The Girl Who Owned a City

Oct 21, 2008 Chandra rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: kids-young-adult

So many teachers come in and out of our lives and I'm sure we all have a million stories about an inspirational English teacher. But that isn't one of those stories. I will never forget Mrs. Brown. I had just moved to a new school. I was an avid reader and prior to the move English was always my favorite subject. Mrs. Brown put a stop to that nonsense. This was the first book she assigned in 7th grade English. Let's just say it was a loooong year.

The premise explores a theme that taps into chil...more So many teachers come in and out of our lives and I'm sure we all have a million stories about an inspirational English teacher. But that isn't one of those stories. I will never forget Mrs. Brown. I had just moved to a new school. I was an avid reader and prior to the move English was always my favorite subject. Mrs. Brown put a stop to that nonsense. This was the first book she assigned in 7th grade English. Let's just say it was a loooong year.

The premise explores a theme that taps into children's innermost fears/desires: All the adults are gone - everyone over 12 wiped out by a mysterious illness. But the final product is a nightmare. But Mrs. Brown still plowed through this book as if it was a fine piece of literature. Thank goodness I had a strong foundation of reading under my belt or Mrs. Brown might have ruined me for reading forever!

Just a few of the problems:

a) It's boring as hell. Like I said I was an avid reader and I barely made it through this book. It's preachy and unbearably dull.

b) The writing is amateurish and the plot underestimates the intelligence of the audience. There are too many unanswered questions. For example: Since the plague wiped out everyone over a certain age; will the kids die when they get older too? Why don't the kids ever seem to grieve or miss their parents? Where are all of the dead bodies? These are just a few of the questions I wanted answered. And of course Mrs. Brown would have none of that!

c) The protagonist is basically a little fascist who wields absolute power over her subordinates. Lisa, the hero of this book, actually makes a speech about why she will not allow elections...it's for the good of the people. What on earth kind of lesson is this? Creepy!

Basically, all you need to know is that this is like a really really dumbed down, poorly written, horrible attempt at a post-apocalyptic version of Lord of the Flies. Don't bother with it. And, for goodness sakes, if you're a teacher please please please don't inflict this on your class!

Luckily, this story has a happy ending - clearly I still love reading, but I worry a lot about teachers like Mrs. Brown ruining reading for kids who are already a little wary of it.(less)

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Jun 29, 2007 Aerin rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: childrens, apocalyptic, well-that-was-awesome, science-fiction

This book is the reason why, to this day, whenever I drive by an old rundown school building, I have this strange desire to move in and build a community there.

This book is also the reason why, to this day, I am addicted to dystopian fiction.

In The Girl Who Owned a City, a plague sweeps through the world, killing everyone over the age of twelve. The children, left to fend for themselves, live in utter anarchy. There is no order, there is no electricity, and the food supply (from raiding grocery...more

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Mar 18, 2009 Flourish rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: childhood-greats, young-adult-phantastics

When I first read this book (as a child), I didn't realize that it was an attempt to bring objectivism to kids, to which I can only say, "hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!" And yeah, okay, it was Ayn Rand for 10-year-olds. That said, I still really like it. I feel like it was formative for me. Do I agree with everything in it? No. But I prize individualism and self-sufficiency - and I think that this book may have been part of what made me that way. Those are values I'd like to pass on to my kids,...more When I first read this book (as a child), I didn't realize that it was an attempt to bring objectivism to kids, to which I can only say, "hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!" And yeah, okay, it was Ayn Rand for 10-year-olds. That said, I still really like it. I feel like it was formative for me. Do I agree with everything in it? No. But I prize individualism and self-sufficiency - and I think that this book may have been part of what made me that way. Those are values I'd like to pass on to my kids, even if some other values in the book aren't (ex: I would like my kids to be OK with taxation; I would like my kids to believe in God). I plan on giving this book to my children when I have them.

I had forgotten that the book is very realistic and even horrific at times. It glosses over most dead bodies (it's a postapocalyptic world) - but not all of them. The kids use guns and Molotov cocktails to defend themselves. One of the characters gets shot. I appreciate that the book includes these things and treats them as tools, not as things to be purely scared of or to be purely repulsed by. I don't think that any kid would come out of this book saying "let's go shoot people!" They might say "I'd like to learn how to shoot a target," though.

