Confessions of a Literary Addict

This review is spoiler-free!

Where the Drowned Girls Go by Seanan McGuire
Series: Wayward Children #7
Genres: Young Adult, Fantasy
Release Date: January 4th 2022 by Tordotcom
Format: Hardcover, 150 pages
Rating: ★★★★★
Find it here: Goodreads

The world in these books just keeps getting bigger and bigger. From the lands that the characters go to through their doors, to the fact there’s another school out there to act as an opposite to the school we’ve been set in thus far, I can only imagine (and maybe that’s the point) of what McGuire will throw at us next.

(Kade book? Please? Kade is my favorite and I want his story SO badly.)

I was really glad this book was set in Cora’s POV as we follow her to the Whitethorn Institute — a school that acts literally as an opposite to everything that Eleanor’s school works and stands for — because Cora’s reasoning for wanting to leave fit in well with what the books had been giving us so far.

Also, Cora is just plain awesome, and I wanted to read more about her after what happened to her in… Come Tumbling Down, was it? I need to reread the series, I read them when they come out and that leaves a yearly gap that scrambles my memories a little. Either way, this book deals with the aftermath of what happened when Cora tagged along on a forbidden adventure, and being there with her for it is so cool.

McGuire really knows how to make you wonder if maybe the bad guys aren’t exactly bad, even if they’re very clearly not good, and I think that’s the point. The *holds hand up like an Italian caricature* nuance. I can’t go into detail about what I mean without giving away a HUGE plot point (but if you know, you know — yes, it has to do with that one character), but the perspective and the plot twist were awesome elements to a way-too-short story. They’re always too short, but they feel like they’re getting shorter with each installation, just when I want more and more!

At the end there, definitely could have had more! But maybe a little would have still been too much, because then I’d want even more detail, and there was a whole journey to be had that just… wasn’t. I don’t know. These books and their length confuse me while also making sense sometimes.

It’s only a week after I’ve finished the book as I’m writing this, but I already want the next one now. I hate waiting! Why do I do this to myself!

(Maybe I’ll just reread in the meantime.)

Anyway, thanks for reading!