Gunslinger Girl by Lyndsay Ely

1/25/2018

SYNOPSIS

Seventeen-year-old Serendipity "Pity" Jones inherited two things from her mother: a pair of six shooters and perfect aim. She's been offered a life of fame and fortune in Cessation, a glittering city where lawlessness is a way of life. But the price she pays for her freedom may be too great.

In this extraordinary debut from Lyndsay Ely, the West is once again wild after a Second Civil War fractures the U.S. into a broken, dangerous land...

Pity's struggle against the dark and twisted underbelly of a corrupt city will haunt you long after the final bullet is shot.

Synopsis from Chapters.Indigo.ca

PERSONAL REVIEW

I was immediately drawn to this book after reading the synopsis and couldn't wait to give it a read. I've never really been drawn to Western-type novels before, but something about "Pity" Jones captured my imagination. My requirements for dystopian novels are simple: unique storyline, some kind of backstory about what happened to the world, and strong and dynamic characters. This book hit all of those points for me!

What I Liked:

Unique Storyline:
I really liked the blend of dystopian future with Western-esque elements. This could have been easily devolved to simply be settlements of people struggling to survive, but Ely make a strong decision to connect it to the Wild West to give us both a taste of the past and a taste of the future. I totally bought into it because it made sense; there were no magic or brand new out-of-this-world technologies, but a world ravaged by another civil war that has divided the country and lead to them having to rebuild what was left. I haven't read many other books like this -- but if there are, send them my way, because I quite enjoyed it!

Good Backstory About What Led to this Future:
My biggest problem with many dystopian novels is that they don't really given us any information about what led to this new world. I totally understand that the author makes this decision based on their storytelling or because they are trying to achieve their own goals, but as a reader, I hate it. I want to know how we got here because it makes it all seem more real to me. So I was really happy that Ely decided to give us the background on how the world, and these characters, got to where it is today! It just made me feel like this future wasn't completely out of the realm of possibility; if I'm reading about a pretty-mess up future, I really want to know what brought us here.
Strong Female Characters:
From our main protagonist to the leader of the colony, women show nothing but strength in this book. I love Pity and how she continues to adapt to her new surroundings -- she's had some pretty horrible things happen to her and doesn't stop fighting for a better life. Olivia and Siena are flat-out just badasses -- Olivia is a bounty hunter turned awesome bartender, while Siena is still a bounty hunter, and apparently one of the best. And then we have Selene, the leader of Cessation and someone who will not let anyone come in and take what she has built. Does she make some bad decisions? Yes. Is she an incredibly strong woman who built everything for herself and shows the other characters what it means to be a leader? Also yes!

I thought this was a great debut novel from Ely and I really enjoyed reading it, but it really seems like it was left with the intention of a sequel...but I can't find anything about one! If it's a standalone novel, it didn't give us a good ending, and if it's part of a series then we don't have enough information to know where this is going next! Either way, I'm keeping my eye on Ely to see what she brings us next.

FINAL RATING: 4/5