This book is awesome as far as feminism goes. While there's a slight traditionalist skew in the roles characters take on, I don't think it's egregious, and every character is represented as doing every thing (building, cooking, teaching, caregiving). A climactic scene involves the protagonist standing up for herself when a boy jeers at the idea of a female leader. The heroine protagonist works with a group of kids of mixed gender. On the other hand, the enemies are mostly male ( they are represented as a violent, hyper-masculine "gang" that only accepts male members).

Race-wise, the protagonist says some regrettable things about the Pilgrims defending themselves from Indian raids (less than a paragraph). Other than that and the white girl on the cover, there is no mention of race. Most of the names are easily within the "average name" bracket for when it was written (protagonist Lisa, her brother Todd, their friends Craig and Jill...) but since you rarely hear characters' last names, I found it easy to imagine them as any race at all. If you get past an assumption of whiteness, I think this book isn't problematic, and if you're reading it to a kid, you could easily update it as you went.(less)

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Nov 24, 2008 Tyree rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 7th-grade-ir-books-rick

This book is about a girl named lisa who lives alone with her brother Tom. When she was young her mother and her father died so they are living a terrible life. Thats not all, they are living in a neighborhood where there are gangs and stuff. Also there are only teenagers and kids because last year there was a virus that went around and killed all of the adults. So the all the stores are empty and they have to find out how to survive.
I can connect to this book because once there was a black ou...more

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Apr 11, 2013 Shamari Scott rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book is about a world where all the people older than 12 died from a deadly plague. The only people that are left on the planet are children 12 and under. These kids must learn to survive without parents, electiricity, and stuff that they are used to living with. The main character Lisa and her little brother Todd must stick together if they want to survive. While Lisa is out looking for food Tom Logan and his gang jumps Todd and takes their spair food. Now they have to figure out a way to...more

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Mar 29, 2013 Fiver rated it 2 of 5 stars

A dismal and hugely overrated experience.

We all have a weak spot in our literary preferences, and I have a particular one for post-apocalyptic settings. But while most 'PA' stories smartly take advantage of the thrills found in survivalism and violent conflict, I'm a real sucker for the focus on rebuilding, on the need for organization and structure, and the intricate task of reintroducing it into the world. So I thought I would enjoy "The Girl Who Owned A City", which I'd heard focused on this...more A dismal and hugely overrated experience.

We all have a weak spot in our literary preferences, and I have a particular one for post-apocalyptic settings. But while most 'PA' stories smartly take advantage of the thrills found in survivalism and violent conflict, I'm a real sucker for the focus on rebuilding, on the need for organization and structure, and the intricate task of reintroducing it into the world. So I thought I would enjoy "The Girl Who Owned A City", which I'd heard focused on this idea.

Sadly, what I got was something of a mess. The basic premise and structure showed the right idea: Lisa, a 10-year-old girl, is a survivor of a plague which has wiped out the entire adult population of the earth. The novel follows her progression 'from survivor to savior' as she expands her influence via her ingenuity and hard work.

The tone of the story is pretty disjointed, to the point where it's quite the guessing game to figure out what age group this story is intended for. For example, the story takes place in a world where literally every child has just lost both of their parents... but amazingly, not a single character ever seems to mourn the loss of their mother or father, and no mention of dead bodies is made. Or take another case: the novel seems explicitly survivalist, with a strong focus on the children forming militias, arming themselves with guns, setting deadly booby-traps, training attack dogs, and yet there never seems to be a sense of fright or danger: even in supposed clashes with gangs and armies, most injuries are 'off stage' and amount to minor scratches.

The writing is no better. Even with an unnecessarily omniscient narrator who jumps between different points of view, characters have essentially no personalities or even physical traits, only slight differences of opinions. They explicitly state their thoughts and feelings in drab complete sentences and explanatory arguments. Villains aren't nasty, threatening, or intimidating: they simply say what they want, and it happens to contradict what the main character wants. Imagine the Big Bad Wolf simply being a dog who comes up to the pigs and says "I want to eat you. I'm going to try to eat you," while the pigs respond with "No, don't eat us. We don't want you to eat us!"

