I read Siobhan Vivian’s The Last Boy and Girl in the World earlier this year, and I absolutely loved it. So when The List showed up on my daily BookBub email for only $1.99, I was pretty excited and purchased it right away.
I can’t say that I was disappointed, but I certainly didn’t enjoy it as much as I expected.
In this book, we follow eight girls: the prettiest and ugliest from each grade of the high school, as determined by the infamous “List.” Nobody knows who creates this list, but it’s come out yearly for as long as anybody can remember. The girls all react differently. This was one thing about the book that I really liked. It wasn’t smooth sailing for all the prettiest girls. It wasn’t an immediate devastating blow for all of the ugliest girls. Everybody had their own emotions, their own lives, and their own problems, both related and unrelated to their position on the list.
However, I felt that something was missing. The book is not nearly long enough to do justice to these characters. I felt that I knew some of them better than others. I had a full picture of some of the girls. Danielle’s story, for example, was nicely wrapped up. But will Bridget be okay? Will Lauren ever have a normal life? Did the list help Candace? I was halfway expecting some kind of Mean Girls-esque moment where one of the prettiest girls gets up on stage and distributes broken pieces of the Homecoming crown. Nothing of that sort happens. The book just ends with no resolution.
I really wanted to enjoy this book, and might have been able to if it had a better ending.
Final rating: ★★★☆☆
The Bibliophagist 