I love me a dystopian book, but this was a bit to horrific for me. It was a bit hard for me to read because it was so well done by the author. Definitely good for fans of Handmaid's Tale.

3.5 *s.
This one was really tough to rate. After seeing so many great reviews (and a bit of cover love), I picked this one up. I was totally drawn into the beginning. Unfortunately, as soon as the actually "Grace Year" started, it became a bit of a crazy mess for me. I almost stopped reading but kept seeing positive reviews so I continued. I did think the end came together quite well.

This book was so good!

The end! THE END! Listen it was ambiguous, however I think I know what she was impelling and I need a second book. There is so much potential.

Everyone should read and then go beg her for me.

The. Grace. Year.

Holy crap!!! this book!!

Where has this been my whole life?!
There is so much I want to say about this book. I don't even know where to start with this
I guess I'll start with Tierney James. Tierney is such a special character and I'm sad that it's over now because
she really has become dear to me. I found a lot of myself in her. She makes mistakes and falls again and again and keeps getting up and I just love how empowered I feel after reading this.

(Not all heroes wear capes, some of them have ribbons in their hair)

This book is so absolutely wild. Its not what I expected but it is MORE than what I expected.

I won't give too much away but actually you know what, I won't give anything away.

Go.Read.This.

YA is not my typical genre but as someone who isn't a lover of YA, I still really enjoyed this book.

The Grace Year is set in a town that sends girls away during the 16th year of life because it's believed that they're powerful enough to lure grown men out of their beds. Yes, you read that right. How twisted! These young women are raised to believe that they're their own worst enemies but really the problem may be with the people who raise them and those who influence them.

The Grace Year can be thought of as a coming of age story and how what we go through in childhood impacts us through future life and how those experiences shape who we are. I definitely recommend this title if you love YA but even if it isn't your typical genre, you may still really enjoy it like I did!

** spoiler alert ** Heh. I received an ARC of this from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

I just scrolled thru the other reviews kind of desperately trying to find any 1 or 2 stars to see if someone else had managed to put into words what I didn't like about this. But either there are none or I didn't look hard enough.

It is ALL RIGHT but, I felt it missed the mark of feminism to some degree. The main character, Tierney, is constantly being defined by others rather than by herself. There is a really lame insta-love romance that is completely unnecessary. The end! UGH! I don't want to give many spoilers but... suffice it to say that some stuff happens which negates any progress in female equality which was made. And then it kind of ends with a vague hope but also with a super ambiguous couple lines in a life/death situation.

So I think the takeaway is supposed to be, she made some lasting (hopefully) mark on female relationships and things might eventually change for the better. But you know who made the actual changes in their society that we can see happening at the end? A guy. Not that males can't be feminists but it would be far more powerful if the females in this book were seen to have more agency at the end.

The beginning was also really slow. The parts in the camp were generally awesome, also gruesome, upsetting and awful. But interesting to read at least. I can see this being super popular and a movie deal. I'm not going to be one of the ones shouting about it from the rooftops though unless someone really convinces me it was more feminist than I found it.

Also, this is the first time I am seeing the cover and it is SO PINK AND AWFUL.

Disturbing, exciting, thrilling, sad. I really enjoyed this book, though it took a different direction than I expected, and despite not enjoying the ending.

The Handmaid's Tale meets Lord of the Flies in this unique, entertaining novel about a group of young girls sent into the woods to survive and become "worthy" of being women. I was absolutely enamored with this story and although it didn't have the ending I wanted, it ended realistically and hopefully.

THE GRACE YEAR is fascinating and compelling and will stay with you long after you turn the last page. Incredibly well written and incredibly scary and completely irresistible.

Young adult, dystopian, feminist. Dark, terrifying, difficult to read, The end was maybe a little too abrupt in my opinion. I read on kindle and listened on audible and the audiobook was excellent. Great narrator. Definitely recommend.

* ARC provided by NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Thank you!

I read this book on a long weekend trip to New Orleans, and this was the perfect book to read while traveling because it never failed to keep my attention. This dystopian novel definitely gave me Hunger Games and Handmaid's Tale vibes, but still had its own unique story line.

In Garner County, girls are taught that they have a particular "magic" that can entice men and lure them away from their wives and families. This mysterious power supposedly threatens the sanctity and very existence of their village, so in their sixteenth year, girls are banished from their homes, families, and village and exiled to a camp on the outskirts, where they are to rid themselves of their "magic" before they return at the year's conclusion, to either marry or work as laborers in the village.