Mr. Nelson was explicit in his goal of translating the values of Objectivism in terms simple enough for children to understand, and while I actually have no beef with this in itself, in the book this translates to characters simply stating 'morals' outright at different points in the story. It gives the hideous impression that while being written, the value of this book was seen chiefly in its ability to transmit a philosophy, rather than engage or entertain. Some might say that in this sense Mr. Nelson follows Mrs. Rand's example.

The only good part of this book is the blurb on the cover, which compares it to Lord Of The Flies. This line made me laugh and laugh.

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Feb 25, 2013 Leporidae rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: young-adult-novels

It's hard to review a book when you've read it as both a child and an adult. The kid in me still loves this book, but the older me isn't sure how much of that is genuine adoration and how much is just the rose-tinted glasses that color memories from that time in my life.

I first read this book in fifth or sixth grade, I think, and at the time it was exactly the sort of thing that appealed to me. Kids running around without any pesky adults to tell them what to do, and, despite their hardships, le...more

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Jan 16, 2013 Katie rated it 2 of 5 stars

Oh, this book. The eight-year-old me who first discovered it would give it a 5-star rating. Twelve year old me would probably put it at 3. And as an adult, I want to give it a 1. So, I have given it a 2, overall.

This book is why I became interested in dystopian fiction. It is also why, as other reviewers have commented, I pass by school buildings and wonder what it'd be like to build a community within them.

But it really isn't that good. It's actually poorly written in many ways - the timeline i...more

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Nov 27, 2012 Cecelia rated it 4 of 5 stars

The Girl Who Owned a City

By: O.T. Nelson

The Girl Who Owned a City is a fictional dystopia or a post-apocalyptic story, where a disease wiped out all people ages 13 and older. Ten-year old, smart, and creative Lisa becomes the leader of Grand Avenue, a neighborhood, and all the children in it. Because of Lisa and her big ideas, the citizens of Grand Ave. have food, shelter, and protection from the gangs, which were formed as a source of power to acquire food and other vital necessities.

Lisa and h...more The Girl Who Owned a City

By: O.T. Nelson

The Girl Who Owned a City is a fictional dystopia or a post-apocalyptic story, where a disease wiped out all people ages 13 and older. Ten-year old, smart, and creative Lisa becomes the leader of Grand Avenue, a neighborhood, and all the children in it. Because of Lisa and her big ideas, the citizens of Grand Ave. have food, shelter, and protection from the gangs, which were formed as a source of power to acquire food and other vital necessities.

Lisa and her ‘co-workers’ plot their defense plans so that they can fend for themselves in preparation for when Tom Logan and his army attack. Lisa even trains stray dogs as attack dogs. Lisa and her workers together make a united kingdom. Everyone is fed and is learning from the school’s teachers.

Late one night, Tom Logan’s gang had taken over the ‘city’ by surprise. Todd came to see Lisa, who was left on the ground covered in blood after a gunshot. Todd and friends carried her to a nearby farm and removed the bullet, using a first aid book and whatever tools they had. Lisa has to survive through the injury and regain her city. Read the book to learn more about Lisa’s adventure and her attempt to get her city back!

One of the author’s purposes for writing this book was to teach some small life lessons to young children around the ages of 9-12. One of the lessons she is trying to teach is that you should not use fear as power. On pages 197, 198, and 199, Lisa proves this by lecturing Tom.

Another thing the author is showing people how smart kids can really be. She is showing how kids can survive, evolve and mature in an in-depth way, without parents involved.

The author’s writing is easily accessible, but a bit ‘cheesy’. It is also overdone in some parts. An example of this would be Lisa’s speech to her town in which she sounds too mature and worldly for her age (page 63-64). The biggest mistake that the author made was coming up with decisions that Lisa and other characters made. She sometimes made their decisions seem too smart and clever for a 10 or 12 year old. It’s just not that believable. Also, the descriptive language is not helpful for creating a picture in the reader’s head, or in other words, the imagery is poorly crafted.

