So, I made myself a goal of reading one book a month during 2016… unfortunately that hasn’t exactly gone to plan so far this year. 2 ½ months for a book is much better than I was doing last year mind you, so here is my first book review of 2016: Girls in White Dresses by Jennifer Close.

This book was given to me for Christmas by my lovely big sister Emma. She reads a LOT of books, so I definitely trust her judgement and knew it would be a good read. It also looks so pretty on my shelf and the cover matches my bedroom colour scheme so the book automatically gets bonus points for that!

This book is unlike any other book I have ever read – in a good way! The first big thing I noticed, was that the book is written in third person narrative, meaning you never get to see the thoughts inside someone’s head in the same way you do from a first person narrative. At first I found this strange, as I have never read a book written from this perspective, however I actually really enjoyed it and it was nice to read something a little different to usual.

The book itself doesn’t follow a singular plot line. Instead, it follows a group of young adults throughout their twenties, each chapter being a different snippet of a different girl’s life. At first, I found this ridiculously confusing, as I kept muddling the characters up and losing track of who was dating who, but I soon learnt not to focus on the individual characters but instead enjoy the stories from their lives. I really enjoyed the different glimpses into people’s lives, and loved how much their lives changed over the course of the book – it gave me hope! From young adults without a clue what to do with their lives, we see the different girls get different jobs, some marry, some have children, some move out of the city – all at different timescales and emotional points within their lives.

It’s something I could really relate to, as being 20 myself, the next decade of my life seems so daunting, yet every character progressed in a different timescale and different way. For me, the book emphasised the dynamics of a group of young adults and how there is not a ‘norm’ or ‘expectation’ – you develop at whatever rate you do, and just because all your friends might be moving out and having children does not mean that it is the right time in your life to do that, too!

Some of the chapters made me smile, some made me cry and some made me chuckle out loud! It was a fun read and I would recommend it to anyone in their twenties who enjoys a chick-lit!