4 stelline piene.
Libba Bray colpisce ancora!
Dopo aver letto e amato The Diviners, dovevo assolutamente recuperare la prima trilogia dell'autrice.
Una grande e terribile bellezza è un ottimo primo volume, che mette delle buone basi per ciò che accadrà nel resto della saga.
Se dovessi descriverla in poche parole, direi che è Bridgerton che incontra un romanzo gotico. Può sembrare una combo assurda, ma vi giuro che ha senso e funziona!
Infatti, da un lato abbiamo la parte in cui Gemma e altri personaggi femminili si formano al collegio Spence per diventare le perfette dame inglesi dell'epoca vittoriana. Mentre dall'altra si sviluppa un mistero intricato, collegato alla scuola e al sovrannaturale.
Trovo che sia un romanzo decisamente innovativo e progressista per l'epoca in cui è uscito, ovvero il 2005. Ho apprezzato davvero molto come Libba Bray ha rappresentato la figura femminile, trasmettendo l'importantissimo messaggio che una donna non deve essere relegata al ruolo di donna e madre. È stato interessante e di ispirazione vedere come Gemma, Felicity, Pippi e Ann si svincolino dal cliché di "angelo del focolare" imposto dalla società vittoriana.
"Women who have power are always feared."
Quanta verità in questa frase.
Inoltre, all'interno del romanzo è rappresentata parte della comunità LGBTQ+, poiché c'è una coppia lesbo. Non posso specificare a chi mi sto riferendo, perché questa rivelazione è correlata a un altro grande plot twist. Comunque, mi ha fatto incredibilmente piacere per le stesse motivazioni sopra elencate: non è scontato trovare una coppia f/f in un libro del 2005. Poi certo, a livello di rappresentazione non è così approfondita, ma per l'epoca già che ci fosse un accenno significa tantissimo.
Rimanendo in ambito amoroso, all'inizio temevo ci fosse un insta love tra due personaggi. Invece, credo proprio che sarà un enemies to lovers AND I'M READY FOR IT!
Poi, ho avuto anche i miei momenti da Signora in Giallo, perché ho indovinato diversi colpi di scena.
Infine, non ho dato le 5 stelle in quanto la parte fantasy non è troppo approfondita. Ma ci può stare, perché si tratta del primo della trilogia, e conoscendo Libba Bray, sono certa che lo amplierà nei prossimi volumi.
Assolutamente consigliato!
"Because you don't notice the light without a bit of shadow. Everything has both dark and light. You have to play with it till you get it exactly right."
"But we can’t live in the light all of the time. You have to take whatever light you can hold into the dark with you."

This book is exceptionally okay. It is like really, really, really, really okay. I think it would be more good and not so much okay if it started out less good in the beginning. As it is, I felt like it had a lot of promise it didn’t live up to. But, it didn’t exactly waste my time, either, so I can’t really say I disliked it or anything. It is just SUPER mediocre. Almost good, it’s so mediocre. Even, throughout, I would think things were going somewhere, but instead things would kind of stay the same. But, the expectation of things going somewhere kind of kept my attention.

This book is about a girl who has special powers. So, right there you’ve basically got me. I mean, there are still only about five books about girls with special powers, right? Female special powers automatically give this book has a bunch of points in its favor. But, after that there is not much to the whole story, so not a lot else going for it. But, speaking of that, let’s list the books with girls who have special powers.

The main contenders:

1. Golden Compass
2. Hunger Games
3. Daughter of Smoke and Bone
4. Blood Red Road

I didn’t include Buffy because, even though the eighth season is written down, the bulk of the story is on TV. And then there is Twilight, where the super power is kind of appalling. And then you have sort of middle-ground books like Shiver, Uglies, Wicked Lovely, City of Bones, Wither, Darkfever, etc., where there is a girl, and she is the protagonist, and there are fantastical things, but the girl doesn’t really have a power, you know? Like, I don’t think falling in love with a dog or seeing fairies is really a power. If anything, it’s a lame power and more similar to the Twilight power. Also, it is scientifically proven that the ol’ magic vagina, or the wikimagvag, as it’s popularly called, is not a super power. And if we’re going for positive role models, I’d kind of rather see nothing fantastical than see super-creepy-mom power or super-child-prostitute power or super-animal-sex power keep cropping up all over the place.

