Wild Girl Book Review

Wild Girl Book Review

Have you ever wondered what it is like to come to a different country? Wild Girl is a realistic fiction book written by a two-time Newbery Honor-winning author, Patricia Reilly Giff.

Lidie is a young girl whose mother died many years ago. After her mother died, Lidie’s father and brother move to  New York. Lidie loves riding horses in the field behind her house, feeling the fresh air, of Jales, Brazil, brush across her face, and smelling the fresh scent of the lemon trees just over the bend. She dreams of one day going to live with her father and race horses.

When Lidie turns twelve, she leaves her home in Jales, Brazil to go live with her father in Queens, New York. Her father runs a stable at a famous race track, and her brother is training to be a jockey.  

When Lidie finally gets to New York, she is reunited with her brother and father after five long years apart, but nothing was the same. When they left Jales to go to New York, Lidie was very young. One thing her father asked her to bring to him when she comes to New York was a lemon off the tree in Jales. Lidie did just that. She brought a lemon with her, but her father doesn’t even really remember. Lidie tries to make things as they left off, but she discovers nothing would be the same without her beloved mother.

One thing I really love about the story Wild Girl is the setting. I love that it has things to do with horses. Ever since a young age, Lidie’s passion was horses. While she’s in America, she falls in love with this dapple grey filly named Wild Girl. She longs of riding this little filly in a race one day, but her father and brother don’t even think she can ride. Instead they got Lidie an old run down horse named Love Yourself for her to learn how to ride on or so they think.  Lidie longs to race this little grey, but no one believes she is capable of it.

Lidie later discovers that her brother, who’s a jockey, is getting too tall to ride race horses anymore. She tries in every way to figure out a way to race her father's horse, Dorce, in the next dig race. Lidie is a very determined girl and no matter how hard the task is she will always find a way to conquer it. The attitude Lidie uses to concur that issue should help all girls to relate to because not only boys can overcome challenges.

This story has two perspectives: the little fillie’s and Lidie’s. The author of this book did a really good job of making this book easy to follow. Even though it had two different perspectives, I never once had trouble figuring out if Lidie or Wild Girl was talking. This book is interesting because the author makes the filly talk because you could get to know its personality. Every horse has its own personality, and it is important that people understand that.

When the book talked in the perspective of Wild Girl, it gives a much needed change in the book. This book can get a little slow paced, and I got bored once in a while. When they changed to the perspective of the filly, Wild Girl, it just made the book fun to read again because this little filly is full of life and emotion. The author does a really nice job of putting a picture in your mind of the little filly.

Overall this book was a well written book. The inseparable bond between man and equine, and that anything is possible with a little determination and that's why I love this book so much.