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A review by wchereads
The Girl and the Ghost by Hanna Alkaf
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
2.0
I am unsure how to rate or review this book. There are many things I liked but ultimately there are more thing I didn't like.
Th set up was solid. A girl who's a bit "strange", lives with a borderline neglectful mother and struggles to build friendship, and a ghost who loves the girl dearly but does not know the best way to protect her and relies on dark methods a bit too much... I feel like there are lots of potentials for character development here. There's a lot of nuance too with the girl and her mother's relationship and also the way the girl reacts to/interacts with the school bullies. But none of these are explored in a satisfying way.
What bothered me the most was how the bullying was handled. I checked out when the girl would rather take essentially inhumane treatment than doing ANYTHING for herself. Not letting Ghost retaliate is one thing, but considering any sorts of fighting back as bad as the bullies themselves is quite another.
The girl's character development is incredibly weak and nonexistent. The conflict with the antagonist also feels fake and unconvincing. For the rest of the book I was simply not engaged.
Th set up was solid. A girl who's a bit "strange", lives with a borderline neglectful mother and struggles to build friendship, and a ghost who loves the girl dearly but does not know the best way to protect her and relies on dark methods a bit too much... I feel like there are lots of potentials for character development here. There's a lot of nuance too with the girl and her mother's relationship and also the way the girl reacts to/interacts with the school bullies. But none of these are explored in a satisfying way.
What bothered me the most was how the bullying was handled. I checked out when the girl would rather take essentially inhumane treatment than doing ANYTHING for herself. Not letting Ghost retaliate is one thing, but considering any sorts of fighting back as bad as the bullies themselves is quite another.
The girl's character development is incredibly weak and nonexistent. The conflict with the antagonist also feels fake and unconvincing. For the rest of the book I was simply not engaged.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Bullying