So, that’s my take on the current state of girls with special powers. Actually, now that I think about it, even in my main-contenders list, only Daughter of Smoke and Bone actually has a girl with extra powers that are above the people around her. Even Katniss is just a girl who grew up tough and learned how to shoot stuff in the woods. Man. What is up with girls not getting super powers, huh? That’s kind of a bummer. I know about Kitty and the Midnight Hour and Anita Blake, but I have not read them. Do they actually have special powers, or is that the wikimagvag all over again? And feel free to tell me about any girls I should know about.

In A Great and Terrible Beauty, our girl Gemma has some magical powers, so that’s pretty cool. The thing is that the rest of it isn’t so exciting. There’s kind of a mystery and this group of girls kind of almost destroys, but conveniently saves the world. And Libba Bray confronts anti-feminist messages pretty head on, but, I don’t know, sometimes the way she does that is so heavy handed that it almost seems useless to me. Like, everyone is walking around this book saying stuff like, “Well, my mother told me that ladies have to find a husband and can’t work.” It has this twenty-first-century directness that is a little tiresome to see in a nineteenth-century setting. And then the girls get together and sort of undermine that message by bonding in a magical cave (ummm, and there is actually a chance that is some kind of womb imagery, which is a little tiresome, too). But, at the same time, do they undermine the anti-feminist messages? Not really. The ending is pretty ambivalent about women’s control over our own lives, I think.

A lot of people have talked about how unlikeable the girls are in this story, and I have to agree with that. Some of it seemed deliberate, but that didn’t really make it better to me. They were all grasping for something in what seemed like a symbolic way – Felicity for power, Pippa for romance, Ann for beauty. And then Gemma, the chosen one, knew that people can only get what we desire if we go at it through seeking self-actualization. And all of this plays out in the tone of a fable and ended up as kind of another heavy-handed message that I don’t really disagree with, but that I felt myself resisting only for its heavy-handedness.

So, all of it left me with this really mediocre amount of interest. The story was okay, the action was okay, the friendships were okay, even the special power was very, very okay. I will say, though, that I listened to this on audio, and it is a beautiful audio. The reader has this exceptional pace and lovely voice. I definitely recommend the audio if you feel like picking this book up. And I wouldn’t even recommend against reading this book, I just hoped for so much more.

I am not someone who can watch scary movies. Now, I like scary movies (not full of blood, but full of suspense) but I have a problem in that I don't stop being scared when they're over (Lady in White, What Lies Beneath). My dad is a big Dean Koontz fan and so I read a book when I was younger. It was so scary--the walls even attacked people! I couldn't walk down our narrow hallway without feeling scared. Irrational? Absolutely. Why am I mentioning this? Well, because this book had a touch of the supernatural suspense that I don't handle well. I am undecided whether I'll go on to read the other books in the series or not (although I was intrigued so I might try it--I'll wait a few more days to see how many nightmares I have before deciding for sure).

The story follows Gemma Doyle from the death of her mother in India to her placmeent in a finishing school back in England. Gemma has a strange ability to transport into a different realm where she sees visions. She makes friends at the school and together they begin to adventure as they learn more about the realms and what Gemma's purpose might be.

Gemma is a great character, but her friends are not so easily likeable for me. Well, likeable, but they seem such superficial friends in many ways that some of what happens doesn't come as a surprise. I think it is nice that Bray makes the characters have flaws but I don't know that I particularly appreciated them. However, some of their foibles (self mutilation for example) is something that may bring stuffy victorian characters to life for teens nowadays.

That said, I sometimes question what the label "Young Adult" means. I didn't feel that this was inappropriate for young adults (except for a few things, Mary Dowd's sacrifice) but that might be because it was almost too much for me, so why should a teenager have to deal with it?

