Scan barcode
A review by ohyouread
Where Sleeping Girls Lie by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé
5.0
Why do these creepy boarding schools exist? Is it just for people to be able to write dark academia and horror stories about the people who are FORCED to attend? Honestly, between the costumes (I mean uniforms) the commandments (I mean rules) and the heathen-ous monsters (otherwise known as students), I don’t understand how they’re still around.
Like most YA books that take place in a school, boarding school has its bullies. The difference is that when their parents are the ones to ship them off so they don’t have to deal with them, it also means they aren’t dealing with horrible behaviors. So I knewwwwwww there would be truly awful characters. Was it who I expected it to be? Absolutely not!
I went into Where Sleeping Girls Lie on the remembered high of my adoration of Ace of Spades. I didn’t read the synopsis. I just knew what I had gleaned from the cover and seeing it on social media. But just like the author’s first book, I was left blown away by their takedown of systemic problems in schools. Only this book dealt with sexual assault.
I really loved that I seem to easily fall in love with the characters in Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé’s books. Sade is an orphan who is seemingly thrown to the wolves of Alfred Nobel Academy, albeit by choice, without friends to help or guide her. She knows nothing about the school or its rules and from the very start of the story is playing catch up. She is really relatable is a lot of ways and likable because of that.
I was really hoping this would be a queer story, because Ace of Spades was. I went into it without expectations (that’s kind of a lie, because I expected to love the book and did), but I had my fingers and toes crossed. Now I know and I won’t be answering if it is or not…….. again I’m lying.
Like most YA books that take place in a school, boarding school has its bullies. The difference is that when their parents are the ones to ship them off so they don’t have to deal with them, it also means they aren’t dealing with horrible behaviors. So I knewwwwwww there would be truly awful characters. Was it who I expected it to be? Absolutely not!
I went into Where Sleeping Girls Lie on the remembered high of my adoration of Ace of Spades. I didn’t read the synopsis. I just knew what I had gleaned from the cover and seeing it on social media. But just like the author’s first book, I was left blown away by their takedown of systemic problems in schools. Only this book dealt with sexual assault.
I really loved that I seem to easily fall in love with the characters in Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé’s books. Sade is an orphan who is seemingly thrown to the wolves of Alfred Nobel Academy, albeit by choice, without friends to help or guide her. She knows nothing about the school or its rules and from the very start of the story is playing catch up. She is really relatable is a lot of ways and likable because of that.
I was really hoping this would be a queer story, because Ace of Spades was. I went into it without expectations (that’s kind of a lie, because I expected to love the book and did), but I had my fingers and toes crossed. Now I know and I won’t be answering if it is or not…….. again I’m lying.