125Pages

She by Michelle Latiolais
Published by W. W. Norton & Company on May 3, 2016

She sounded so great. A modern day Go Ask Alice where a 15 year-old runs from an abusive home to the mean streets of Los Angeles. A nameless everygirl, the titular she could have been a powerful literary figure that could have spoken to a generation. Unfortunately her story was interspersed with those of other nameless women inhabiting the city. Those other stories broke up the lovely narrative and confused the story.

The plot of the main story was fantastic; a young girl striking out on her own and depending on strangers for assistance. The other stories filling out the plot detracted from the main plot and muddied it rather than enhancing it. The writing of Michelle Latiolais was very good in the main sections where there was a coherent storyline. In the other shorts, it was looser and did not seem to match. The pacing was spot on in the main section and confusing in the others. The world built was very nebulous with few locations described. The emotions matched the rest of the sections, in the main story line they were great and I really felt with her and in the other stories had no connection. The characters in She were confusing. Due to no names being used, just the pronoun she, I was thrown off when the story turned from the main arc as I was not expecting it and thought it was still the main character.

I was so evenly mixed on She. I really enjoyed the main arc, but was confused by the side stories. I liked the writing of Michelle Latiolais but could not wrap my brain around the changing plot and characters. I am not generally a lover of short stories for just this reason, I don’t have the time to sink into the story and connect with the characters. I would recommend this for those that love shorts and know going in that the characters are not differentiated.

I received this book for free from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.