I enjoyed reading dystopian fiction again. It was an interesting concept. Tierney is a great character that lead the beginning of a rebellion.

The Grace Year is heavily influenced by Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale. If you loved that, you'll love this!

Absolutely brilliant!.
Really enjoyed this coming of age dystopian novel. Well written and fabulous interesting characters. I loved the way the quirks of human nature were apparent and all is not what it seems !!

This is definitely a new idea for the YA dystopian genre. There’s lots of twists, particularly in the last quarter of the book that keep you interested in the narrative.

This is just not for me. Which I should have gathered from the length of time it spent unread on my shelves. I read the first 10% but did not get on with the prose, the characters, and especially not with how unsubtle it felt. Now, there is a chance that this unsublety will be used as a clever way to subvert the reader's expectations but for me to be interested in finding that out, I would have to enjoy the writing more than I did. At the end of the day, my reading has been erratic as is and I am finally giving up on this book.

Thank you to the publisher for my eARC copy of this book. Unfortunately I didn’t love this book and therefore didn’t finish, I just didn’t connect with this one. Not for me, sorry.

I have to say I’m so glad that I’m going back through some of the books that are outstanding on my TBR because there are far too many books waiting on my shelves and if they are anything like this one then I have some real gems ahead of me. The Grace Year is a fantastic book I don’t think I’ve felt so emotionally connected to a book in quite a while, I honestly went through a full range of feelings and I was hooked from the first page to the last.

The setting and atmosphere in this book are outstanding, the secluded, restrictive and watchful community where women are, of course, on the bottom rung of the hierarchy and are blamed for the faults of men, from the start it feels like no one can trust each other and will turn on each other just so that they are not in the spotlight. This is set against the forest full of dangers and people that have been cast out from the community serving as a reminder of what is to be avoided, and the Grace Year which looms as a constant threat that no one speaks of. The injustice seeps off the page right from the start and I got really angry at how the women were treating each other and allowing themselves to be treated.

Next up it was dread, I could actually feel it in the pit of my stomach as the girls make their way to the wilderness for their Grace Year to get rid of their magic, as you start to see how manipulative some of them become and desperate to survive on their own terms. I loved the fact that as the girls found their home for the next year and started trying to settle in I found myself really questioning if the magic was real or not, the creepy and horrific situations felt completely unexplainable otherwise and it has to be said that the author did not go easy on these characters, it was definitely a nightmarish scene. I have to say though that the gruesome nature of what happens didn’t feel gratuitous, I think it fits in really well with the message of the story and heightened that flight or fight survival atmosphere.

It’s hard not to love Tierney, the free spirit in a restricted world, who at the beginning seems like she might have a shot at getting through unscathed until the girls are alone and you realise how dangerous it is to be the outsider. I did feel like I was going through this journey with her and I admired how much strength she had to continue when everything was set against her. I think the author portrayed the girls so well, the hierarchies and groups and behaviours felt so believable, I would say that most people have come across these types of people in their lives, not to this extreme obviously, but it just made it all the more scary for me seeing the similarities.

I loved how the story draws on aspects from history and uses them to turn this at times terrifying story into an almost hopeful message, I can’t really explain that in too much detail because I don’t want to spoil the book but I’ll just say that I had some preconceived notions that I was glad were turned on their head by the end of the story. The plot really is incredible and clever and there are so many elements of it that had me thinking about it for a good while after I’d finished reading, this is the kind of book that will be stuck in your head for a while.

I would highly recommend The Grace Year it is at the same time ghastly and empowering, thrilling and heartbreaking, it was a reading experience I won’t forget in a hurry.

A great premise but I didn’t find it fully realised great potential but I found the kiddie part of the book a little slower. It could be that my head wasn’t in the right place due to covid

Really like this book and hope there'll be a sequel! Very original story with great characters and plot.

I'm not a big lover of dystopian books, but this one I did enjoy. But not a lot. I thought that it was very interesting, the world building was sound and the characters felt decently fleshed out. However, I wasn't sat at the edge of my seat and unable to put down this book. I liked it but not a lot.