But other than these negatives, the book was well done for the most part. I think the book was creative because of the theme and the setting, along with the things that the children came up with as defense plans and ways to get food, etc. Although the book was not perfect, and most of the characters lacked depth in personality, I think this was an overall exciting book that would receive 4 stars out of 5 because I wasn’t able to abandon it - it kept me interested and turning the pages. I would recommend this book to children through the ages 9-12 because it appeals to those aged children the most.(less)

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Sep 07, 2012 Sara rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: novels

I read this in junior high. I can't remember a lot of details, just certain specific incidents come back to me at different times. Sometimes I think - remember when that girl in that book went to the grocery store and was glad the gang members hadn't taken the medicine, just the potato chips? Or, remember when that girl from that book had to learn to drive and didn't do so badly and was glad there was gas in the car? Then I start to think how hard it would be to start over again when all the adu...more

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Mar 08, 2012 Grace rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: books-i-won-t-ever-read-again, read-2012

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I read this book when I was 12 and I remember loving it. But after I reread it I was disappointed. Part of that is probably because it was targeting a younger audience, but it also made me a little mad. The morals of this story were awful! You see right away that the main character Lisa's morals were a little skewed when she refuses to help her friend who is taking care of defenseless and hungry five year old orphans. All she has to worry about is her brother Todd and herself, and she tries to g...more

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Jan 12, 2012 Mikayla rated it 4 of 5 stars

The book The Girl Who Owned A City by: O.T. Nelson is about this ten year old girl whose name is Lisa. She lives with her younger brother Todd. Her and Todd live in a Suburban City. There’s not any adults that live there because anyone older than twelve as died. The reason people have died is because the plague has hit there. It’s up to Lisa and Todd to save themselves from the plague. Another fear of theirs is the older kids/gangs. They are afraid of the gangs because they will try and steel o...more

The book The Girl Who Owned A City by: O.T. Nelson is about this ten year old girl whose name is Lisa. She lives with her younger brother Todd. Her and Todd live in a Suburban City. There’s not any adults that live there because anyone older than twelve as died. The reason people have died is because the plague has hit there. It’s up to Lisa and Todd to save themselves from the plague. Another fear of theirs is the older kids/gangs. They are afraid of the gangs because they will try and steel other peoples food/water to save themselves rather than others. If Lisa can’t hide the food/water from the gangs from getting it they will no way possible of surviving by themselves. It’s hard enough that they have to save themselves from the plague never mind the gangs. Lisa and her brother Todd are very scared of what might end up happening to them next. For all they know they could get the plague at this very second. Or maybe even longer depending on how quickly it spreads to them. When Lisa had to go to school she had many friends that she had to leave behind in order for her to not have higher chance of getting the plague. Most people would probably be super terrified to have to live by themselves besides a younger brother with them. It must be insanely hard for Lisa and Todd to survive on their own without having any parents to watch over them.

I thought that this was a pretty good book and I would probably want to read it again. I wouldn’t say that it’s the best book that I’ve ever read though because I’ve read a book that was like way better than this one was. That doesn’t mean that I would like this book any less then I do now just because I’ve read a book much better than this one before.

If I were to rate this book on a scale of 1-5 one being terrible and five being great I would give it a four. I would give this book a four because it was a great book and all but I’ve read better books than this one. One of the reasons that I would give this book a four is it was about the plague and I don’t really like books that much that talk about the plague. It was sorta a sad book if you think of it like people are dying which can be really sad for some people but not to others.(less)

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Sep 27, 2011 brook rated it 3 of 5 stars

Disclaimer: THIS IS NOT ADULT READING.

The 3-star rating is based upon how a reader of the same age group as the characters (9-12, going up through 15 or 16 for some) would take the book. It is mini-Ayn Rand as some noted. It is not a pleasant story, in that children rob from, maim, and kill other children. It does not have the depth of emotion of Lord of the Flies, nor does it have the sense of a journey that you might get with a guilty-pleasure novel like The Stand.

As a kid who loved post-apoca...more

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Jan 08, 2011 Thomas Ryerson rated it 5 of 5 stars

I originally read this book back in Grade Seven, (1977-1978) and loved the concept. No parents! I was surprised that the author, Terry Nelson, didn't write any sequels. I see in searching for this book today, another author may have taken the lead from Terry and done just that. This book could have easily gone into a 10 volume set of Lisa's adventures.

