ARC Review: The Girl in the Well Is Me



Title: The Girl in the Well Is Me
Author: Karen Rivers
Series: No
Genre: Middle-grade, Contemporary
Publication Date: March 15, 2016
Publisher: Algonquin Young Readers
Pages: 224
My Rating: 4 Stars






Newcomer Kammie Summers has fallen into a well during a (fake) initiation into a club whose members have no intention of letting her join. Now Kammie’s trapped in the dark, growing increasingly claustrophobic, and waiting to be rescued—or possibly not.
As hours pass, the reality of Kammie’s predicament mixes with her memories of the highlights and lowlights of her life so far, including the reasons her family moved to this new town in the first place. And as she begins to run out of oxygen, Kammie starts to imagine she has company, including a French-speaking coyote and goats that just might be zombies.


Wow, I'm not sure what to say here. I'm still a bit caught up in the story. It was very captivating.

But yeah, I'm gonna give my head a good shake and organize my thoughts. Or at least try to. Here goes nothing.

This was a really short read. Took me about 4-5 hours and I'm not even a fast reader. It was a very easy-to-read book with a likable protagonist. The pace was also good despite the fact that you might feel that it's dragging at time. All that "dragging" is part of getting to know Kammie and how she ended up in the well.

There were a lot of things that led up to it and you'd be surprized by many of the things that happened in Kammie's life. It makes her even more admirable. She's an incerdibly strong girl, and not for falling in a well. She was plenty strong before. But the resiliance and optimism she showed in the well was amazing.

I think the narrative is the most important part of this book. You see, it takes place in a very short period of time and if it weren't for the humorous, imaginative and interesting narrative, finishing the book would have been a chore, short book or not.

But Kammie's perspective was so great and getting to know her family and her life was interesting because of her. She made you feel connected.

Some might complain that since it's pretty onvious Kammie isn't going to die in the well, it takes away from the story. It doesn't; not in the least. This story wasn't really about the well. It was about what happened before it, how it, and the well, affected her and the changes that were brought in her. It was about the person she would become.

And in that department, the character development one, the book excelled. Kammie realized so many things in that well and thought so much about her life, her family and what she wanted. She discovered herself while stuck in a well and beyond dazed.

Overall, this book was a short, sweet yet deep book with a great protagonist. I loved it.

P.S. I know I didn't give a reason for not giving it 5 stars. I do have one, but I strangely don't want to write it. I don't want to write anything bad about this book.

Last but not least, thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing this copy in exchange for my honest review.



4 Short-and-sweet Stars


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