Book Title: St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves
Author: Karen Russell
Date Started: March 20th 2013
Date Completed: April 28th 2013
Genres: Fantasy
Rating: Three stars
Review:
This book took me an age to read, but it was one of the best - if strangest - short story collections I've ever read. Admittedly, I tend to stay away from short stories since I prefer longer and more intricate plots, but still.
St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves (wow, that's a mouthful) has a variety of weird and wonderful tales about different individuals. I always imagined them all living on different parts of the same island, although this is never specified. There's minotaurs and ghost fish and sheep murders and avalanches and god knows what else.
Karen Russell's writing style is something I've never really come across. It isn't exactly hard-reading, but it took a while to get through each page. I'm still not sure whether I like it or not, but it was definitely different - and not necessarily in a bad way.
I liked the way each story was obviously set in the same world, but was so different and teeming with all these magical and whimsical creatures and settings. I particularly loved the idea of the ghost fish. I'm ot even sure why. I just like the idea is swimming and seeing prehistoric creatures as well as the modern specimens.
My favourite story was The Camp for Disturbed Sleepers (it was something like that). And I liked that best because I felt I really got to know the characters, and I could relate to them. It's not that we aren't told anything about the people in the other stories - on the contrary, the majority of the writing is about how each character feels and how their past has effected them and is effecting them - but the characters really grew during this story, so I felt I knew them better for it. Furthermore, I loved the idea and the mystery wound into it.
In fact, I loved all the ideas. I loved a lot of it - some parts of the writing were truly, truly beautiful - but I needed more. I avoid short stories, not because I don't like the stories being short - I don't mind it that much if I'm honest - it's more that I think authors are tempted to not put as much effort into them, as they aren't going to have time to really construct a good, solid plot for such a short text. The issue I found with this book, however, was the Russell went in to the story so much, it felt like every single one of the passages was left unfinished. They were all left, not so much on cliffhangers, but more like the end of a chapter: like they were planned to originally be continued, but then ended up at the back of the cupboard. I would have been happy with a cliffhanger to be honest.
I'm not saying I didn't like it. I'm just saying it needed that extra little climax, rather than an anticlimax that never finishes.
I would recommend it to anyone who likes fantasy and crazy ideas and worlds because the concepts in this novel are just amazing. But I wouldn't do what I did - to decide to read one story every time you just wanted a quick read in between whatever chapter book you're halfway through: it's just too detailed and long. But give it a try - you might feel differently to me.
Image Source: http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/shiningskyline/27555055/10908/10908_600.jpg
This book took me an age to read, but it was one of the best - if strangest - short story collections I've ever read. Admittedly, I tend to stay away from short stories since I prefer longer and more intricate plots, but still.
St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves (wow, that's a mouthful) has a variety of weird and wonderful tales about different individuals. I always imagined them all living on different parts of the same island, although this is never specified. There's minotaurs and ghost fish and sheep murders and avalanches and god knows what else.
Karen Russell's writing style is something I've never really come across. It isn't exactly hard-reading, but it took a while to get through each page. I'm still not sure whether I like it or not, but it was definitely different - and not necessarily in a bad way.
I liked the way each story was obviously set in the same world, but was so different and teeming with all these magical and whimsical creatures and settings. I particularly loved the idea of the ghost fish. I'm ot even sure why. I just like the idea is swimming and seeing prehistoric creatures as well as the modern specimens.
My favourite story was The Camp for Disturbed Sleepers (it was something like that). And I liked that best because I felt I really got to know the characters, and I could relate to them. It's not that we aren't told anything about the people in the other stories - on the contrary, the majority of the writing is about how each character feels and how their past has effected them and is effecting them - but the characters really grew during this story, so I felt I knew them better for it. Furthermore, I loved the idea and the mystery wound into it.
In fact, I loved all the ideas. I loved a lot of it - some parts of the writing were truly, truly beautiful - but I needed more. I avoid short stories, not because I don't like the stories being short - I don't mind it that much if I'm honest - it's more that I think authors are tempted to not put as much effort into them, as they aren't going to have time to really construct a good, solid plot for such a short text. The issue I found with this book, however, was the Russell went in to the story so much, it felt like every single one of the passages was left unfinished. They were all left, not so much on cliffhangers, but more like the end of a chapter: like they were planned to originally be continued, but then ended up at the back of the cupboard. I would have been happy with a cliffhanger to be honest.
I'm not saying I didn't like it. I'm just saying it needed that extra little climax, rather than an anticlimax that never finishes.
I would recommend it to anyone who likes fantasy and crazy ideas and worlds because the concepts in this novel are just amazing. But I wouldn't do what I did - to decide to read one story every time you just wanted a quick read in between whatever chapter book you're halfway through: it's just too detailed and long. But give it a try - you might feel differently to me.
Image Source: http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/shiningskyline/27555055/10908/10908_600.jpg
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