The Grace Year is an enthralling novel that bares witness to the violent presumptions and superstitions that force the women of Garner County into isolation when they reach the age they are at their most powerful.
The magic is told to be strong enough to be a fatal risk to the men of the village, the thought alone too wicked a possibility to allow the girls to live amongst the rest of the population. They are shamed for their power and told that the grace year is the only opportunity they have at ever living a normal life. That or face a punishment worse.
The girls are destined for disaster, as the power of ancient stories and whispers from the women who return from the north shackle them to a reality they find hard to understand.
Kim Liggett has written a powerful novel that does not fail to set itself apart in a genre that has provided us with many modern classics. The rich description, from the minute details of red ribbons to the eerie forest surroundings captivates us from start to finish. We grow to love and despise our grace year girls, as they turn on each other and themselves as the year passes by, and as something among them grows stronger. However, we feel no ease as the time in the forest nears its end, as the village they return to is no better a home for them. They are forced into engagement like commodities by their father's, with the apparent relief that they will have a husband when they return home. The act of marriage is less an act of love but more so a tighter restriction on their freedom as women. Their greatest opportunity for freedom comes at the time they are begging for its gift. Its a contradiction that truly sets this novel apart.
“They can call it magic.
I can call it madness.
But one thing is certain.
There is no grace here.”
I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys fem-dystopian novels, similar to those to my last blog post. This is certain to be a massive success, and I really hope they do take this to the big screen!

Content warning: violence, injuries (including stitches and graphic descriptions of scarring), major character death, misogyny, childbirth.

Wow. This is an atmospheric and well-written dystopian novel that merges The Scarlet Letter and The Handmaid's Tale with The Hunger Games, plus a dash of those campfire horror stories you used to terrify your friends with as a teen. It's compelling but awful to watch as the girls on their grace year sink into madness, and there were several points at which I genuinely didn't know what was going to happen. Some aspects were a little bit trite (there's one major plot point which feels very similar to Noughts and Crosses), and I would have liked a little bit more information about how the society got this way (why so few males in the county?) but it didn't really matter, because it's still very readable (and worryingly, rather believable). If you enjoyed Girls with Sharp Sticks, or just like your YA chillingly feminist, this is definitely a good next read.

"No one speaks of the grace year. It’s forbidden."

Which makes this quite hard to review! But no, actually it's pretty easy. As so called YA (more about that later) goes this stands out in what is, let's face it, a pretty crowded field.

In this dystopian world (although to be fair it feel like more of an alternate reality) women are vilified for the desire they provoke in men. This is their "magic" At the height of their beauty, their sixteenth year, they are either picked as wives or workers. Regardless of their fate they are sent out of the town, to the forest, to survive poachers and each other. Then they return, apparently rid of their "magic" to live a life of servitude, either to their husbands or the work chosen for them. Most consider marriage the lucky choice, but not this stories heroine Tierney James. She considers herself a rebel and would rather work than end up with a husband who revolts her. But her Grace Year comes and she find the decision taken from her hands and that she is now in even more danger.

This is a great read, but with some genuinely uncomfortable moments. But this is been called YA by some...I'd say it fits more into the New Adult genre, there are moments in this I wouldn't be happy about my daughter reading until she much older. It's definitely for 16 plus in my (admittedly old fashioned) opinion. It owes much to The Handmaidens Tale but is still original enough not to have you crying plagiarism into the night.

The Grace Year is one of my top books for 2020 so far. It's fantastic.

Tierney lives in a dystopian alternative world, where at 16 years old girls are thought to develop dangerous magical powers. They are shipped out of the county to a distant sort of enclosure for a year - the grace year. They must live there together for a year and rid themselves of their magic. Not all of them will return and many will return with terrible scars. Some will be killed by poachers. The lucky ones who return will either be married or sent to a work house if nobody wants to marry them.

Sadly, the women greatly outnumber the men in this world, but somehow the men still hold all the power, even to decide who they should marry. The girls don't get a choice, and any who don't follow the rules are banished to the outskirts.

