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273rd out of 816 books
—
2,048 voters
The Blue Mirror
by
Kathe Koja
In this "psychologically gripping" ("Publishers Weekly") novel, a 16-year-old girl deals with the dark life of the streets.
Paperback, 128 pages
Published
November 2nd 2006
by Speak
(first published March 5th 2004)
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The Blue Mirror by Kathe Koja is a very confusing yet interesting book. When i saw this book in the library, the front cover seemed mysterious and so did the title which made me want to read it. This book is about a girl named Maggy and the journey she goes through from falling in love with a runaway street boy named Cole, dealing with her alcoholic mother Monica, and the endless hours she spends at the Blue Mirror. My favorite line from this book was "My own personal paper world: it's called "T...more
I don't' really know how to rate this book...at times I wanted to give it 4 stars, at other 2, so in the end lets roll with 2.5? lolz
I bet you can already guess since I can't even decide how to rate this book that my review will be equally all over the place;) So ummmm just hang on tight and we will try to make it through this together.
In my experience there are books you love, books you hate, and books that were just *shrugs*. Well now there is a new kind to add to that list. Books that leave...more
I bet you can already guess since I can't even decide how to rate this book that my review will be equally all over the place;) So ummmm just hang on tight and we will try to make it through this together.
In my experience there are books you love, books you hate, and books that were just *shrugs*. Well now there is a new kind to add to that list. Books that leave...more
2 likes · like · see review
Maggie flees to The Blue Mirror, a café that serves as her sacred space, nightly to escape her drunk, depressed mother. There she nurses a drink and spends most of her time drawing the things and people around her, translating them into her own world, which shares a name with her café hide out.
It's there that she meets Cole, a dreamy stranger who makes something inside her sing. Leader of a small band of street kids he's exciting, dangerous and manipulative. And he swears he loves her.
After the...more
It's there that she meets Cole, a dreamy stranger who makes something inside her sing. Leader of a small band of street kids he's exciting, dangerous and manipulative. And he swears he loves her.
After the...more
I marked this book TBR on goodreads,but don't know why. I wish we had a book to do this so I would know why I thought I wanted to read a book. Based on that I thought this would be an abusive teenage relationship that I could recommend to teens. It is a wierd telling of abuse that was only alluded to and the reader was really told what/how it happened. Cole is a street guy who takes advantages of the girl runaways running the street. Mags has a home but hangs in the coffee shop to avoid her addi...more
Sometimes when I read books by Kathe Koja, I wonder if they are actual books or just fictional accounts of people that certainly could be real. These people tend to be unable to find happiness, they are restless, their lives do not flow with ease. There is a word, which I cannot remember, that describes the philosophy behind the fact that every day you pass so many people (dozens, hundreds, thousands) sometimes called "extras", in your fabulous lives, and they all have lives of their own in whic...more
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
***READ FOR AUTHOR PRESENTATION***
Maggie, a high school senior, is an artist and a caretaker of her alcoholic mother. Her outlet is sitting a cafe called The Blue Mirror and drawing the people that past the cafe's window. She falls in love with an extremely good looking boy that she sees through the window. The suave boy, Cole, and his two friends, both younger girls, befriend lonely Maggie. It turns out that Cole and his friends are homeless and thieves, but Maggie ignores this because she love...more
Maggie, a high school senior, is an artist and a caretaker of her alcoholic mother. Her outlet is sitting a cafe called The Blue Mirror and drawing the people that past the cafe's window. She falls in love with an extremely good looking boy that she sees through the window. The suave boy, Cole, and his two friends, both younger girls, befriend lonely Maggie. It turns out that Cole and his friends are homeless and thieves, but Maggie ignores this because she love...more
Jul 15, 2011
Greta is Erikasbuddy
rated it
5 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
If you love words
Recommended to Greta is Erikasbuddy by:
Darkfallen
Shelves:
because-darkfallen-says-so,
favorites
First Review - May 2011
Stay away from the static cling boys that make your heart go pitter patter. When things are too good to be true... they probably are.
This book had me glued until the very end... although I absolutely hated the ALMOST end ... I really did dig the FINAL end ;) and everything in between was amazing.
Its a nice short read that is written in a language of its very own. It was unbelievably true to the heart. You could feel that the author slipped a piece of herself into these pag...more
Stay away from the static cling boys that make your heart go pitter patter. When things are too good to be true... they probably are.
This book had me glued until the very end... although I absolutely hated the ALMOST end ... I really did dig the FINAL end ;) and everything in between was amazing.
Its a nice short read that is written in a language of its very own. It was unbelievably true to the heart. You could feel that the author slipped a piece of herself into these pag...more
4 likes · like · see review
Kathe Koja, The Blue Mirror (Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux, 2004)
It should be obvious by now that any time a new Kathe Koja book comes out, I'll be reviewing it within a few weeks. The Blue Mirror is Koja's eighth novel, and her third for young adults. The YA novels are markedly different from her adult work; they are much shorter and more focused on a sole protagonist than her adult work (and, needless to say, there's less sex). The protagonist here is Maggy, a sixteen-year-old girl with an alcoh...more
It should be obvious by now that any time a new Kathe Koja book comes out, I'll be reviewing it within a few weeks. The Blue Mirror is Koja's eighth novel, and her third for young adults. The YA novels are markedly different from her adult work; they are much shorter and more focused on a sole protagonist than her adult work (and, needless to say, there's less sex). The protagonist here is Maggy, a sixteen-year-old girl with an alcoh...more
The setting and feel of teen angst are gorgeously realized in this book. The tight writing and strong visual sensibility makes this absolutely worth reading--and it's an easy read, took me a little over an hour. However, I wish that it offered a little more joy, some of the ups and thrills of being a teen, and some plot aside from girl-likes-boy-who-likes-girl-but-girl-realizes-he's-no-good. While relevant for teen girls, it's also predictable in an unfortunate way, given the luminous writing.
