Perfect for fans of:
- Pretty Little Liars
- One of Us Is Lying
- Original fairytales meet Riverdale
- dark academia vibes
“Studying at Grimrose was a guarantee of your future. When you studied at Grimrose, nothing could ever go wrong. Except that on the eve of the first day of school, one of the Académie’s most exceptional students had drowned in the school lake. Alone.”
The premise for The Grimrose Girls is downright titillating. Best friends and classmates Ella, Yuki, and Rory return to their elite boarding school missing the fourth member of their squad, Ariane, who died on school property under mysterious circumstances. While the police—and most of the student body—believes it was a suicide, her friends aren’t so sure. Determined to get to the bottom of Ariane’s death, the trio—some willingly and others not—start hunting for clues. When the new girl, Nani, unwittingly becomes part in that investigation and people at the Academy start dropping like flies, the girls will have to close ranks to stop the killings.
Dark academia vibes? A mysterious murder? All the queer and mental illness rep? Yes, please!
The cast of characters for this story drew me in from the get-go. What I really admired about the four girls was the range of emotions we got to see. There’s definitely some unresolved tension between the girls and especially Yuki and Rory seem like fireworks that are just waiting for the right spark to light up the sky—or burn everything to the ground. Meanwhile Ella seems so well-adjusted, but we learn that this façade comes at a high price and often isolates her from making true connections so others won’t find out about her complicated living situation. There’s also mental health rep for OCD and anxiety in here that felt accurate and authentic. Beyond that, we have a delightfully queer cast of characters and while some of them are repressing their feelings, others are secure in their sexual identity. Though I wish more focus had been put on these aspects, I’m hopeful that later books in this series will elaborate on that.
Every girl added something different and unique to The Grimrose Girls. That being said, it’s always a hit or miss when it comes to portraying so many POVs and somehow, this landed in the middle of that spectrum. The four girls definitely have their own view on things and their opinions, personal struggles (with mental illness, with their sexuality, with fitting in and with their overbearing families) and personal lives were showcased so vividly in their respective POVs that I could really get a grip on who they are and what makes them tick. But while I enjoyed the diversity and the different “voices,” the constant changing of the perspectives also slowed down the pacing immensely. There were some chapters that felt almost inconsequential (especially if you guess the culprit early on) while other times, chapters would basically start with a recap of the former chapter, just to include the emotions of said POV. Which obviously makes sense because you do want to have the insight but at times it felt like I’d read the same chapter twice and that took away some of my enjoyment. The same unfortunately goes for the reveal of the culprit – every girl comes to the conclusion on their own, but it felt redundant the way it was repeated in every POV, which made the reveal fall a bit flat.
Where The Grimrose Girls truly shined is when it came to the setting and the interweaving of fairy tale elements. Pohl creates the perfect creepy, mysterious setting and all the little tidbits we get about Grimrose, its curriculum and student body as well as the places like the library and the landscape, paints a vivid picture in your mind. Beyond that, the way that Pohl incorporates these fantastical elements will excite fans of urban fantasy. To find a way to include such well-known fairy tales seamlessly into a contemporary setting without losing the “credibility” of it all really speaks to Pohl’s talent as a writer. Evidently, some connections are more obvious than others—i.e. Ella, for example, is clearly Cinderella—but others are more difficult to figure out and it’s a fun time trying to come to the right conclusions before the girls do. While I take some issue with Yuki’s fantastical counterpart because it feeds a bit into the stereotype of ace-aromantic people being cold, abrash or downright robotic, I did love that we got this magical touch (I won’t say more because of spoilers) added to the plot and I’m excited to see where that will be taken in the sequel.
All in all, The Grimrose Girls is a contemporary take on classic fairytales with a haunting setting, and a ruthless mystery at its core—perfect for lovers of dark academia vibes, fairytales with a twist, or mini-Sherlocks in the making!
The Grimrose Girls is available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers, like your local bookstore, as of November 2nd 2021.
Will you be picking up The Grimrose Girls? Tell us in the comments below!
Synopsis | Goodreads
Four troubled friends, One murdered girl… and a dark fate that may leave them all doomed.
After the mysterious death of their best friend, Ella, Yuki, and Rory are the talk of their elite school, Grimrose Académie. The police ruled it a suicide, but the trio are determined to find out what really happened.
When Nani Eszes arrives as their newest roommate, it sets into motion a series of events they couldn’t have imagined. As the girls retrace their friend’s last steps, they uncover dark secrets about themselves and their destinies, discovering they’re all cursed to repeat the brutal and gruesome endings to their stories until they can break the cycle.
This contemporary take on classic fairytales reimagines heroines as friends attending the same school. While investigating the murder of their best friend, they uncover connections to their ancient fairytale curses and attempt to forge their own fate before it’s too late.
