I thought that this book could have been really interesting if it had played with the concept of the unreliable narrator a bit more, but as it was SOME KIND OF ANIMAL was far more straightforward than I anticipated. And unfortunately, that straightforwardness didn't really work for me with the story as it was. First of all, I didn't think that any of the characters were terribly well drawn or explored, and were fairly two dimensional because of it. The backstories are there for most of them, and the setting of the poverty riddled small town has lots of potential for giving them hardships that shape their lives, and while that plays some part I still didn't feel like I got to know any of them terribly well. I also had a really hard time suspending my disbelief that Lee would have been able to survive and function as long as she did with minimal help, or that Jo would have gone as long as she did without revealing that she had a twin to someone who MIGHT listen. Throw in some random twists and reveals that aren't well explored, and an ending that left me once again unable to suspend my disbelief AND frustrated about a lack of accountability, and SOME KIND OF ANIMAL really didn't gel with me. I will say that I liked Jo's aunt Aggie, though. She felt like the most realistic character in the entire story.

SOME KIND OF ANIMAL didn't work for me. It's a shame, as I felt like it had a lot of potential.

Series Info/Source: This is a stand alone book that I got through NetGalley for review.

Story (3/5): Jo lives in a small Appalachian town with her aunt. Jo’s mother disappeared fifteen years ago and the mystery of this casts a shadow over Jo. Unfortunately, no one knows that Jo has a secret that is causing her day to day life to fall apart. She has a sister who lives in the woods, a sister who desperately wants Jo to join her in the woods. As Jo struggles to unravel the mystery behind her family she gets drawn deeper into her sister’s world.

This was an interesting mystery but the whole thing just ended up feeling kind of anti-climatic and unfinished to me. By the end I just felt like, “Uh, okay….so what?”

Characters (3/5): Jo was okay but I was pretty frustrated with how long she had kept her sister’s secrets. I get that she couldn’t trust many of the adults in her life, but she never really tried to trust them either. I also didn’t understand some of the side characters, like her “love interest” Henry, why was he even in the story? Then there is her wild sister Lee, another interesting character but not well developed. All the characters felt kind of selfish and confused and made a lot of bad decisions which was frustrating.

Setting (4/5): I enjoyed the setting in a small Appalachian town and the forest surrounding it. The author did a good job making this sleepy small town setting really come alive for the reader.

Writing Style (3/5): This was a bit of a mess overall. I never felt like there was much propelling this story forward. Yes, there was the mystery about Jo’s mom but I never felt like it really mattered. Also there was Jo’s sister but I never felt like there was a good outcome for her and the way it ended was very non-committal. The writing was okay and the descriptions of the surroundings were good. Everything else felt really under developed and unfinished to me.

My Summary (3/5): Overall this was an interesting idea and I loved the description around the settings. However, the story didn’t have a lot to drive it forward. I also felt like the characters and the resolution were unfinished. It was an okay read but I didn’t love it and wouldn’t necessarily recommend it. If you have a particular interest in children that grow up literally wild, you might enjoy this.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a DRC of this title for review. All opinions are my own.

This was a wild ride. On one hand, the sheer implausibility of it (a girl with a twin no one knows about who somehow has managed to survive in the wilderness, on her own, for 10 years?) makes it a hard sell. But then, as you start to read it, you get sucked in to the story and it becomes something you can't really look away from. There are themes of feminism, striking out on your own, religion vs morality, etc that make it compelling at times, but they also complicate things. This is a book that struggles under the own weight of itself. Instead of just being a horror/noir book about a girl who has become feral, it tries to become a commentary on society in general. And there aren't really any redeeming characters.

Final verdict: this is a second purchase type of book for large collections. It will have niche readers and that type of following, but it will not be a beloved book by all.

Thanks, Netgalley, for letting me read this book in exchange for an honest review.

Jolene lives with her aunt in a small town in Ohio. Her twin sister, Lee, lives in the woods just outside of town, but no one believes she exists. Their mother disappeared 15 years ago and everyone thinks she was murdered. Lee is almost feral and Jolene has an intense need to protect her sister at all costs. When Lee's existence is substantiated, Jolene, Lee, and Jolene's BFF Savannah, run away to the wilderness.

The book started off with a lot of potential, but the characters never got well fleshed out. It was hard to connect with them and actually care what was happening. The last bit of the book jumped the shark and made me feel as though the girls really had no morality. It seemed like a "neat" way to tie the book into a bow and there were no consequences for the horrid decisions the girls made.

While I didn't love this book, I did not hate it, either. I would not recommend this book, but would be open to reading something else from the a

I'm sorry to the author but I just cant do it with this book anymore. I really tried I really did but I DNF'd it at 30% mark. The cover was what made me really want to give this book a try and the premise sounded really interesting but this book is all over the place. It has so much teen angst that its literally filled to them brim with it. The characters are not most likeable in the world. To be honest I could really stand them and it was hard to connect with any of them. Jo was old enough to know that something was wrong with her sister and I could see how she didnt really catch on when she was younger to how severe the situation was with Lee. She should have made it a priority to help her now that she was older. There was a lot stuff that just repetitive in this story. The writing was weird every chapter would start as a flashback most of the time and then go back to the present or vise versa. It seemed like there was so much going on that it got confusing. I was excited about this one because it seemed like it was gonna be really different but It just fell flat for me.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for giving me copy to read and review.

