Download Your Copy The Icarus Girl Constructed By Helen Oyeyemi Available In Audiobook

you pick up this crazily awesome book late at night like I did last night you will be forced to stay up all night just to finish it, as I have.
I just could not put this book down, It was unique and creepy and really excelled at creating a frightening atmosphere, while having ambitions beyond just scaring its audience.
All the fun of a popcorn read and all the beautiful prose, sensitivity, and depth of a so called "literary" novel.
I loved it! Drop what you're doing and read this now, sitelinkblog sitelinkthestorygraph sitelinkletterboxd sitelink tumblr sitelinkkofi

That Helen Oyeyemi wrote her debut novel agedwhile studying for her ALevels is certainly an impressive feat.
And, as debuts go, The Icarus Child is by no means a weak one, As this happens to be the third book Ive read of hers I can see just how much her writing has grown since The Icarus Child.
The storys surreal atmosphere is certainly one that permeates most of her works, but perhaps here the fantastical elements arent as mindboggling as the ones characterising her later books.


The Icarus Child revolves around Jessamy Harrison, who goes by Jess, an eightyearold child with a white British father and a Nigerian mother living in England.
The novel opens with her going on a trip to Nigeria with her parents where she stays in her mothers family home.
Here she comes across a girl called TillyTilly, The two quickly become friends but much about TillyTilly preoccupies Jess, Where are her parents How old is she
When she returns home with her family Jess discovers that TillyTilly has followed her there.
As they spend more and more time together Jess realizes that TillyTilly is not like other children and that angering or antagonising her might result in disaster.
Yet, her friendship with TillyTilly proves detrimental as an increasingly alienated Jess finds herself in trouble at school and at home.

Although the story is narrated through ard pov Oyeyemi succeeds in authentically conveying Jess' voice, We view her reality/world through her eyes and with her child understanding, Things that are obvious to us are a mystery to her for example when she observes the behaviour/actions of the adults around her.
Jess is a sensitive child who often seeks refuge in her own imagination, The adults fail to understand or try to label her difficult or different, Her loneliness is so poignant that I found myself truly invested in her character, TillyTilly is more of a trickster sort of figure, egging Jess to misbehave or let loose, Their dynamic brought to mind my own childhood best friend who was a fun if slightly tyrannical girl who was very much aware of how in awe of her I was if she told me to jump, id jump.

What brings the story down is its meandering pacing and its repetitive scenes, When I thought that the story was reaching a conclusion I was amazed to discover that I was only at the halfway point.
Much of the narrative consists in Jess having steadily severe temper tantrums, fighting with other girls at her school, or having to face her understandably exasperated mother.
There were also some dream/nightmare sequences that were intentionally confusing that didnt really add much to the narrative or atmosphere.
The character of TillyTilly also proved a bit of a disappointment as she says the same creepy things over and over again.
The prose too was at times a tad jejune, Anyhow, the latter half of the novel was a bit of a chore to get trough, I found myself skimreading hoping that the ending would be worth it but was let down by a frankly anticlimactic conclusion.


All in all, I would recommend this to fans of this author, While the story and writing aren't quite as polished as her more recent releases, and on the whole, the novel isn't as vivacious or as humorous as her usual stuff, The Icarus Child does introduce us to a compelling protagonist.
Mindnumbingly boring. Bailed a quarter of the way in, My final feelings about this book couldn't be any farther from where they started, I selected this book as one of the latest piles for a sitelinkspeeddating project, and afterpages I wanted to put everything else aside and immerse in the story.
The writing of the young girl Jessamy and her mysterious friend grabbed me it felt new, different, fresh,

Somehow along the way it grew tiresome, I think perhaps the idea made a better short story and it just seemed stretched out, the ending was not very satisfying, and it could have been handled better.
Still a promising debut from an author I continue to hear great things about, and I'm looking forward to reading her more recent works.
She was onlyyears old when this was published! I didn't follow every single thing that happened in this book but it was okay I was pretty into it, so even if some of its magical bits clunked around, I let them.


