The Girls at the Kingfisher Club
by Genevieve Valentine
I was so intrigued by the premise of The Girls at the Kingfisher Club: a re-telling of The Twelve Dancing Princesses set in the 1920s! How perfect would that be! Not only did I dislike the different directions the storyline took, but I intensely disliked Genevieve Valentine’s writing style. She frequently used parentheses and often included several sentences within each bracket. This style was supposed to seem conversational, as if the storyteller was talking in asides to the reader, but I found it jarring and immature. It felt like a middle-grade book, even though the main protagonists are in their twenties.
It’s very hard to root for the story if you’re not rooting for the protagonist. The eldest sister isn’t very likable, and I don’t like the way she treats her domineering father or her impressionable sisters. Overall, the story has extreme feminist views; Valentine often makes sarcastic remarks about marriage and women’s domestic roles. It will appeal to feminist readers who deep-down don’t really like men and who wish they could be “free” of all male constraints. As I am not that type of reader, I didn’t like this book.
It’s very hard to root for the story if you’re not rooting for the protagonist. The eldest sister isn’t very likable, and I don’t like the way she treats her domineering father or her impressionable sisters. Overall, the story has extreme feminist views; Valentine often makes sarcastic remarks about marriage and women’s domestic roles. It will appeal to feminist readers who deep-down don’t really like men and who wish they could be “free” of all male constraints. As I am not that type of reader, I didn’t like this book.