A girl who lives on the edge of her life. Her mother is some sort of depression while she is out of school. All her days, she reflects on what she sees in the street; the sadness, the poverty and screwing over of one's life.
A think it was a good book. It questions why people continue to live in the world. In addition, it informs us of what a true friend is like. Although having a companion is important, you should also be aware of who you befriend or trust.
A think it was a good book. It questions why people continue to live in the world. In addition, it informs us of what a true friend is like. Although having a companion is important, you should also be aware of who you befriend or trust.
This book immediately draws you into the uncompromising world of teens living on the street. Maggie, the main character, is honest and lovable, and Cole is incredibly intriguing. Koja's writing style is unique and poetic, providing the story with lots of unexpected turns. Reading it, it feels as though you are spiralling down into the darkness of Maggie's world, suspended somewhere between fiction and reality. The ending is amazing, as well. I feel in love straight away.
1 like · like · see review
I thought this book was really confusing because there were some parts where the main character was confused on what her boyfriend and his two friends were up to. For example,her boyfriend and his two friends wore blue lipstick and it was never revealed why they wore it and how it never came off. Toward the ending it got very intense because she found out something bad about her boyfriend. I would recommend this book to high school girls because it has to do with her mysterious boyfriend, her dr...more
1 like · like · see review
This is one of those short books you can knock out in a less than 2 hours, has believable characters, and a scary plot. Maggy is a 16 year old with a flair for drawing. She lives with her alcoholic mother and is basically rasing herself when she meets a homeless guy, Cole, who she is mesmerized by. Enough said. Grab it and give it a try.
this book is a really good book if you like mystery stories, but still the story is a bit predictable. this book is about a girl who is being raised by an alcholic mother. i thought this was a good book to read for one because it was easy to understand, and two it is a very good story to keep you held on to the book. the author of the story could of added a bit more of suspense into the story, just to blank out a couple boring spots; but other than that the story was good!
This was a good book if your in to this kind of stuff unlike me so i did not like it to much, It is about this sixteen year old girl named Maggy who has a very bad alcohalic mother Maggy finds peace at this cafe called the blue mirror there she keeps a journal with drawing and writeings that make of her own little world called the blue mirror witch yeah is named after the cafe maggy also gets involved with this boy named Cole who is not to good of a guy to be around. Over all this was an ok book...more
This was an odd pick. It was a boring day in the library so I went down a random aisle with my eyes closed and promised myself to read whatever book I picked. This was the winner.
It's not really noteworthy, but here I am years later filling up my bookshelve on this website and I find myself remembering it. Figures.
It's not really noteworthy, but here I am years later filling up my bookshelve on this website and I find myself remembering it. Figures.
Dec 16, 2009
Daydreemer5696
rated it
2 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
no one
Recommended to Daydreemer5696 by:
teacher
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
This is a rather surreal story, dark and sometimes disjointed, but definitely worth a read. Its short (at 119 pages), but not exactly sweet. Though really, there's a few good lessons to take away from it.
I liked this book well enough that I wanted to make sure it was on my list. Maggy is an artist who gets into a scary relationship with a homeless youth named Cole.
The grammar wasn't that of a normal book really, and it was confusing in some parts. But it did show a lot of emotional issues that come with a relationship.
This book was ok. I didn't quite get the buddhist philosophy behind it though. It was interesting, but it did not have a very strong ending.
Short novel about teen artist angst and bad boyfriend problems, a little on the supernatural side.
I have read this book twice. once in my freshman year and once in my sophomore year. Now that I'm a junior, i am reading it once again. I still hold this book dear to my heart with the beautiful descriptions of Maggy's paper world and the real world. I love how the air around the book makes me feel. I don't get saddened at the dead, damp life she's going through. I have always embraced the difference in this book and it's strangely beautiful. It is one of the rare books I read over and over agai...more
I thought that this book was pretty good. It mainly talks about her finding her inner self.
Apr 12, 2009
Rebekah
marked it as to-read
Supposedly i was supposed to read this book in gr 7 but obviously i never got around to it.
Another 100 page y.a. booklet, but she knocked it out the park with this one. She has a writing style that's all her own and her words just melt into you in this tense tale about a young girl searching for a connection in a seemingly indifferent and cruel world. Go Koja.
Oct 03, 2011
Kayla Carl
is currently reading it
Im still reading the book its good so far im on chapter 4 .
The Blue Mirror was a really interesting book. It sort of seemed like realistic fiction, but for the hint of the paranormal. I've seen it's tagged as a vampire book, but I don't really think that's what Cole was. I actually thought it was cool that you didn't exactly understand what he was. He was kinda just a black hole of evil.
This is the first novel I've read from author Kathy Koje and I as very impressed with her writing. She has a very lyrical, poetic was of saying things and I though the...more
This is the first novel I've read from author Kathy Koje and I as very impressed with her writing. She has a very lyrical, poetic was of saying things and I though the...more
I really liked this one...i found it kind of sad though...=(
The only reason i didn't give it 5 stars is because i want to know what happened to Jouly. =((
The only reason i didn't give it 5 stars is because i want to know what happened to Jouly. =((
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I've been writing since I was very young, just about as soon as I could read. It's more than what I do for a living: writing is who I am, the way I see the world, the way I try to make sense of what I see.
But it wasn't until I attended the Clarion Workshop that I got serious about my writing. At Clarion I met writers, real live writers whose books I had actually read, who read my stories, offered...more
More about Kathe Koja...
But it wasn't until I attended the Clarion Workshop that I got serious about my writing. At Clarion I met writers, real live writers whose books I had actually read, who read my stories, offered...more
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May 18, 2011 04:53am