I recently went on a crusade to read the books my local high school was requiring it's students to read. I thought I would be exposed to authors I hadn't heard of, my understanding of young adult fiction was limited and I looked forward to exapnding it. I found most of the books horrible, offensive, and not well-written. I wonder what makes a novel a young adult book?

It seems that having a teenage character is the only requirement. Whether it is suitable for teens (or anyone else) doesn't matter.

Okay, back to the book... I enjoyed it but it didn't bowl me over (and I admit that I expected that after hearing some reviews and reading some Q&A sessions with Libby Bray). We'll see if I read the other ones...

This book is in the slow side. I didn't hate the writing just the pace.

Der Anfang der Geschichte hat mich (für ein Jugendbuch) noch sehr gekriegt. Viele Themen, die Mädels in diesem Alter umtreiben und auch welche, über die sie sich Gedanken machen sollten, werden angesprochen. Allerdings wurden die Beweggründe für manche Taten der Protagonistin immer unglaubwürdiger. Das Ende hat mich dann leider gar nicht mehr überzeugt.

n  Luego de la muerte de su madre en extrañas circunstancias, Gema Doyle es enviada desde la India a Inglaterra para a terminar sus estudios a una reconocida escuela para señoritas, donde conocerá tres chicas de distintas y opuestas personalidades: Ann, Pippa y Felicity. En su compañía comenzará una aventura que le llevará a conocer su verdadero origen y a desenterrar la magia ancestral que habita dentro de ella. Esto fortalecerá su amistad, pero, a su vez, abrirá un portal a un mundo exótico y peligroso, donde habitan enemigos inesperados y secretos inconfesables.n

Reseña Completa con imagenes, curiosidades y frases memorables en el post n  La Orden de la Academia Spence de Libba Bray o las señoritas victorianas deberían hacerle caso al Tio de Spidermann

Hacia mucho tiempo que desea leer esta novela y la comencé con miedo horrible a que me decepcionara (*¿ya le dije que odie "Humo y Hueso”? Si ¿verdad? Bueno aquí vamos de nuevo… la odio con todo mi ser *), pero nop, no sucedió y superó mis expectativas. De hecho leí a full y sólo me demoré dos días en terminarla. Hacia mucho que me había llegado, fue una de mis primeras compras en Bookdepository, pero la forma en que está narrada me desencantó lo suficiente como para dejarla dormir en paz unos cuantos meses en mi estantería. Me explico, creo que la narración en primera persona esta sobrevalorada y con frecuencia me aburre. Si, hay novelas que quedan completamente estructuradas con la visión de un solo personaje, pero generalmente, casi siempre en mi experiencia, las historias se nutren mejor cuando existe un narrador omnisciente o si se nos provee del punto de vista de varios personajes. Además en este caso estaba narrado de una manera que en un primer momento me pareció un poco tosca, pero a la cual me acostumbré conforme pasabas las hojas y me encontraba con un nutrido vocabulario, frases y párrafos largos y bien construidos y una historia entretenida y coherente.