This book was rather... meh. I tend to enjoy thrillers, and this one just fell rather flat. I don't think the comparisons to Sadie are deserved. I just can't see my students reading this book with any interest.

I didn't end up being able to get into this one, so I DNFed it. There was too much exposition at the beginning and i was confused at the same time as to what was going on. It's an interesting concept but the writing didn't click with me. THank you to NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I'm pretty bummed about this one. There just wasn't anything particularly exciting about the story and I found it to be a bit confusing.

Some Kind of Animal is a good book for readers that like mysteries. As a true crime buff I found that this book was interesting and yet disappointing. It's not that the story was bad or that it was poorly written. It was anti-climatic. Nonetheless, it was a good read and I do know many teens in my library who will greatly enjoy this book,

From the first chapter, I knew this wasn't my kind of thriller. I just couldn't really connect with the girls and for that reason I am choosing to pass up this book. I appreciate the opportunity, but it's just not my cup of tea.

So this book had a lot going on in it. I can see what the writer was trying to accomplish but found it a little confusing a times just based off of everything that was happening. It did capture my interest right away and was a book that I finished. I did like the premise.

This book was... Weird. The initial premise was interesting, but the further along the book got, the more crazy things were. There was some weird stuff going down in that town. Overall I liked Jo as a character but the story was way too out there for me.

So this one is a 3.5-stars from me.

It started off quite brilliantly with the twin girls - one raised by her aunt and one mysterious girl from the woods.

I loved how we weren't sure if there was something supernatural at play or what.

The imagery (haunting blue dress, the plastic purse, the two girls (one wild, one not)) also really played that up - and I was so hooked.

But the longer it went on, the less that worked for me.

Jolene was old enough to cognitively be aware that something was very, very wrong with her sister and that she was starving. If she was 10-12, I could see her not quite grasping the severity of Lee's situation...but as a freshman, I feel like her understanding should've been higher and her priority to the health/wellness of her sister should've been a higher priority.

Also, once the story shifted from being possibly-fantasy and all became firmly bound in reality, the magic/intrigue wore off and it became rather...sad. This poor girl survived alone in the woods for a decade and yet her sister was all, 'hmm...I love her life. I want to live it." Which felt disconnected from reality.

In addition, the whole running-away into the woods seemed to happen quite a bit and felt rather circly by the end.

I did love the way this one was set up and the ending went better than I expected...I just wish there was some magic or something similar to brighten up this bleak book.

There was too much going on in this book. The author (with the help of the editor) needed to pick a direction and stick with it. Since it seemed like the author wanted to do it all the book was too long, too directionless, and the heroine was not strong enough to carry all the threads of the story the author expected her to.

This was a different read and interesting but didnt keep my interest as much as I thought it was going to. It was a bit repetitive and was a bit hard to connect with the characters in the story. Wasnt quite sure where this story was going. Thanks though for letting me have the option to read this early.

Some Kind of Animal sounded like such a great book to me but it just didn’t really hit the nail on the head. I found the characters hard to connect with and the writing was a bit awkward and highly repetitive, which made me quickly loose interest in both the characters and the story itself. Interesting concept but just wasn’t executed properly. Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for sending me an ARC of this book.

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for my digital copy in exchange for an honest review.

I requested this book because the premise sounded really interesting and I wanted to see where it went. Honestly, I can see that I liked this book more than most people seemed to and I really don't know why. The book follows fifteen-year-old, Jolene, who has not had the best life so far. As her mother went missing when she was born and is presumed dead, her grandmother and aunt took her into their homes, respectively. One night when she is 5 years old, Jolene sees a girl out near the woods and it was like looking in a mirror. She realizes the little girl is her twin sister, that nobody even knew she had. How is that even possible? Well, when Jolene was a baby, she was brought to her grandmother's house all wrapped up in a bundle by the brother of her mother's boyfriend at the time. Nobody ever mentioned another little girl so nobody had any idea she was alive and out there all alone. For ten years, Jo has been living a normal life by day and running wild with her sister at night. Until it starts to get to be too much and she falls asleep in school and falls behind on homework...she tells Lee(the sister) that she won't be able to run at night anymore for awhile and she thinks everything is okay. Until one night she is out with a boy and Lee attacks him, nearly killing him. Suddenly everyone in town thinks it was JO that attacked him and they want blood. During all of this, we start to find out what happened to their mother and nothing is what she thought it was...I'm going to stop there but the book had so many twists and turns that once you reach a certain point, you just don't want to stop. Or at least I didn't. I liked it a lot and I would personally recommend it to anyone that would be interested in the psychological aspect of what is happening.

I'm not really sure what to think of this book. I requested this based on cover alone and expected a YA thriller.

It fell short on my expectations. I appreciate the chance to read this in advance but I unfortunately couldn't finish this book.

Sadly I just could not connect with this book. The only person I actually liked was Brandon. The story itself was interesting though, two sisters, separated, trying to work out their relationship when it’s suddenly exposed. The writing was fine and the pacing was okay. My main issues was that I just couldn’t find myself liking the characters as much. The relationship between the sisters was okay and the secret behind their family was okay. Maybe this would be better for someone else but it just did not work out for my preferences as well as I had hoped.

Unfortunately, I was not a fan of this book, and judging by the other reviews, I'm not alone, which makes me feel bad for the author. But this book was just all over the place! It seems to try to encompass every genre possible, and it seems like it's following a straight path and then just kind of meanders. And so much was unrealistic and the characters weren't anyone you'd really like.