Thoughts: The Name of the Star

The Name of the Star

by Maureen Johnson
Book 1 of Shades of London

~ Goodreads ~

Rating:  4.0 Stars

See Also:  First Impression for The Name of the Star

The Day Louisiana teenager Rory Deveaux arrives in London marks a memorable occasion.  For Rory, it's the start of a new life at a London boarding school.  But for many, this will be remembered as the day a series of brutal murders broke out across the city--gruesome crimes mimicking the horrific work of Jack the Ripper in the autumn of 1888.

Soon "Rippermania" takes hold of modern-day London, and the police are left with few leads and no witnesses.  Except one.  Rory spotted the man police believe to be the prime suspect.  But she is the only one who saw him.  Even her roommate, who was with her at the time, didn't notice the mysterious man.  So why can only Rory see him?  And more urgently, what is he planning to do about her?

In this edge-of-your-seat thriller, full of suspense, humor, and romance, Rory will learn the truth about the secret ghost police of London and discover her own shocking abilities.

I haven't read a lot of YA in a long time, at least a couple years, maybe, or four.  Honestly, I don't remember, because I just kind of drifted away from it.  I might have read one YA book here and there, but I think I eventually gave up picking up anything YA unless by an author I know I love.

But all of that isn't really the point of this review.

I'm glad that I randomly chose The Name of the Star as my read for his year's Halloween Bingo, for the Baker Street Irregulars square (see end of post).  And I'm glad that it turned out much more interesting and fun than I had initially anticipated.  Mind you, I didn't expect it to be bad or anything, I just wasn't really expecting anything at all.

But I found myself quickly loving Rory's tone and her dry snark, and her random tendencies to get excited about the strangest things--like no hockey today!--and loved that she was extremely honest.  And I loved that she wasn't the typical mopey, outcast, and misunderstood YA heroine who is hated on by all the girls, but whom every male has a secret lusting attraction towards.

Rory was just an ordinary girl who traveled to England for high school, who became just another student at Wexford, who made friends and went to class and stressed about homework, like any other normal high school girl.  She had friends, both boys and girls, and there were no mean girls or overly broody alpha boys.

And then she picked up a fancy new gift after a near death experience, and ended up being the sole witness of a Ripper murder.

The truth is, I normally would have hated how dragged out a lot of this book ended up being in the beginning, and even some parts in the middle.  There was a very mundane, everyday feel to each chapter, like a boring "A Day in the Life of Aurora Deveaux."  But Rory's voice and her telling was actually kind of fun, and while a lot of detail was probably excessive, I found I enjoyed the short tangents into her family and her life back in Louisana.  Call me contradictory, because I probably would have condemned another book for being so banal.

But Rory made it interesting.

It took a while for the actual story to start up, truth be told, and meanwhile, there was a nagging voice in the back of my head wondering if we were ever going to get Rory involved in these Ripper copycat murders.  And the moment she starts seeing the ghosts, it wasn't hard to figure out how things would go from there--aside from the continuation of mundane, everyday activities, because I hadn't expected the book to keep that up.

I suppose for many others, this book might come off boring, as there is very little action, and a lot more focus on Rory's school life and her interactions with her fellow Wexford classmates.  I would have liked to have seen more scenes with her and the squad of youths known as the Shades, really, but I'm guessing that will take place more in later books.

Meanwhile, I will admit, I truly enjoyed The Name of the Star a lot, much more than I had thought I would, and that makes me extremely happy.  I will also admit that there was a point that I stopped reading this book at night because I was afraid of seeing the ghostly Ripper at my bedroom door...

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Halloween Bingo 2018
(mystery that involves children/teens in crime solving)

Other Possible Squares:

• Genre: Suspense
• Ghost stories
• Supernatural
• Darkest London
• Amateur Sleuth
• Terrifying Women
• Murder Most Foul

First Impression: The Name of the Star

The Name of the Star

by Maureen Johnson
Book 1 of Shades of London

~ Goodreads ~



Here is a cautionary **SPOILER WARNING**  just in case I have inadvertently given away anything significant to the story itself.  I will do my best not to mention any big spoilers, but I don't always check myself accordingly.

Review for The Name of the Star | link coming soon

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Progress on 8/27/18:  61 of 372 pages (16%)

Some other facts I picked up:

Welsh is an actual, currently used language and our next-door neighbors Angela and Gaenor spoke it.  It sounds like Wizard.

[...]

England and Britain and the United Kingdom are not the same thing.  England is the country.  Britain is the island containing England, Scotland, and Wales.  The United Kingdom is the formal designation of England, Scotland, and Wales and Northern Ireland as a political entity.  If you mess this up, you will be corrected.  Repeatedly.

The English will play hockey in any weather.  Thunder, lightning, plague of locusts... nothing can stop the hockey.  Do not fight the hockey, for the hockey will win.

I don't know how on point these facts Rory picked up really are, but I have to admit that that last one made me chuckle and decide to write an update post.

I'm actually enjoying this book despite the fact that it's so far pretty mundane as far as stories go.  The book started with the discovery of a dead body and some bloody descriptions.  But then we jump right into Rory's narration, following her from Bénouville, Louisiana, to London.  I've read other YAs before where the main character who has to travel to a new place tends to be a bit pouty and a sour sport about her own situation; too closed-minded, ignorant, and entirely too arrogant and rude for her own good.  And usually always whining.

But I'm finding Rory's "fish out of water" experience kind of fun, if only because in spite of her ignorance, she's actually being a pretty good sport about being in a place she's unfamiliar with.  It probably helps that she DID choose to come to London to study abroad herself.  And it also helps that the tone of the narration is dry, a little sarcastic, and nonsensical in a way that I love.

Rory is just an ordinary girl with no "special snowflake" stats.  She knows she used to be popular when she lived in Bénouville, but now she understands that at Wexford, she is neither popular nor unpopular and "was just there."  She's finding the curriculum grueling and panics accordingly.  She keeps quiet when she doesn't have anything to say, but will quip something sarcastic if it strikes her mood.

The fact that she's not the sporty type endears her to me, and the fact that she admits this, and the book's narration also proves this, makes her all the more likable.  Because, for one, I'm not a sporty type either--give me a couch and a book any time of the day--and second, she doesn't magically become a sporty type and even dreads going to hockey.  Nothing is more annoying than someone proclaiming how un-sporty she is, only to become the best field hockey player on the first day, without having had any idea how to even play the sport in the first place.

Rory's first day of field hockey was spent sitting out because she forgot her mouth guard.  Her second day consisted of pouring rain, heavy goalie equipment, and the inability to move despite being yelled at by the teacher to block with her arms and legs.

Man, if I had to take a mandatory sports class regularly, I'd probably keel over and die pretty quickly.

Back to the story, I'm hoping that things pick up pretty soon, because so far we've mainly been following the copy-cat Ripper murders in the news.  I'm looking forward to the moment Rory gets involved and the supernatural stuff starts to happen--in fact, I think we just met one of our resident supernatural stuff a few pages ago without realizing it yet.  Just the way his introduction was written has "I'm significant to the story plot" written all over it.