it's amazing 😍

loved it 🤣☺️ because it's satisfaction made me interested 😊🙂 and I'll definitely keep listening to it over and over

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Emily Barr never disappoints

I love all of of Emily Barr’s books and this one is no exception. Aimed at younger adults but a good story for anyone- although you can tell the story (and narrator voice) it is told from a younger person’s perspective and due to this some of the characteristic wit that Barr’s female protagonists usually have (which I love) is missing... however there are enough twists, turns and different characters to make this a page turner (or sit in the car stopped outside home for 10min while you listen to more). Love the descriptions of India, and the grey realism of contrasting life in the UK! A positive read, perfect escapism. Would recommend as good use of your credit.

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2 people found this helpful

Often hilarious but equally heartbreaking

In the mid-to-late 1990s it seemed like everybody was checking out, some more than others. In a resurgence of 60's hippie culture, New Age travellers and other likeminded individuals were rejecting the millennium and all that it brought and going off-grid. I've often wondered what became of those people, the ones who simply disappeared and speculated about the lives of the children that grew up in cults and alternative communities.

Emily Barr's The Girl Who Came Out of the Woods begins in one such community. Set in a clearing in the woods in a remote south Indian forest, a group of people believe themselves to be all gods and goddesses. They are completely self-sufficient, shunning contact with the world outside, and the children in the community have never seen more than ten people in their lives.

Until one day when tragedy occurs during an annual celebration and sixteen-year-old Arty is forced out of the community and into a world she has never set foot in, in order to gain urgent medical attention.

Often hilarious but equally heartbreaking, The Girl Who Came Out of the Woods is Arty's story and how she comes to terms with this brand new world, considering that much of her previous knowledge was gleamed from Richard Scarry picture books. Everything is new to her and how is it that we all carry around phones that we use to do everything but talk to other people?

Threaded throughout the novel is a mystery and the promise of a dark secret. As the chapters flip between now and then, we have to wonder how it was that things went so wrong, how did Arty's mother land up in the clearing in the woods and is Arty herself now in grave danger?

At times uplifting in a way that reminded me of Slumdog Millionaire and at others downright terrifying, The Girl Who Came Out of the Woods is wonderfully unique and speculative (although I have started to notice other novels coming out with a similar theme). Arty often shows eye-rolling naivety - I honestly thought I'd dislocated my eyeball during one particular scene - and she possesses impossible amounts of good luck and fortune. But if you can suspend disbelief and forgive Barr for her slightly rose-tinted storytelling, there is a deeper message to be found about privacy, technology and how we build trust to develop deep and meaningful relationships.

I listened to The Girl Who Came Out of the Woods on Audible, narrated by Tamaryn Payne. Tamaryn did a great job of reading the multitude of characters in the story, so much so that you can begin to tell them apart by her voice. I obviously can't know for sure but I think I enjoyed this novel more on audiobook than I would have if I'd read it and I'd definitely recommend it.

I give The Girl Who Came Out of the Woods an excellent four out of five stars and recommend to fans of young adult thrillers, lovers of India and anyone with a healthy fascination of cults and communes.

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2 people found this helpful

The girl who came out of the woods

This was a very good story because it made you want to listen to more. The reader was good and clear with the words.

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2 people found this helpful

Cant get into it. Dragging

Just cant get into it. Dragging just not capturing me. Shame as a book i would like

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