This is a sweet story about a brilliant young lady but it broke my heart and I am desperately trolling around now trying to find a book to read that will make me feel better.

Whew. This girl is a tough cookie. I just wanted to grab on to her and hug her. Gilly is a foster kid that has toughened herself up to survive the world she lives in. She sabotages her placements, making sure that people can't hurt her. She's racist, she's foul-mouthed, she's mean, and she's a thief. She's broken. She's wearing an armor a mile thick, and still hurts constantly because her mama doesn't want her.

Gilly finds herself in a foster placements with a family that starts to affect her a bit. By the end, though she still puts on the tough girl attitude, we see the cracks in her armor, the broken child inside that just wants to be loved.

This book got me right in the feels. I know Gilly. I've seen Gilly fight and claw and sabotage. I've seen adults give up on Gilly, and I've seen Gilly finally open up and blossom once she found a love that she couldn't shake off, no matter what she tried. There are so many Gillys in our broken world, that need that kind of love. My heart was broken during this book. Katherine Paterson has a way of making me cry no matter what book I read of hers. She doesn't pull her punches, she shows you the truth.

This isn't a book that we will read with our book club. It will be a book that I leave lying around my house though, in hopes that my boys might pick it up and read it and be moved. I'm so thankful that my boys don't know this kind of despair and heartache, the kind that forces a child to be so tough and hard, but to understand where it can come from in others, that there is a hard world outside, and that love can soften it.

This is also a revisit due to a class requirement. This is not one that I was looking forward to revisiting. This is one of the most depressing books that I have ever read. That has not changed since I read it back in 2015. It is an important book that opens up great discussion but it hurts my heart and it stays with me. I suppose that is the whole idea...

Graham and I read this on a mini road trip and loved it :)

Gilly, a very intelligent child, who has been in the system for years going from foster home to foster home, making her angry and a brat. She is determined to be with her mother who she believes loves her and wants her. She finds herself with Maime Trotter, the fat widow. William Earnest, 7, a mentally challenged boy along with the blind, black elderly man next door. The reader watches her grow both emotionally and socially. However, the story ends unsatisfactorily for me but I suppose realistically.

Not my stupid assigned children’s book making me cry

Very Clever

"The Great Gilly Hopkins" was very well written and therefore I enjoyed it immensely.

As a seeming permanant member of the Foster care system Gilly moves quite frequently. She is looking to live with her birth family. Oh the incidents she causes!

An excellent ending for sure.

I highly recommend.

Apie šią knygą prisiminiau tik tiek, kad skaitant vaikystėje labai patiko. Tad pamačiusi ją knygų namelyje, nusprendžiau perskaityti dar kartą, būdama jau suaugusi.

Istorijoje apie mamos paliktą ir per globėjų namus tampomą mergaitę, susipina aštrumas su jautrumu. Gilės personažas yra puikus pavyzdys to, kas dažniausiai slepiasi po vaiko maištu ir agresija. Sudaužyti lūkesčiai ir atstūmimas vaiką paverčia dygiu, piktu kaktusu - tam, kad išvengtų dar vieno netikėto nusivylimo ir širdgėlos.

Skaitydama ir iš naujo pasinerdama į šią istoriją, supratau, kodėl man ji taip patiko vaikystėje. Juokiausi iš kandaus ir išraiškingo žodyno, atjaučiau Gilę ir kartu ja piktinausi, o persiritus į antrą knygos pusę neišvengiau ir ašarų.

Man, it has been a long time since I have read this. It was a great listen today at work. Listening today as an adult, my favorite line in this heart wrenching book is when Gilly finally sees the mother who abandoned her and thinks to herself that her dreams of her mother are shattered and her mother is nothing more than a "a flower child gone to seed." God Bless Gilly and all the children in the world out there who are living in her same circumstances.

this poor girl is a orphan and she has to protect her brother from bullies

I am a fifth grade teacher, and read this book while teaching from it to one of my reading groups. I have used it every year since, and it gets better with each reading.

Katherine Paterson's storytelling and descriptive qualities are top-notch. Her characters become so real to the readers, and the storyline unfolds to a greater depth on each page. This book will not disappoint, whether read by a child or an adult!

Plot: 5/5
Pacing: 5/5
Writing: 4/5
Characters: 4.5/5
General Enjoyment: 4/5
Average: 4.5 stars

This was a short yet incredibly impactful novel about a hardened young girl in the foster system who is known for being completely unmanageable. Galadriel (Gilly) Hopkins is eleven years old and has been in numerous foster homes since her mother abandoned her, and the one thing she wants most in the world is for her mother to come retrieve her. When she moves in with the Trotters, she knows she has a plan to leave them and get to her mother. But things aren't going to go quite as Gilly expected...

This book reminded me of the DC movie Shazam minus the superhero stuff, to be honest. A hardened young foster kid who's been in a lot of homes, planning to find their mother before they are swept up by the magic of a ✨found family✨. I'm a sucker for that trope, so I didn't mind, and besides, this book was published long before the movie came out.

But anyway, rambling aside, this was very deep for such a short little novel. My only critique would be that I would have liked it a bit better had it been longer, but that's probably just because it's a middle grade novel rather than YA. Gilly was the type of protagonist that you don't really like, especially at the beginning, but rather feel really bad for. But as it went on, I grew to like her a lot, especially when her character development really progresses. It's a reflection on home and family, and the ills of the foster care system. I also liked the subtle messages of overcoming racism interwoven throughout, and how Gilly learns to get over her learned prejudice through two of my favorite characters, her neighbor and her teacher.

This novel would probably be good for someone in a reading slump, since it's deep and impactful but pretty short. It's a very solid book, that I know I'll be thinking about for a while.