La ambientación victoriana me gustó bastante, porque principalmente sirve como un convincente marco costumbrista a la historia. Las estrictas relaciones económico-sociales, las diversas concepciones sobre de moralidad y transgresión, la férrea estratificación social juegan a favor de la trama y nos ayudan a identificarnos con Gemma y sus amigas, adolescentes que buscan una libertad y autorealización en un mundo complejo, cosmopolita, y muchas veces hipócrita. La censura, la soledad y el rechazo están a la vuelta de la esquina y son el castigo para cualquier tipo de duda o insatisfacción. No es de extrañar que los personajes de Libba nos resulten confusos y muchas veces poco simpáticos. En un mundo donde ante todo se aprecia la apariencia y el abolengo, es normal que surjan personalidades para nada benévolas, competitivas, envidiosas y traicioneras. No queda de otra, debes sobrevivir como sea, aun cuando eso signifique traicionar tu propio ser o a los que confían en ti. Lo único que importa es idear formas ingeniosas para cubrir tus errores y tramar como conseguir o mantener un lugar en una sociedad que está pendiente de todos tus fracasos, lista para recriminar, ridiculizar o excluir según sea necesario. Pero al mismo tiempo estos defectos enmascaran una soledad y un miedo proporcional al esfuerzo, muchas veces erróneo o francamente malvado, que emplean para mantener lo que se logra mediante ellos. En todo caso, no estoy de acuerdo con esa conocida frase de Rousseau de “el hombre nace bueno y la sociedad lo corrompe”. Para convertiste en alguien torcido debes poseer aptitudes naturales, no basta con que el mundo te de con la puerta en la cara. Y en esta historia hay varias que no terminaran bien, estoy segura. Y no precisamente porqués vida fue pervertida por un Fagin ….

Felicity es fría y calculadora, pero protectora con sus amigas. Pipa es frívola y caprichosa, pero fiel y constante. Ann es resentida, pero dulce y comprensiva y Gemma, es contradictoria, pero fuerte e inteligente. La verdad es que pensé muchas veces que con esa amigas… uff…quien quiere enemigos. Compadecí muchas veces a la pobre Gemma por estar atrapada en semejante nido de víboras. Pero, al final,el grupito se ganó mi corazón. Son personajes ricos, que si bien corresponden a ciertos estereotipos, fácilmente se alejan de ellos mostrando una profundidad y un conflicto, tanto personal como generacional, muy completo y atrayente.Felicity, con toda su rabia y egoísmo es mi favorita. Tiene algo de primitivo y salvaje que me encanta. Ella la lleva 100%. Me gustan muchos los personajes que retratan mujeres de temperamento fuertes, que no tienen miedo de aceptar lo que son y luchar por lo que quieren. Bueno, a ella se le pasa la mano mucho al infinito, pero no esperaba una monjita de la caridad de una chica que culpa a otra de robar un costoso anillo, solo por un deseo esnob de perjudicarla y hacerle saber su lugar en la escala social. ¡Perra!

La trama en si es bastante lineal y con muchos lugares comunes, pero está tan bien llevada y escrita, enriquecida con millones de pequeños detalles (como el de la sesión espiritista, muy en boga en esa época o las alusiones a los pintores prerafaelistas, a las leyendas celtas y a los poemas románticos de Tennyson), que su lectura se hace fácil, rápida y amena, sin que ello reste interés o intriga al libro. Si duda es uno de los mejores libros que he leído este año, aun cuando peca al utilizar varios estereotipos (tanto de personajes como de situaciones) y por lo predecible de ciertas situaciones, pero estos errores no tanto terribles como para derrumbar todo el tinglado.

Ahora pasemos a los viajes psicotrópicos xD! y a la evasión. Si he de ser sincera, los capítulos en los que Gemma y sus amigas experimenta este mundo alterado al que llaman “Los Reinos” me inquietaban bastante, pero al mismo tiempo me producen una curiosidad morbosa. Me parecían alarmantemente cercanas a las percepciones que relatan las personas que se desestructuran mentalmente, construyendo mundos ilusorios a los cuales escapar. Brr! Pienso que para la autora los temas de la evasión y el peligros y la seducción de este tipo de vivencias es un tema importante, por el que todos hemos pasado a esa edad. Ella sumerge a las chicas en un mundo hermoso, peligroso y primitivo, que brinda tanto sosiego como una falsa seguridad. Con un gran poder viene una gran responsabilidad, sabias palabras, lástima que a finales del siglo XIX no pudiesen ver Spiderman…

n  n

n  

“Don’t you ever speak to me that way again,” I snarl. “I am no longer content to be the scared, obedient schoolgirl. Who are you, a stranger, to tell me what I can and cannot do?”

n
Wow, this was such a pleasant surprise. If you don't know, The Diviners by Libba Bray is one of my favorite books ever. So you can imagine I had my doubts that a book written many years earlier by the author would live up to it.