I was entirely unprepared for how scary this was, It isn't a horror book at all, but a lot of scenes are genuinely frightening! I did a lot of the reading at bedtime, in the dark in a strange house.
I loved it but wow,

I impulsebought this at a stoop sale just before leaving Brooklyn, even though I was on a strict nonewbooks packing regimen.
I started reading it on the plane the day we left New York to move to London, not realizing London is the setting of the book.
Nice little tendril of fate, A lovely debut novel. Has a little bit of creepiness that she used more of in White is for Witching, It has taken me way longer than it should to get through thispage book, I just couldn't do it, I lost interestpages into it, not because it was boring but because it just wasn't engaging, I didn't form any attachments to the characters, I didn't look forward to picking it up in my free time to continue reading, and i'm not at all curious as to how the plot will pan out Ok maybe just a little curious, but not enough.
Although i do have to say that even though i wasn't so invested in it, a part of me didn't want to quit reading.
I wanted to continue against my will because it seemed to have such potential, Chapter after chapter i kept saying 'if i keep going, it'll pick up' but alas i just did not care enough about the story to press on, maybe some other time.
I wanted to love this book, The themes of duality, sisters/twins, and cultural identity were engaging, but it seemed like these were never fully explored, despite the length of the book.
The author, Helen Oyeyemi, spends overpages drawing readers into her story, inviting them to wonder what kind of entity is at play with the main character, Jess/Wuraola.
Jess is the nineyearold daughter of a Yoruba, Nigerian mother and an English father, Jess is an exceptionally clever child, but has not developed her social abilities as quickly, She has the tendency to scream when she feels frustration or fright and has difficulty making friends, She remains lonely until she discovers a new playmate, Titiola "TillyTilly", on a visit to her grandfather's compound in Nigeria.


Throughout the book, I couldn't quite figure out if Titiola was a ghost, an imaginary friend no, or a some kind of Nigerian spirit.
So much buildup would seem to demand a dramatic finish and a final confrontation between Jess and TillyTilly, Instead, the story fizzles out in the last six! pages, As I neared the end, I kept wondering how in the world Oyeyemi was going to wrap this upNot well, in my opinion.


Despite these problems, the book includes some beautiful passages and character descriptions, I forgot to mention that Oyeyemi was justwhen Icarus Girl was published, a fantastic accomplishment for her, : I particularly like Jess' Yoruba grandfather and the way their initial meeting is portrayed:

", . . she Jess: allowed herself to stare openly and seriously at her grandfather, and he did the same, She felt as if she were a little piece of him that had crumbled off, which he was examining for flaws and broken bits before deciding whether it was worth taking it to be reattached"

and the way Oyeyemi through Jess describes what a relationship between sisters should be:

".
. . sisters was something about being held without hands, and the skinflinch of seeing and simultaneously being seen"

Beautiful writing from an author with amazing potential.
I didn't love this book, but I will read anything produced by Oyeyemi in the future,
People are doing Oyeyemi a serious disservice in not marketing her books as horror, They are also doing ME a disservice because then I read them late at night and am so terrified I have to leave the bathroom light on as a night light!

Book was so scary.
D: I can't bear the powerlessness of the little girl, I know Jess wins through in the end and gains power from her sister but it's still so scary, And the longarmed lady. And TillyTilly. D:

I liked Jess's granddad, though, He is everything a longlost granddad should be really,

Again, this is the same story Oyeyemi tells again and again, . . but what an interesting story it is,.stars, rounded down for the ending, which felt too rushed and a bit too inconclusive!

I have shelved this as horror, as it certainly contained some very

creepy and downright scary scenes.
On the one hand, it's a story about a halfEnglish, halfNigerian little girl coming to terms with her feelings of not fitting in.
On the other hand, it's a dark dark tale incorporating some seriously terrifying mythologies, This book was written when the author was still at sixth form, and taken in that context the writing is amazing I'll certainly be looking to read more of her work, though possibly not at bed time judging by this one :.