The Girl who owned a city definitely influenced two of my own books; Castle Lake and Fun City. My character of Alicia Murdock in Castle Lake has...more

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Jan 01, 2011 Melody rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to Melody by: Wendy Burton

Shelves: burton-browbeating, dystopia

This is hands-down one of the worst books I have ever read. Pedantic in the extreme, nonsensically plotted and full of so many holes it looks like lace. And the writing is abysmal. Wait, what's worse than abysmal? Right, this book.

A plague has wiped out all the adults, so they are freshly dead. Except there aren't any bodies. Not one. They seem to have vanished, poof. Electricity doesn't work and there's no water to any of the houses, but there aren't any sanitation discussions. Apparently the p...more

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Dec 17, 2010 Diane ~Firefly~ rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: lifetime-challenge, ya

I was searching for a book from 1975 for my lifetime of reading challenge, and found this. It was an interesting story with a strong lead character, Lisa. I think I would have loved it had I read it when I was about 12. Now, I just liked it and saw a lot of plot holes, the most glaring is below the spoiler line. Also, the end was really not a great ending as they overcame one challenge and had an even greater one facing them in the future. The main lesson of the book was repeated enough times th...more

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Nov 30, 2010 Morgan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Lisa and Toby are like the rest of the folks on their street, they own a house, a car, and must go out and work to make end meats and put food on the table. The only thing that is different with this picture is that Lisa is twelve and Toby is ten. The world as they knew it ended when a plague swept the globe and killed anyone over the age of fourteen. The survivors are those that were thirteen and younger. Now that the oldest people in the world are barely teenagers, they must try and find a way...more Lisa and Toby are like the rest of the folks on their street, they own a house, a car, and must go out and work to make end meats and put food on the table. The only thing that is different with this picture is that Lisa is twelve and Toby is ten. The world as they knew it ended when a plague swept the globe and killed anyone over the age of fourteen. The survivors are those that were thirteen and younger. Now that the oldest people in the world are barely teenagers, they must try and find a way to survive while trying to put their world back in some kind of order. That something has to change becomes apparent as food supplies begin to dwindle and gangs begin to form to take supplies away from those that are unable to defend themselves.

After being robbed of her hard earned supplies after a foraging trip Lisa sees that she won't be able to fight the gangs off herself and protect her younger brother. Instead of hiding and waiting for the inevitable, Lisa decides that she needs to approach the rest of her scattered neighbors and band together to resist the roving gangs. It takes some convincing and a few adventures but Lisa succeeds in getting her neighbors to come around to the idea that they have to work together to survive. Now all they need is their place in the world....
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I liked this book because it was a different take on what would happen if a plague swept the world and reduced civilization back to the basics. I know there have been one or two televisions programs over the years that have touched on the subject, but they usually deal with actual teenagers who lived through the crisis and are all grown up and trying to make their way in the world. This book actually stays with the kids as they go through their various trials to try and find a place where they can live in peace. While this book can be considered a children's / teenagers book it should also be entertaining for older readers as it does have plenty of action in it.

It also pretty well points out that these children have to turn their brains on in order to survive. There is no more fun and games for a while. In one part of the book the Lisa is talking to one of her neighbor's that is starving and sick. She asks her what they had been surviving on for the last few weeks as the world wound down. The neighbor sheepishly pulls out a collection of soda, candy and various other junk food and tries to make the excuse that her mother always made sure that she had something to eat. After saying it out loud the girl realizes that she has been waiting for a world that is not going to come back.

I would recommend this book to anyone who likes stories that have a little bit of a different take on a old idea. I would also recommend this to anyone, younger or older, who likes a good adventure that does not rely on violence to carry the story. M.a.c (less)

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Mar 12, 2010 Jenika rated it 4 of 5 stars

How would you survive if disease wiped out the entire population except children twelve and younger? Gangs and armies of children arise immediately after, and chaos begins. Lisa is a ten-year-old girl trying to help herself and her brother, Todd, survive. She spends her days breaking into houses that no one lives in anymore to find food for herself and her brother. She keeps a low profile until she teaches herself how to drive a car and attracts attention to herself from the neighborhood gangs.

