Holiday Sale! Get an annual membership for 20% off!

Book Summary and Reviews of The Looking Glass by Janet McNally

The Looking Glass by Janet McNally

The Looking Glass

by Janet McNally

  • Critics' Consensus:
  • Published:
  • Aug 2018, 336 pages
  • Rate this book

About this book

Book Summary

Janet McNally's imaginative story of sisterhood shows that the fiercest of loves are often the ones that exist outside of happily-ever-afters.

GIRLS IN TROUBLE. That's what Sylvie Blake's older sister Julia renamed their favorite fairy tale book, way back when they were just girls themselves. Now Julia has disappeared - and no one knows for sure if she wants to be away, or if she's the one in trouble.

Then a copy of their old storybook arrives with a mysterious list inside, and Sylvie begins to see signs of her sister, and their favorite fairy tales, everywhere she goes.

With the help of her best friend's enigmatic brother and his beat-up car, Sylvie sets out to follow the strange signs right to Julia and return to New York with her in tow. But trouble comes in lots of forms - and Sylvie soon learns that the damsel in distress is often the only one who can save herself.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Reviews

Media Reviews

"Starred Review. McNally's vivid imagery and exquisite, poetic language - with an ever so slightly sinister undercurrent - weave shimmering, slow-building tension throughout. This ode to sisterhood and strength leads up to an unexpected and thoroughly satisfying conclusion. Grades 7-10." - Kirkus

"Starred Review. Similar in concept, though softer in tone, to Melissa Albert's The Hazel Wood... A bittersweet modern fairy tale, tinged with magical realism, that will touch hearts." - Booklist

"Janet McNally's The Looking Glass is gossamer woven with gold and glass: a fairytale of a novel rooted in the heart of real life. An absolute beauty of a read." - Kathleen Glasgow, New York Times bestselling author of Girl in Pieces

"A poignant, beautifully-woven story, The Looking Glass explores all the complexities of love, loss, family, and healing, as we follow one girl on a powerful journey of self-discovery." - Amber Smith, New York Times bestselling author of The Way I Used to Be

"Reading this book feels like standing in a sunbeam and watching the dust glitter. McNally transforms the mundane into the extraordinary, expertly pairs life's bitter with its sweet, and coaxes her readers into a world they won't soon want to leave. The Looking Glass is pure delight." - Emily Henry, author of The Love That Split the World

"Janet McNally's writing glows like your best memory, sensuous and alive with moonlight and the smell of flowers." - Jeff Zentner, author of The Serpent King and Goodbye Days

"A lyrical and heartfelt tale of love, family, and self-discovery that will sweep you up in its magic right from the very first page." - Caleb Roehrig, author of Last Seen Leaving

"Much like her ballerina heroine, Janet McNally makes her effervescent writing seem effortless. But there's grit beneath the glitter of this charming road-trip fairytale. Stock up on highlighters: you'll want to underline every perfect sentence." - Harriet Reuter Hapgood, author of The Square Root of Summer

This information about The Looking Glass was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Author Information

Janet McNally

Janet McNally is the author of the novels The Looking Glass and Girls in the Moon, as well as a prizewinning collection of poems, Some Girls. She has an MFA from the University of Notre Dame, and her stories and poems have been published widely in magazines. She has twice been a fiction fellow with the New York Foundation for the Arts. Janet lives in Buffalo, New York, with her husband and three little girls, in a house full of records and books, and teaches creative writing at Canisius College. You can visit her online at www.janetmmcnally.com.

More Author Information

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

More Recommendations

Readers Also Browsed . . .

more YA literary fiction...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Top Picks

  • Book Jacket: Margo's Got Money Troubles
    Margo's Got Money Troubles
    by Rufi Thorpe
    Forgive me if I begin this review with an awkward confession. My first impression of author Rufi ...
  • Book Jacket: Our Evenings
    Our Evenings
    by Alan Hollinghurst
    Alan Hollinghurst's novel Our Evenings is the fictional autobiography of Dave Win, a British ...
  • Book Jacket: Graveyard Shift
    Graveyard Shift
    by M. L. Rio
    Following the success of her debut novel, If We Were Villains, M. L. Rio's latest book is the quasi-...
  • Book Jacket: The Sisters K
    The Sisters K
    by Maureen Sun
    The Kim sisters—Minah, Sarah, and Esther—have just learned their father is dying of ...

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    Pony Confidential
    by Christina Lynch

    In this whimsical mystery, a grumpy pony must clear his beloved human's name from a murder accusation.

Who Said...

A book is one of the most patient of all man's inventions.

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

F the M

and be entered to win..

Your guide toexceptional          books

BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.