J. L. Willow

Title: The Impossible Girl

Author: Lydia Kang

Genre: Mystery

Review: The Impossible Girl spins a dark, edge-of-your-seat mystery that revolves around corpse theft but somehow still manages to be beautifully written. The book revolves around Cora Lee, who lives a double-life as both herself and her “brother,” Jacob. Cora is known as a smart, young girl with a broad knowledge of medicine. On the other hand, Jacob is known for his skills in resurrection — the art of thieving bodies from their coffins and selling them to buying museums and universities. But Cora has another secret even larger than the impersonation of her fake brother: she was born with a second heart. And when people with deformities begin to die from unnatural causes and rumors of a girl with two hearts begin to spread, Cora finds herself next on the list of desired resurrections. With things quickly getting out of hand — no thanks to a mysterious man named Theo who sneaks himself into Cora’s resurrection group — Cora finds herself racing against the clock to find whoever is committing the murders before they find her first.

The thing that stood out to me most about this book was Kang’s style of writing. This is one of those stories that could be re-written and told in a completely different style, but I found that Kang’s choice of voice to be perfect for the story. While there were scenes of tension and violence, other moments of softness brought a striking balance to the story. Some lines were so artistically written that I couldn’t help but reread them again and again. It’s very difficult to come across stories with those kinds of emotional highs and lows that still manages to read fluently, but The Impossible Girl makes it seem effortless.

I really enjoyed this book. I love a good creepy story, and The Impossible Girl definitely delivered on that front. Kang did a good job of knowing when to describe the gore or violence so that it wasn’t overdone. As a mystery goes, there were plenty of twists I never saw coming. The ending was especially striking and definitely made me do a double-take. If you’re looking for a creepy, dark mystery with a good amount of heart (in fact, it has two hearts) then The Impossible Girl by Lydia Kang is the book for you.

Good Choice in you Liked: City of Ghosts, The Graveyard Book, Vengeful

Rating: 9/10