L...more

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Feb 03, 2010 Delaina rated it 1 of 5 stars

Let me start by saying that I didn't finish this so-called novel -- in fact, I didn't get past chapter 5. I kept thinking to myself that it would get better, but as the plot got rolling the unrealistic elements leaped out even more strongly than before. From page one, I felt the writing was less than acceptable for a published novel. (And when I saw the author's dedication to 'Lisa and Todd' I knew that a large conceit like super-characterizing your own children would lead to many, many others.)...more

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Jan 18, 2010 Jeff_§of2014 rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: grade-8-ir-shelf-seniorita

This book is about a 10 year old girl, Lisa, surviving with her brother, Todd in their own city. A deadly virus has swept through town and killed everyone over the ages of 12. This leaves all the kids 12 and under by themselves, in a city with no order it would be total chaos. They need to find ways to survive so first they look for food. Fortunately, they found an abandoned supermarket that they raid and strip of all essential things for their survival in a town with no adults. That wasn't all...more

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Jan 06, 2010 Rachael rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: upper-elem-middle-school

I'm reading this now with my 6th graders; I think it's at 5th grade level. They love it so far and ask questions compulsively--sometimes we can't get to the bottom of the page without 5 or so questions. They are baffled by the world without adults and keep asking things like, what happens if she runs a red light? Oh yeah, there's no more electricity so there are no red lights. Why don't they have eggs for breakfast? Oh yeah, there are no farmers living or delivery trucks or stores where they can...more

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Oct 31, 2009 Grace rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it, young-adult

Okay, this is a review with major qualification.

I read this first when I was nine, and I loved it. I think I read it along with some other apocalyptic scenarios, and this was also the time I started in on sci fi, so altogether I was looking for adventure. Somehow this book lodged in my mind and I only recently got my hands on it again. And once I did, I burst out laughing: this is a libertarian call to action!

I'm much savvier politically than I was at 9 years old, and it's hilarious to realize t...more

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May 03, 2009 Nicole rated it 3 of 5 stars

The Girl Who Owned a City is a book that I can really relate to. Lisa is the main character of the book, and she is 10 years old. You might say, what's so interesting about a 10 year old girl? Well that’s when you're wrong. Lisa's life had change a lot when their parents died from a terrible plague that swept across the earth. And the weirdest part is, only kids who are 12 year old or younger doesn't get infected. But that’s what makes the story interesting.

Everyday, Lisa will have to search for...more The Girl Who Owned a City is a book that I can really relate to. Lisa is the main character of the book, and she is 10 years old. You might say, what's so interesting about a 10 year old girl? Well that’s when you're wrong. Lisa's life had change a lot when their parents died from a terrible plague that swept across the earth. And the weirdest part is, only kids who are 12 year old or younger doesn't get infected. But that’s what makes the story interesting.

Everyday, Lisa will have to search for food. There's isn't any electricity, and Lisa and her brother Todd must find a way to survive in this dangerous world. Every kid in the city had taken most of the food from the grocery stores near them, and you might think there's food everywhere! But you’re wrong again! There’s no food, not within the distance the kids could travel to! Lisa would thinking of her parents everyday, and the parties they had when all the grown ups were still alive, but what keeps her strong is her brother, Todd. They give each other company and are there for each other everyday. When Lisa goes search for food in the morning, Todd would stay at home watching the house.

There are gangs of kids walking all over the place, stealing people's food. Lisa is a smart 10 year old. She thinks outside the box. She was the first one to think of other places beyond the grocery stores. She thought of the farms, 3 miles away, and the warehouse at was further. She kept thinking every night to get an idea what would make her life better. Then she clicked! She got it. She'll learn to drive! But driving, that's for grown ups, not 10 year old kids. Lisa knew that, but she took a risk.

Her plan was working, until one of the gang led by a kid name Tom Logan hurt her little brother and took all her food. She was mad. Very mad. And she decided to form a militia. Several kids from her neighborhood joined. It didn't take long for Lisa to come up for the BIG plan, to defend her militia and have a happy live. She wanted to move in a school. There’s everything in there! Gym, classrooms, cafeterias! Everything! But everything is going to fall in pieces again. Tom will ruin it all. Does she have what it takes to fight it back?