Nobody is allowed to speak of the grace year, so when it's Tierney's turn to go she has no idea what to expect. None of the girls do. They have just heard rumours about what will happen, and they are all waiting for their magic to come in at any second. I won't give anything else away because it will ruin the book, and I hate spoilers!

The book is very tense for most of the time, very fast paced. There are loads of different characters, but the main protagonist is Tierney. She is a rebellious, tomboy, independent girl who doesn't want to get married and just wants to get through the grace year any way she can. Unfortunately she doesn't have many friends amongst the grace year girls because she's different, so she is understandably worried that this might cause problems for her when they are left alone.

The whole thing is very reminiscent of the hunger games and other similar YA novels where teenagers are left to fend for themselves in some sort of apocalyptic or battle setting. It's completely gripping, and quite emotional. I love the character of Tierney because I totally agree with her philosophies on the whole and I love how unique she is compared to the rest of her community. I was 100% rooting for her all the way through, and I always believed in her - corny but true!

This is a modern book about very strong women and I loved it. I would recommend to anyone who enjoys YA novels with a dystopian twist, and a strong female lead. 5 stars!

Loved this from start to finish. The little details you don't pick up on until you've finished the book and realised how it all comes together. Very poignant and an un-putdownable read.

While this book definitely had my attention and interest at first, it slowly started dipping a fifth into it. This is an interesting mix of Dystopian novels like The Hunger Games, Handmaid's Tale and Only Ever Yours but just didn't deliver enough new things for me to want to continue with it. None of the characters were very interesting and I didn't care about reading the end of their story. On the contrary, I sadly just found most characters rather annoying and while it's not necessarily a bad thing to have an unlikeable main character, I'm pretty sure you were able to sympathize with this protagonist which I just didn't.
Ultimately I think that the way this book is portraying this certain topic will work for some people and not so much for others. I don't have much faith in this one going in a direction that will be for me, so I decided to put it down.

Although a familiar trope – a group sent off to fend for themselves and they fall into roles and adapt behaviours to fit expectations – this is different in that the group are all women who have started menstruating but not yet come into their ‘power.’ They’ve been brainwashed by the patriarchy and followed strict rules and regimes in their village so that once on their own, their hearts and minds are full of fear and they have no idea what freedom looks like.

Tierney is already at a disadvantage as they walk to their destination with their guards. Taught skills she shouldn’t know, always a tom boy and a rebel, she’s put in an awkward position that isn’t of her making. There was obviously going to be an impact but wow! Kim Liggett knows how to harness the shadows to amplify the darkness inside of the girls. As if that wasn’t enough, there’s another danger from the hunters and a couple of betrayals I didn’t see coming. The pages turned themselves as I was desperate to see how this all played out and what the resolution would be. I couldn’t predict how it would end and when it comes, it’s bittersweet but exactly as it should be. I would love to find out how this affects the village and the grace year moving forwards. Fingers crossed for more!

I have to mention the language of flowers. Historically, families immigrated to the village and because there were many different languages, their shared common language was the language of flowers. I thought this added so much to the story.

The Grace Year is one of my top reads this year. I read it over a month ago and I still think about it now. If you enjoyed The Hunger Games, The Handmaid’s Tale or the I-Land (Netflix), I guarantee you will love this story.

Good read for fans of The Power and The Hunger Games. Alternative reality where girls are sent away for a wild year before accepting a constrained female role. But this year's Grace Year is different. It should be the beginning of an interesting new series.

I thought for sure I would love The Grace Year, so when I read the description on NetGalley I requested it straight away. As so often happens (to me at least!), by the time I got the approval I was in the middle of something else and I found myself putting The Grace Year off. Finally, right before the end of 2019 I picked it up, and immediately regretted not having picked it up sooner!

