Grit | Gillian French
HarperTeen | Stand-alone | Realist | 304 pp.
~~Buy it here~~
Synopsis: It’s summer in rural Maine; when seventeen-year-old Darcy Prentiss isn’t raking berries with her sister, Mags, and cousin, Nell, during the day, she’s drinking and swimming with the boys in the quarry by night. She knows how to have a good time, just like anyone else, but when you’ve been designated the town slut, every move you make seems to further solidify your “trashy girl” reputation.
But the fun is what’s been keeping Darcy’s mind off the things she can’t forget: a disturbing secret she shares with Nell, the mysterious disappearance of her ex-best friend, and that hazy Fourth of July party that ended with Darcy drunk, on her back, wondering how she let it get this far.
Then someone in town anonymously nominates Darcy to be in the running for Bay Festival Princess—a cruel, almost laughable gesture that can only be the work of someone with a score to settle. Everything Darcy has been trying to keep down comes bubbling to the surface in ways she wasn’t prepared to handle…and isn’t sure if she can.
Hi, everybody! First of all I want to thank HarperCollins for sending me this beautiful ARC. I have enjoyed reading Grit, Darcy is an amazing girl and it is really easy to empathise with her, but I think the plot was a bit chaotic and predictable at some points.
The setting was one of the things that interested me the most, for I have always loved to watch movies about small rural villages were everybody knows each other. As I see it, in those kind of places relationships are built in a different way, they really value people's loyalty and effort, whereas here we are used to having dozens of conversations via Whatsapp or buying clothes in shopping centres every week. However, familiatity also implies knowing everybody's secrets and disgrace, and this is precisely what this book is about. Even if they look perfect, small towns also have their disadvantages. There are rumours, but rumours are not always true. And sometimes you consent to be called certain things just because you cannot tell the truth, like Darcy Prentiss.
I was really intrigued by the fact that Darcy, Mags, and Nell had to work raking berries with a group of teenage boys, which in the end becomes an implacable competition between them. I wanted to meet the masculine characters and see how they behaved with Darcy, if they were the bad-boy type or the cheese one, since I have always enjoyed books where a girl has to interact with several boys. The characters in Grit are all complex, especially Darcy who is incredibly well-developed in psychological terms. Her evolution is an emotional roller coaster that absorbed me and nearly made me drop some tears. Darcy is strong, kind, resolute, nothing to do with the typical feminine protagonists of YA fiction. Mags is also lovable, despite being rather ironic and grumpy sometimes. It is impossible not to feel the desire to protect Nell from everything and everybody and her friendship with Darcy is really sweet. They love each other so much and it is clear as water as you read. That, in my opinion, is another strenght of Grit.
However, I am not absolutely convinced about the male characters. There is love in this story, that is for sure, but it is quite collateral. The plot revolves around the life of Darcy while she works, she takes baths in the river and prepares herself for the Bay Festival Princess. Do not get confused, this is fine, but as an avid romance reader I wanted to see more scenes between Darcy and Mysterious boy number 1. The other boy, let's call him Mysterious boy number 2, is completely mad and obsessed with her. I still cannot believe what he does to Darcy. It is horrific. I expected him to be punished, but apparently everybody forgets about the episode in the book, which I do not think is the proper -and logical- way to deal with such a serious issue. That is one of the aspects I did not like about this novel. The ending was good, but I had the sensation that the story required something else. The big secret is revealed, of course, and it is quite surprising. Nevertheless, I do not understand the connection between Darcy, all her demons, and the missing girl of the Fourth of July party. Darcy knew the girl, Darcy knew valuable information, but why does she blame herself for what happened?
As I said at the beginning of my review, I have enjoyed this book because of the main character, Darcy, and her relationship with her family and friends. I also liked the author's style but for me the plot lacked coherence, especially at the end of the novel. Above all, I think, Grit tells the beautiful story of a girl who may seem immune to pain, but if you read the book you will discover that in reality Darcy Prentiss is slowly sinking.
Rating: 3/5 kittens.
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¡Hola, mininos! Hoy os traigo la reseña de un ARC que me envió HarperCollins y cuya protagonista me ha encantado. Sin embargo, hay algunos detalles del libro que no me han terminado de convencer y que ahora explicaré con más detalle.
Grit trata sobre una chica, Darcy Prentiss, que vive en un pequeño pueblo en Maine y que en verano se va a una viña a recolectar bayas para conseguir dinero. No se va sola, pues la acompañan su hermana Mags y Nell, su prima, y allí se encontrará con un grupo de chicos a los que ya conoce desde hace un tiempo. El problema es que el año pasado, durante la fiesta del 4 de julio, ocurrió algo espantoso: una chica desapareció. Al parecer, Darcy estuvo implicada y ahora la policía empieza a hacer preguntas incómodas. Darcy no puede decir la verdad, además, ¿quién creería a la chica facilona del pueblo?, pero hay ciertas personas que estarán dispuestas a revelar sus peores secretos sólo con el propósito de hacerle daño.
Debo admitir que me he enamorado del personaje de Darcy. Hacía tiempo que no me encontraba con una protagonista tan fuerte, tan espontánea y resulta como ella. Además, su evolución a lo largo de la novela es magnífica. Por lo general vemos a una Darcy invencible, pero poco a poco empezaremos a darnos cuenta de que en el fondo también le afectan las críticas. No os miento si os digo que en una escena estuve a punto de soltar alguna que otra lagrimilla por ella. Me ha encantado ver cómo se relacionaba con los chicos de la villa, ya que tenemos al chico bueno, al chico malo y al chico callado que al final hace acto de presencia. En lo que se refiere a los personajes, por tanto, no tengo ninguna pega, aunque sí que es verdad que me hubiese gustado saber más de los chicos, especialmente del que está obsesionado con ella. El cariño que se tienen Darcy, Mags y Nell también me parece que es digno de mención, ya que se puede palpar en las páginas de Grit el ambiente familiar y rústico de su pequeño pueblo.
Sin embargo, creo que hay algunos fallos en el argumento. Todo gira en torno al gran secreto, a la desaparición de esa chica, y todo indica que Darcy tuvo algo que ver, pero a mí no me lo parece. Sí, Darcy conocía a la chica, sabía cierta información valiosa, pero no llego a entender por qué se siente tan culpable por su desaparición. Creo que la autora podría haber hilado mejor el argumento, especialmente al final, cuando se descubre qué pasó realmente, puesto que en ocasiones me daba la sensación de que no existía una conexión real entre algunas subtramas. El final de la novela fue una montaña rusa de emociones, y aunque me pareció un final adecuado no pude evitar sentir que le había faltado algo, sobre todo a la historia de amor que surge entre Darcy y uno de los personajes masculinos. Asimismo, uno de los chicos hace algo imperdonable (y he de admitir que no me gusta cómo se resuelve en el libro, ya que no parece tener consecuencias) y sale a la luz un secreto que realmente me sorprendió.
En las últimas páginas es cuando realmente conocemos a la verdadera Darcy, y es que todo ese peso que cargaba sobre sus hombros estaba ahogándola lentamente. Ella quiere proteger a sus seres queridos a toda costa, incluso si eso significa que la critiquen o la menosprecien. El problema es que todos esos secretos le están impidiendo ser feliz, y tarde o temprano la verdad saldrá a la luz.
PUNTUACIÓN: 3/5 gatitos.
¿Lo conocíais? ¿Os llama la atención? ¿Soléis leer libros ambientados en pequeños pueblecitos?
Lilly.