I can relate to Lisa because I feel like age doesn't matter. I believe that kids can do things adults do too, and maybe even better! But what we don’t have is a chance. We don’t have a chance to show our ability to work just as good as the grown ups. The Girl Who Owned a City proved my point. A 10 year old driving is something you can never imagine, well but she did it! And having the power to rule 400 kids might sound easy, but its not. It’s like a small country. You need to put everything in places. Not everything is as easy as you think, but take the risk to try it! You'll never know what will happen. Maybe you have the talent for it!

Read this book if you have nothing better to do. It makes you wonder, what YOU can do.

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Feb 19, 2009 Katy St. Clair rated it 5 of 5 stars

I bought this book at a funky, tiny used bookstore in like, baltimore, when I was a kid, and it quickly became The Greatest Book I Had Ever Read. I liked any book where the kids are forced to be independent and act like adults, and a plague that kills all the grown-ups was just the ticket! The protagonist has to learn how to drive a car on her own, something I totally dug... and she and her pals all holed up in a school and became lords of the city. It is satisfying to see so many people on here...more

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Jun 02, 2012 Mackenzie Kincaid rated it 3 of 5 stars

I picked up the graphic novel version of this book at my local library; I was attracted to it by the art -- which was stellar -- and the post-apocalyptic storyline, which it always a winner for me. It was a pretty decent story, though the narrative was clunky at times and I didn't feel like it really explored the full potential of a universe in which every adult is dead, the kids are on their own, and nobody quite knows if the oldest kids will die, too, when they become adults themselves. It cou...more

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Apr 09, 2009 Estella rated it 3 of 5 stars

Considering the demographic for which this book was intended (preteens), it has some great things in it. Young readers will turn pages to see what happens next in this post-plague, children-rule-the-world society, where one girl, Lisa, emerges as leader thanks to her resourceful thinking, bold actions, and persuasive personality.

The children do everything from drive cars to perform minor surgery. They even defend their city using military force (beware of children using guns and dropping boilin...more

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Oct 19, 2012 Matt rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: childrens, dystopian, complete-shit, fiction, philosophy

I read this way back in fifth grade, and I remember thinking it kinda sucked. This is weird, because I've always loved dystopian books, and this has the whole creepy Lord of the Flies thing going on (which I love), so it should have been one I enjoyed.

I remember, back then, hating that it ended with a lengthy, preachy, anticlimactic lecture that suddenly convinced the little kid acting as the antagonist that he was being a dick. I remember thinking the girl who owned the city was kind of shitty...more

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Mar 07, 2012 Brittany rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: youth

Probably my favorite children's story of all time. It connected with me in a way that 'Lord of the Flies' didn't, leaving my mind racing to imagine what would happen after the back cover closed.

The first time I encountered this book lying innocently on a shelf in my elementary school library I was intrigued. There was a girl who owned a city? How did that happen? The story blew my mind. Never had I read about children in such adult situations, making tough decisions and living with the conseque...more

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Jan 12, 2011 Sally rated it 2 of 5 stars

This was a favorite book of one of my daughters. It had been read to her class by her teacher when she was in 5th grade. She recently re-read it and loaned it to me. I thought it was an interesting story premise, with enough action to keep a young person interested in finding out what happens. Overall, though, I thought it was pretty sketchy. There were possibilities of more details and descriptions, as well as character development that were missed. Also, I felt that the self-motivation of the...more

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Oct 04, 2011 6yolanda rated it 3 of 5 stars

This book is okay so far and I am only half way through the book. It is about a twelve-year old girl nMed Lisa who lives in a city where only kids live. All humans, except for people that are 6-12 years old, got a virus that kills them and there is nothing to do about it. So, this city is filled with kid families and have to survive. It sounds very hard for them to take care of themselves and their siblings because they have to find food, supplies, a place to sleep, and watch out for the gangs...more

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topics	posts	views	last activity
What's The Name o...: YA book from 80's (I think...) Everyone over age 12 died and kids are running the world [s]	4	138	Jan 12, 2012 11:25am
the girl who owned a city	2	18	Apr 04, 2011 06:52pm

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