During their grace year it's a fight to survive, and although the elements and poachers that surround their camp pose a significant threat to their survival, the biggest threat may just come from the girls, themselves.

I absolutely loved this book. It kept me on the edge of my seat, the characters were deep and compelling, and although Liggett took on some dark and heavy themes, she handled them with grace (pun completely intended).

Like Katniss Everdeen in Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games, Tierney James of Liggett's The Grace Year exhibits remarkable bravery, tenacity, and a compassion that touched my heart. Readers can't help but root for her and her friend, Gertrude, and although I had a pretty good idea of where the story was going, the conclusion still managed to surprise me and gave me a greater appreciation for some of the other characters in the story.

This book is a quick read, and although there are a few graphic descriptions of violence, it's not overdone or particularly gory. I highly recommend this book, and I'm excited to read more of Liggett's work!

This book was smart faced paced and so so gripping! I could not put it down! It was a thriller and horror but something I didn’t know I desperately needed!

<I>Hunger Games</i> meets <I>Handmaid's Tale</i> and I am here for it! I was so into this book and it was way more brutal than I was expecting, which I thought played well into getting the novel's point across. In this dystopian novel, all girls of Garner County are banished to live outside of the community for their sixteenth year, to cleanse them of their "magic." Not only do these girls have to survive the harsh conditions of the camp they're thrust into for the year, they have to look out for poachers who are trying to kill them to bottle up their magic for trade, and worst of all, they have to watch out for each other. It was a totally unique and powerful take on the fight against the patriarchy.


Many thanks to the publisher for providing me a review copy via NetGalley.

You can find this review and all of my others over at www.readbookrepeat.wordpress.com

In Garner County being born female means that as of the age of sixteen, you possess the power to lure men from their marriage beds and tempt them, while driving other women insane with jealousy. At the age of sixteen, the females in the County first go through a ceremony where only a few are chosen as a wife before being sent off for a year to dispel themselves of their magic - this is The Grace Year. Tierney James holds no dreams of being chosen for a wife, she finds more freedom in the thought that she could be working the fields for the rest of her life. So on the day before she is to depart for a year, she is as surprised as anyone when she is handed a veil. One of the biggest fears, that is drummed into the girls as they grow, is of the poachers who live outside the county and hunt the girls as they travel to their grace year location, and continue to hunt them upon their arrival, the girls are told how the poachers catch them and cut them up into little pieces to be sold on the black market. However, what Tierney discovers upon arrival at the camp where thirty three girls will spend the next twelve months is, the poachers may not be the worst thing out there.

Wow. I finished this book in a day, and I feel like it tore me apart when I finished it. It made me feel ALL of the things and I just didn't know how to deal with life when it ended. I feel that this book is like if The Hunger Games, Lord of the Flies and The Handmaid's Tail (even though I haven't read it) had a baby. It's a dystopian world where the patriarchy rules and women are second class citizens, feared because as a teenager they posses magic that draws men to distraction. So I already had a pretty good idea that the whole social situation was going to bug the hell out of me, but to be honest, it was really well written and while I was annoyed at the society and their beliefs, it only added to the depth of the story.

Tierney is a well written character though she did bug me a little off and on. When the girls first get to the place where they're spending their Grace Year, instead of trying to just blend in and get through it the best she could, she was continuing to be her regular abrasive self which ended up segregating her from the rest of the girls. She complained about being alone, but wasn't willing to compromise in order to make her situation that little bit more bearable. Though I guess we weren't here to read a nice sweet story where every one gets along. We learn from pretty early on that there is a sliver of Mean Girls in here, because let's face it...girls can be incredibly bitchy, and we are not let down as Kiersten is pretty bitchy, and doesn't make things easy, she's also a fan of turning girls against others. I enjoyed the characters of the story for all of their flaws, flaws make a character more real to me. Though I feel this story is more plot driven than character driven, I still felt like the characters were well written and each had a very distinct voice.

The way this story was written was amazing to me. The pace was epic, and I honestly felt like I couldn't put the book down, that probably had something to do with the weird formatting of the eARC that I received. There were no page breaks or chapters really. I mean, there were chapters, but there was like five? Maybe six? in the whole book. I think I read in another review that in the final copy there were little page breaks which separated the story into proper portions. Honestly though, it didn't even bug me, I was quite happy to keep powering through because I just loved the story THAT much.

This is a rather feminist book in the characters ideals and thoughts and dreams, but that's probably where it ends. There is a lot of female attacking female, and they don't really stick up for each other where I feel that they should have living in the society that they do. I feel like this story was more about a society who were learning and taking the steps needed, it wasn't a society that was born with a feminist view (obviously), but we see a feminist society in the making which was kind of cool.

