A young adult book that has enough of a story for adults to enjoy, with a story complex enough to stretch younger readers. The book’s beautifully presented with maps and patterned pages. The world building here stands out, though there’s something vaporous about the overall plot and some of the action sequences, which may confuse a younger audience. Even I found a couple of sequences difficult to picture; with all the drops off ledges, I expected broken bones. Although characters get hurt, they seem to have miraculous escapes. Still, there’s something charming and magical about this story. The young female lead shows more than her share of bravery, as do her young friends. I’m left wanting a grumpy old chicken. ( )

I wish books came with a fantasy rating (1 – real, 10 – pure fantasy) so fools like me (who can probably cope with a 4 or 5 on the scale) wouldn’t find themselves reading 6 -10s and being plagued by the nonsensical and make-believe. I would say ‘The Girl of Ink and Stars’ would be a 7 or 8, add to this that it’s a book aimed at a more youthful audience and the result is that it wasn’t really the book for me.
It is the story of a young cartographer’s daughter living on an island ruled by a strict governor who won’t let its people leave for reasons only he knows. Furthermore, large parts of the island are off limits and visiting them is a punishable offence. Yet, after the death of a young girl, the governor’s own daughter flees into the isle’s unmapped regions in order to discover what mysterious entities may have attacked her classmate. As her friend, Isabella and her father’s hand-me-down cartography skills smuggles herself onto the search party so that she can both explore the island, discover its mysteries and rescue her friend.
Despite the book not really being my cup of tea, there are without doubt good things about it: Kiran Millwood-Hargreaves clearly has a way with words and some of the descriptive language and similes were very well chosen. IN my humble opinion there is an ample amount of magic to entertain the young readers as well as bringing to the fore important themes like loss, injustice, control, remembrance and redemption, but there are also fundamental plot points that are a little flimsy and unbelievable.
But, as my girlfriend has so politely reminded me as I read this back, the age factor - that I am a 36 year old man – is a huge caveat to my critique of the book. I am a primary school teacher however so retain the right to some authority on YA literature haha. Truth be told, it’s a shame the book deals with such adult themes because my main aim for reading it was to be able to recommend it to some children in my class but they are too young for it. Anyway, I digress. The Girl of Ink and Stars is worth a look and a decent read for the young, adventurous soul - not so much for thirty something males or people with an aversion to the fantastical! ( )

Cover of THE GIRL OF INK AND STARS stirs a compelling mystery of freedom rising from the top of her head.

Latitude and Longitude are fun to locate on a real map.

Deaths are enough to fill a cemetery, from twin brother and mother and friend, Cata, to cruel Governor and his faithful companions.

It made No Sense to kill off yet another friend = Lupe!!!!!

With so many dead already, this "twist" throws the plot ending way off. ( )

Representation: Non-white protagonist and side character
Trigger warnings: Death of a child, death of a friend, death in an underwater cave

6/10, this was another meh book, I expected a lot more from that book, but alas, it didn't live up to its promises. The plot was basic, I think it was dumbed down for the middle graders to read this book easily. When the main character, Isabella Riosse, was told that another girl called Cata, was killed, she goes on an adventure to find who killed her and he was an underworld figure called Yote, but not much of the world building was explained so I couldn't get what was going on in the book half of the time. Isabella was courageous, but I do wonder why Governor Adori had to bring his daughter, Lupe, along with some people on a ship to the Forgotten Territories, I'm perplexed as to why they were forgotten.

The places in this world were just the names of the places in the real world, but changed slightly, such as Amrica instead of America, Ægypt instead of Egypt, Chine instead of China, Afrik instead of Africa, but some place names stayed the same, such as India and Asia, and some places like Australia and Antarctica were entirely missing, which was strange but understandable. Towards the latter half of the book, Isabella and Lupe got stuck in a labyrinth, then behind a lava waterfall with a glass wall, escaped Yote, then got stuck in a cave, which conveniently had a trapdoor. The author decided to kill off Lupe by making her stay underwater for too long so she dies, and Isabella calls it a sacrifice. How could the author do this, Lupe was a pretty major character, I'm bamboozled, she should have survived. In the end, Isabella drew a brand new updated map of her country, Joya. If you like an action packed fantasy story, this is the book for you. ( )

This is a pretty quick-reading tale, sort of an alternative-reality adventure fantasy I guess, with fairy tale elements, about a girl who finds herself chasing a friend into unknown lands. Isabella's father is a mapmaker. The two of them live alone after the deaths of mother and brother some time before the story starts, on an island on a familiar but different Earth, ruled by a steel-fisted Governor. Isabella carries on a somewhat hush-hush friendship with the Governor's daughter, Lupe. When one of their classmates is found dead, Lupe takes it upon herself to chase the supposed assailants into the forbidden forest, and Isabella follows her as part of the Governor's search party, a navigator who knows the way because of her father's vocation. Along the way the searchers encounter mythical beasts and supernatural forces, which Isabella knows to be echoes of powers from long ago, which have fallen into legend. It is a struggle between myth and reality as Isabella and Lupe fight their way back to their village. It is a tight story, brimming with imagination. I'm a sucker for stories where girls act heroic, and this does not disappoint. ( )