly inconsistent with little explanation, and the characters were not fleshed out enough.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Self harm, Suicide, and Vomit