I was a bit taken back by the violence that we experience, but this is what led me to see the parallels between Lord of the Flies and this book - it shows us what power can do to people (as well as other things impacting this but I won't go into it). There is also a hint of romance which I thought was done tastefully. I just honestly can't stop thinking about the story and the way things went. I'll say that the story didn't exactly end in the way that I was hoping it would, but I guess you can't have books all end the way you want, where is the fun in that. I did have fun being surprised by certain revelations and the ending did surprise me as I wasn't expecting it to go the way it did. Finding everything out when the character did was great fun, however, in the first portion of the book, I had a couple of things worked out which made me anxious to just hurry up and get to their reveal, the rest of the book kept throwing surprises at me and I just enjoyed it so much.

I'm seriously rambling now, and I don't think anything of what I've said above really made sense. It's a book that looks at the patriarchal society, I felt for the women in the County, all of them, even the nasty ones. Finding out what's actually been going on for as long as anyone knows, was a shocking revelation to me and I felt everything Tierney did. This book left me wanting it to continue, I flew through the story and really connected with all the characters. I recommend it highly.

Young woman are given a year in the wild to "get rid of their magic". They are to return one year later, if they survive and live in clear cut cookie cutter lives. Interesting concept regarding society and a women's place in that society. Enjoyed the narrative and the trials and tribulations of the heroine.

This was like a cross between The Hunger Games and The Handmaids Tale and I really liked it. I found myself rushing home to read this and devoured it in just a couple of days. I will definitely be recommending it to my friends who also enjoy YA fiction.

The Grace Year made me feel so many emotions. I got angry. I cried. I got angry again. The entire time I thought of how much, in ways, this still mirrors society today.

Tierney James is unique. She wants a better life for herself; getting married, being owned and only producing male airs is her personal hell. All that doesn’t even matter if she can’t survive the grace year. Her whole life she has watched and listened, trying to figure out what exactly goes on during the grace year. She wants to survive, keep her mind clear and come back to work in the fields; where she can be her own person. As she fights to not only live but understand the grace year, on this remote island, she becomes the woman the other girls need and learns to fight for what she wants.

I absolutely loved Tierney. She shows strength and compassion when she is not shown the same. I like to think I am like her in that way. Always showing kindness to others in the hopes that karma will come back, tenfold. I think this book should be read by all women, at all ages. Sometimes, women can be so hard on one another. Especially in today’s society where we compare each other all the time, on social media. I hope this books not only inspires you to get more involved in women’s issues but also to be kind to one another.

This was probably my absolute favorite book of 2019. The prose was poignant, the story intense and heart-breaking and heart-pounding, the characters unforgettable. This tale is up there with Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale for sure.

The aspect of the story that sticks with me the most is the female relationships and how the main character's understanding of them evolve. At the beginning she believes that there is a sour, selfish drive behind all women and girls to undermine each other, and for a good portion of the book you believe her thinking to be true. But slowly memories surface, little moments of compassion, subtle kindnesses come forward, and she realizes that women are working within the toxic patriarchal system as best as they can to help their systems in oppression and fear. It is simply brilliant.

I literally have nothing bad to say about this book.

This was a dark, sometimes disturbing book that reminded me quite a bit of Lord of the Flies. It was a very fast-paced book, and, despite it being over 400 pages, I read it in under 2 days. I liked how the mystery of "the grace year" itself was unraveled slowly and in layers. I enjoyed the idea of revolution that seemed to be resting just under the surface throughout the story...how the girls and women of the county (and especially the grace year girls) needed to unite against the rules and restrictions unfairly placed on them by the men, to change their lives and lives of future generations. And I enjoyed the examination of the relationships between the girls and women, especially within the grace year encampment and how leaders were "chosen" and followed. However, in the end, I felt like the "revolutionary" aspect of the book kind of fell through. I guess I understand why, but it was still a bit of a letdown. I was not a big fan of the romance in this story either. It felt out of place to me and seemed out of character. Overall, I enjoyed this book and would recommend it to those that enjoy dystopian novels, or those that are specifically fans of The Hunger Games, Lord of the Flies or The Handmaid's Tale. This book definitely gave me a lot to think about and it will likely stick with me for a long time.

I really enjoyed this book, especially since I am a fan of anything The Handmaid's Tale related and I look forward to reading what the author writes in the future. The pace was great throughout the book, the characters are interesting and engaging and I thought the story line was excellent. Thank you to the publisher for sending me an ARC of this book.