But A Great and Terrible Beauty was just so good. I shouldn't have doubted Ms. Bray. It had so many great things going for it, with the Victorian setting, mysterious death of the main character's mother, supernatural elements, and rebellious, lovable narrator, Gemma Doyle.

Seriously, this book was too much fun, while also taking a look at more serious historical facts, such as how many young girls were bred to be the wives of rich men during this time - even if the men were thirty years older. Gemma was a fantastic narrator; she grew up in India until her mother's sudden death forced her to come to England and attend a young ladies' boarding school.

At Spence Academy Gemma befriends three girls and they start their own secret club, but when Gemma finds out she possess supernatural powers from her mother, it changes everything.

The writing was wonderful; the friendships between the well-developed characters Gemma, Felicity, Pippa, and Ann were hilarious and sometimes vicious in the way that teenage girls can be. They were expected to behave like proper ladies, but these wild girls were the complete opposite and were desperate to escape constricting corsets, French lessons, and everyone telling them what not to do.

I became so absorbed in this world - the Victorian era felt like something supernatural in itself, with the claustrophobic rules of Spence Academy. Gemma's mysterious family legacy, the strange boy who kept showing up in her bedroom, and the diary of a dead girl she discovered drove the plot until I felt like I was living in it. I just love when stories do that - when I become so invested in them they seem to come to life, and for a short while I'm a part of that world.

A gothic, Victorian paranormal that focused on a young woman during a time where she didn't seem to fit into the social rules. It was a fun, clever, and female empowering story.

n  

“I think I’m beginning to understand why those ancient women had to hide in caves. Why our parents and teachers and suitors want us to behave properly and predictably. It’s not that they want to protect us; it’s that they fear us.”

n

n  n    "Oh, honestly, this is the worst attempt at a gothic novel I've ever read. All we're missing are creaking castle floors and a heroine in danger of losing her virtue."n  n

I had half a mind to DNF this book and I'm disappointed that I didn't.

It was very boring. It took 90% of the book for some action to happen. And by that time, I had already lost all interest in the Spence girls. I couldn't care less about what happens to them, whether they would live or not. But I was lowkey hoping that they wouldn't survive just so it wouldn't have a sequel This basically felt like a filler book which was weird because it was the first book in the series. The author is clearly setting up the characters for a bigger adventure in the next book but it dragged the story so much. A huge chunk of this novel could be cut and it would deliver a better story. Instead, we get a 400 page book about annoying girls.

I love it when characters are flawed. It makes them very relateable and human. But the characters here were just plain annoying. They were very one dimensional. They were spoiled and I don't believe that they had actually cared for each other. They only cared for themselves. Gemma was such a bad main character. There was no growth and development that happened to her character whatsoever.

Overall, the title was correct. It was terrible.

The world-building was pretty cool, but I so disliked most of the girls.

I have been doubting about this book a long time. Did I like it or didn't I like it? To be honest to you guys and myself, I cannot say I liked the book although I did like some parts. But for most of the time I skimmed through the pages. So yeah it had a lot of potential and I seriously don't know why this book didn't grip me like it should have done. Therefore I"ll give this book a 3 stars. Because I liked the excited parts of the story and the creepy parts, but I didn't like the rest of the story (I found it quite boring in all honesty). Anyone who had the same issues?

3, 5 tähteä.

Koukuttava ja salaperäinen. Historiallinen kirjallisuus ja fantasia ovat kaksi lempigenreäni, joten ei ollut yllätys että pidin tästä kirjasta. Rakastan viktoriaanisen ajan Englantia ja muutenkin 1800-lukua! Ihan täysin en kuitenkaan rakastunut tähän kirjaan.

2.5 stars

I don't know how I feel about this book. It's fast but it also gets boring real fast.
Gemma is not that smart, but if you compare her to the other girls then she's a genius. The entire group is actually really difficult to tolerate.
Something was cute but I don't think it was enough to make me want to continue the series.