During the grace year, girls are sent away to release and use up their magic, sent off into the wild to fend for themselves against the wilderness, the poachers who want to sell them for parts, and at times, the other girls. The girls don’t exactly get along – in a world with not enough men, a small number of the girls are ‘veiled’ before leaving; selected as a bride-to-be for when they return…IF they return. Not all the girls will make it back, and a man whose veiled girl doesn’t come back may well choose another bride from the girls who do. Bitterness against the chosen girls is strong, and in a world dominated by men, the girls are more interested in competing than supporting each other.

Tierney has no interest in being veiled. She just wants to get through the grace year and then go to work in the fields; it’s hard work, but she can be herself there at least, not some meek wife who goes along with her husband and perpetuates the cycle of the grace year and dead girls. It’s forbidden to talk about the grace year, so like the other girls, she has no idea what to expect. I think the mystery of the grace year is crucial for the enjoyment of the book so I won’t say much about the plot, except that it’s a spectacular blend of horror and mystery. Throughout the book, I was never quite sure whether the magic was real, whether something supernatural was going on, and who or what was terrorising the girls. I thought the plot was brilliant, and the reveal of what exactly was happening was satisfying.

While the events are spooky and mysterious, The Grace Year is also a story about relationships and society, with well fleshed-out characters. The girls go into the grace year with nothing but contempt and competition between them, and it’s up to them how they will choose to respond to their year of isolation – will they support each other or use it as an excuse to terrorise and drive out those who don’t fit? Early reviews and publicity compared The Grace Year to The Handmaid’s Tale and Lord of The Flies and that’s a perfect fit. While I’ve seen a lot of books compared to The Handmaid’s Tale in the last few years (Vox, The Power, The Jewel, Who Runs the World?) this has been my favourite of the ones I’ve read – it’s thought-provoking, atmospheric, evocative and incredibly addictive.

Liggett’s writing is wonderfully atmospheric, and enables you to so clearly visualise the world Tierney lives in, without being excessively flowery or long-winded. The pacing is tight and ramps up satisfyingly; from an intriguing beginning to genuinely tense moments in the middle to a thrilling, emotional, epic ending. The Grace Year has it all; a plot I couldn’t put down, characters I was invested in, and a world both terrifying, believable and that I was desperate to know more about.

3.5 stars.

Nobody speaks about the grace year. It’s forbidden. Every year, the 16 year old girls of the county leave the safety of their homes to spend a year enclosed in an encampment to loose their magic. Magic that can corrupt men, turn them towards passionate rages, and corrupt them. The girls who have gone before them always come back broken, deformed - if they come back at all. Tierney is one of the grace year girls. But what really happens during that year away? And can Tierney make it back whole?

I’m conflicted with this one. There’s no denying it was addictive reading, as I finished it in two days. I wanted to know what was going to happen to these girls, and I enjoyed all of the many twist and turns along the way - some of which took me by surprise. I also liked Tierney as a character while she spends her time in the encampment, especially her relationship with Gertie and rivalry with Kiersten. There was many a sinister, tension filled moment with Kiersten, especially early on, that reminded me heavily of Lord of the Flies. There’s some great scenes with the girls ‘finding their magic’ that really unnerved me, as well as managing to throw up some important questions about women, their friendships and how easily that can be manipulated to suit the needs of others.

I think it’s the latter stages of the story, where things start to unravel slightly, that lets it down. Although sectioned into seasons, there’s no real cohesion to the story beyond this with events happening very rapidly (if some instances major plot developments happen in the space of a sentence, in a ‘blink and you’ll miss’ type moment) and at types I started to get confused. I also found certain plot points very hard to get to grips with, and there’s a romantic element that just feels very instalove/unrealistic at best. I didn’t feel any chemistry.

And the ending. Don’t get me started on the ending. <spoiler>There is no way that Michael would have reacted the way he does. To find the supposedly pure woman you’re going to marry returned, pregnant with another man’s child, and to just accept it? In their society where to even have a bath with flowers in demands a whipping? I don’t think so. Also, Tierney’s behaviour towards Michael on returning is just down right awful, and completely out of character</spoiler>. I found it just ruined the story for me.

Gripping story that has some undeniable powerful moments, but I can’t get past that ending.