A Girl Can Dream book review

A Girl Can Dream follows Hazel who has gone on holiday with her brother and best friend to Venice after getting out of a bad relationship with an older boyfriend to celebrate becoming herself again. Until it seems like Venice isn’t all it seems and more could be going on than what meets the eye.

I’m not so sure about this book, I was confused for much of it as we jumped timelines frequently and a lot was going on in our ‘current’ timeline. I understand why it was written the way it was and how many could love it but I don’t think it worked for me. I didn’t understand what was happening in Venice and where the story was trying to go. I didn’t feel invested until the last 100 pages and couldn’t really care about where the story was going, nor was I particularly invested in Hazel’s overall story.

Saying this I do understand what message was trying to be told by Emily Barr and I do think it was done in a very powerful way. Books like this share powerful messages and I think they are important but I do think it’s important to share them in many different ways as not every way of telling the story works for everyone. The way that the past section of the story was also done in a really interesting way, how at times Hazel from the present was telling the story, sharing things that you only know when looking back.

There were many characters that I enjoyed reading about including Enzo and Phoebe who Hazel goes to Venice with. I found them interesting people and supported many of their actions, understood what they did and why, along with this I found Hazel an interesting character but I wouldn’t say I loved any characters in the way that I often do when reading. On the other hand there were many characters who I felt indifferent towards or was not a fan of, not many characters have stuck with me and I understood their actions but I didn’t care particularly for them.

Overall this was easily a 3 star read that I understood why it was written in the way it was, and found to be an important book that I could understand why others like but just don’t think was for me. I may recommend this in the future to others however I think I have read books with similar messages before that I preferred and would more readily recommend.

Thank you to Netgalley and Penguin Random House for a free e-arc in exchange for an honest review.

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