Note: I'm going to do something totally different...rather then holding back my opinion until the end I am going to present it first then explain why I like/dislike it as well as the pros and cons of reading it. Shall we get our examining gowns on and place the patient on the table? This will be fun.
This story takes place at an Asylum, for the most part that is. Seventeen-year-old Louisa Cosgrove longs to break free from her respectable life as a Victorian doctor's daughter and become a doctor herself (unheard of in those days). But her dreams become a nightmare when she is sent to Wildthorn Hall; labeled a lunatic, deprived of her liberty and even her real name. As she unravels those who've betrayed her and incarcerated her, she comes to know some of the patients and workers and even finds love.
You may not see from the picture but it states;
Treachery locks her away. Love is the key.
My verdict: The best book I've read this year. I'm not being sarcastic. I have been looking for a book with a developing character, someone who changes from the beginning of the book and becomes a new person. Someone who does not give up her dreams and life for a boy or has love triangles. Someone who breaks the rules of society and it's taboos. And I've found it. Louisa Cosgrove is my 2011 Best Character of a teen fiction book. The plot is refreshing and full of action and suspense. I devoured this book in only three (3) days!
So you know why I like it, now here is why I think you'll like it.
Pros: Hello, the plot is something new; a girl who is falsely accused of insanity is sent to an asylum, and she's clearly not crazy, and must escape. It's even based on a few events in history of how patients in the asylums where treated. It will amaze you at how much the doctors and workers got away with such cruel things. It forces you to acknowledged that 'Gentlemen' are not that great. I've heard people say that they wish men were more like that (gentlemen like) - usually the Victorian era - and be romantic again. The truth is they were the way they were because men felt that women were inferior and stupid.
If you were told you couldn't follow your dreams, that you had to marry and bare children and look good in society, would you be happy? Louisa Cosgrove is the embodiment of a modern woman in the Victorian era who says no to this question. How she plans to escape, how she escapes and the friends she makes are the height of this story. I also think it's important that we read something that ask us what we would do in the same situation. Would we trust the people Louisa does or would we side with another?
I find it difficult to persuade you to read this without giving away a few spoilers (no, not who-did-what but a few facts) so please bare with me. Louisa starts off as this angst-y teen who wants to follow her dreams. By the end she, her dreams, and the reasons for them, have been altered. She, in her attitude, as been altered. Her view of life is changed drastically and I find it wonderful that a character can look at life in an adult manner and learn from it.
Cons: I wanted to add this to the pros but I feel that not everyone would read it if they knew this. Louisa falls in love near (and I do mean near, like ten passages before) the end...but not with a boy. Yup. The best character I've read this year likes girls. Though it is never stated that she is a lesbian it is ambiguous (Open to more than one interpretation) to it throughout the story. So why, even though I love the character and the story is this in the con of the argument? Because I don't know you, the reader of this blog, and if you'll be let down. It would be rather unfair of me to tell you this is a love story (to me it is but there's more to it) only to have you hate it for it's different choice of love interest. Personally, I liked it. I loved that there is a new love interest, that there are stories like this that don't fully focus on the sexuality of it all. But rather the story and sexuality happens to be in it. There is one MAJOR con in this book; the author does this present vs. past style of writing. There are four parts to the book and only in the first part does this happen. The story opens with Louisa in a carriage going to what she believes to be her new employers house. Once it's revealed where she's really at the section ends. Note: there are no chapters only sections of writing. The story breaks into a bold text that tells us about her life as a child. Then back to the present, then back to the past, then present and then past, etc. Again, only in the first part. After that you see why this was done. It is a writing style and if done correctly, it can work, however, I found it annoying. So, I cheated and read the bold text past before going back to the light text present (the past and present are separated by the text; past=bold, present= italic styled).
Overall: So some of you may not like the whole girl likes girl issue (see my last blog post to understand why this story makes me happy) and the issue of going back and forth from past to present can be annoying. Yet, with a fresh plot of treachery and adventure, a character who you can relate to and want to succeed makes this book great. It's an easy read, though the size may make you think otherwise, and something I will absolutely be rereading again in the future.
So in the end this curious rabbit says READ THIS BOOK!!!
signed; The Carnivorous Rabbit
p.s. I told you I'd have a positive review ;)
Beastly 2010
Red Riding Hood 2011.
Sleeping Beauty 2011
Snow White and the Huntsmen 2012