Member: neighbour

I'm looking around LT finding books and their people and I saw your comment about A Great and Terrible Beauty on wyvernfriend's library -- I agree. Parts of it were good, but overall I didn't like it (and didn't bother to read the sequels, though I did skim them just to see what happened. I will say I liked the way she ended the entire series).

posted by jhwmsls at 3:37 pm (EST) on Apr 10, 2009

I'm in the middle of Wicked by Gregory Maguire at the moment, almost finished actually. It's good, not amazing, but at the same time I stayed up till half two last night reading it without getting tired so it must be some bit good! Et toi??

posted by skittlesej at 4:42 pm (EST) on Feb 6, 2008

Hey...how do you do?

posted by skittlesej at 5:19 am (EST) on Feb 4, 2008

Wow, you started this a day before me...well actually I started it a day after you...But anyway, my point being I thought you were signed up here way before me...nite!

posted by skittlesej at 6:24 pm (EST) on May 10, 2007

my review of "A Great and Terrible Beauty": Interesting but in some ways unsatisfying. Rooted firmly in the real life of victorian girls. After her mother's death Gemma is sent to a victorian boarding school. Prone to visions that come true, Gemma finds it hard to fit in. With warnings to avoid her powers she is being followed by a young man. She starts to use her power but it seems to be trying to take her life over, and there's a darkness there that's trying to overwhelm her.
I was left wanting more out of this book, the conclusion seemed a bit simplistic to me and in the realm of imagination surely it's nearly impossible to destroy everything without almost destroying your own life. Still it would satisfy older female teen readers who are looking for a step up from Harry Potter.
Finding that it's the first in a sequence of three novels improves the ending somewhat.

posted by wyvernfriend at 3:32 pm (EST) on Jan 13, 2007