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A review by elle4352
The Gilded Girl by Alyssa Colman
funny
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
The Gilded Girl is a middle-grade, fantasy novel that is a reimagining of "A Little Princess" with magic.
Things you'll find:
*A boarding school for girls with magic*
*Blossoming Friendships*
*Lots of fire references*
As per usual, I had no idea what I was getting into, however, I picked up on the "A Little Princess" storyline by about 15 pages in and was pretty excited. A Little Princess was my favorite book as a kid and still remains one of my favorite books ever. This book definitely takes the baseline of the story and gives it a magical twist that's both fun and whimsical.
Emma and Izzy parallel Sara and Becky and I enjoyed watching them grow from two girls that don't know each other (I can't really say they're enemies because Izzy's issues with Emma are very one sided) to best friends and I really liked a lot of themes this author was going for. This book explores the idea of true friendship and class differences, the latter really being emphasized by the early 1900s time period of the novel. The writing won me over, Colman is very direct and simple with her narration, but fanciful at the same time. You're able to picture everything and everyone in the novel without too much explanation to weigh down the image. I enjoyed the magical quirks she chose; the cat, the Blanding food, the flowers, golden cars, magitecure, boxing of the ears. It was all really cute and a cool play on words to add a little pop to the New York we all know from our history books.
I did feel that Emma was a little too naive through the book, and was glad when she finally grew out of that. But in the beginning, it almost felt like this child had lived her entire life in a windowless room, with no other interaction with anyone other then her father based on how little she seemed to know about....well anything. I'm also a little surprised that no where in the author's acknowledgements, nor in the summary, does she ever mention "A Little Princess". I get where sometimes, people want to avoid comp. titles to give their book a fair shot, but this is almost scene for scene and character for character a match with "A Little Princess". It's 100% that story; there's a Sara, Becky, Miss Minchin, Amelia, Ermengarde, Lavinia, even a Jesse. The only people missing here are Lottie, Ram Dass, and Mr. Carrisford (or Randolph from the 1995 movie version which this book is a closer adaptation of then the original book). It just seems a bit weird to me.
Overall, this book is a pleasant read and like a stroll down memory lane. Younger me would've loved this and I think it's a perfect edition to a library for kids that like witch stories, but not dark witch stories.
Things you'll find:
*A boarding school for girls with magic*
*Blossoming Friendships*
*Lots of fire references*
As per usual, I had no idea what I was getting into, however, I picked up on the "A Little Princess" storyline by about 15 pages in and was pretty excited. A Little Princess was my favorite book as a kid and still remains one of my favorite books ever. This book definitely takes the baseline of the story and gives it a magical twist that's both fun and whimsical.
Emma and Izzy parallel Sara and Becky and I enjoyed watching them grow from two girls that don't know each other (I can't really say they're enemies because Izzy's issues with Emma are very one sided) to best friends and I really liked a lot of themes this author was going for. This book explores the idea of true friendship and class differences, the latter really being emphasized by the early 1900s time period of the novel. The writing won me over, Colman is very direct and simple with her narration, but fanciful at the same time. You're able to picture everything and everyone in the novel without too much explanation to weigh down the image. I enjoyed the magical quirks she chose; the cat, the Blanding food, the flowers, golden cars, magitecure, boxing of the ears. It was all really cute and a cool play on words to add a little pop to the New York we all know from our history books.
I did feel that Emma was a little too naive through the book, and was glad when she finally grew out of that. But in the beginning, it almost felt like this child had lived her entire life in a windowless room, with no other interaction with anyone other then her father based on how little she seemed to know about....well anything. I'm also a little surprised that no where in the author's acknowledgements, nor in the summary, does she ever mention "A Little Princess". I get where sometimes, people want to avoid comp. titles to give their book a fair shot, but this is almost scene for scene and character for character a match with "A Little Princess". It's 100% that story; there's a Sara, Becky, Miss Minchin, Amelia, Ermengarde, Lavinia, even a Jesse. The only people missing here are Lottie, Ram Dass, and Mr. Carrisford (or Randolph from the 1995 movie version which this book is a closer adaptation of then the original book). It just seems a bit weird to me.
Overall, this book is a pleasant read and like a stroll down memory lane. Younger me would've loved this and I think it's a perfect edition to a library for kids that like witch stories, but not dark witch stories.