Review: How to Build a Girl
16:00
By Caitlin Moran
Source: Supermarket
Page count: 352
Genres: Adult, Feminism, Contemporary, Humour, Music, Coming of Age
Goodreads Synopsis:
My name’s Johanna Morrigan. I’m fourteen, and I’ve just decided to kill myself.
I don’t really want to die, of course! I just need to kill Johanna, and build a new girl. Dolly Wilde will be everything I want to be, and more! But as with all the best coming-of-age stories, it doesn’t exactly go to plan…
My review:
I heartily enjoyed this book. It’s one of those rare books that is so funny you find yourself laughing out loud (and possibly getting some weird stares) at some points, yet feeling heavy-hearted at other times when not everything goes right for the main character. It was very vulgar in a British way, which is probably the reason why I enjoyed it so much.
Johanna (the main character) was very interesting to read about. She was very flawed, but I think it made her more loveable and easy to root for. Her friendship with John Kite was very touching too, and made me really smile. She had good character development, but I feel like because of her background, she could have had more courage and backbone earlier on in the book.
I am very different to Johanna, so I feel like sometimes she could be a bit too frustrating. Some of the things that she did were really embarrassing (second hand embarrassment is the worst), and lots of her decisions seemed odd to me - I know I certainly would never do lots of the things she did!
The supportive family aspects in this book were really enjoyable to read. Although her family seemed chaotic at times, the banter they all had was very funny. I especially liked Johanna and Krissi (her older brother) together because of the way they could be brutally honest with each other (like siblings do), but then always make up after a fight.
Overall, I really enjoyed this book. It had some very original elements, and the characters had me laughing a lot. I would recommend it to British people (lots of British references and humour!) who don’t mind rude jokes, because this did raise a few eyebrows!
My rating:
Hello! I'm D - a dog-loving feminist from the UK. You'll probably find me with my nose in a book or playing my clarinet
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