Unfortunately I no longer wish to review this book as the first few chapters did not reel me in. Thank you for the opportunity.

While it seemed like it was written for a younger audience than I was expecting, I couldn't help but be charmed by this beautiful and bittersweet plot. The characters were lovely and people I loved from the outset.

After the death of their parents, sensible Grace is trying her best to look after her little sister. Crazy, funny Bee doesn't seem to know the difference between real and imagination. She speaks to people Grace can't see and thinks their dog, tells her things. But is Bee really imagining or does she just see more than other people? Maybe you don't always have to be sensible, maybe you can believe in a little more than just what you can see.

Very sweet book, but I felt it skewed younger than it should have. I liked Grace and Bee and their family, but felt the story lacked something

Whilst I absolutely ADORED Sarah's other books, this one just didn't hit the spot for me. It was incredibly heart warming and a great look at grief in adolescents, it felt like something was missing. It was powerful and inspiring and one that I will recommend to customers, but just not my cup of tea!

‘There was magic in the air and Bee McAuliffe at the centre and I started to see that there were things she understood and things she could picture and things she knew that the world was not ready to see.’

The List of Real Things is a sad and lovely middle-grade story about life, loss and grief, and the magic of imagination, with an exciting dose of magical realism. It’s a beautiful and heart-wrenching book that really makes you think about life and all its fragilities. It makes you wonder what is real and what isn’t, and how we define reality; is something any less real because no one else can see it?

Grace and Bee have lived with their Grandfather Patrick, his dog Louie, and Uncle Freddy since their parents died five years ago and have always got along just fine – Grace is mature and sensible, and just wants to fit in, as most teenage girls do, and Bee seems to live in her own happy little world, believing in all kinds of fantastical things. It’s only when their Grandfather dies and their Aunt Lucy turns up out of the blue that things change – Grace’s desire to fit in and be ‘normal’ leads to her resenting Bee and her quirks and becoming angry at Freddy that their lives aren’t more ‘normal’.

“Just because you can’t see something doesn’t mean it’s not there, that’s what they said. And I believe them.”

I loved the way Fitzgerald explored the characters of Grace and Bee. Grace felt so authentic – teenagers can be silly, selfish, and make poor choices. They can be mean, moody, and take out their frustrations on the ones they love, but usually, there is goodness underneath it all. Grace’s desire to be part of the ‘in -crowd’ overwhelms everything, and she finds herself almost wishing away her eccentric family so that she can be that mythical thing – normal. It takes a lot for her to realise that as weird as she finds Bee, she’s her sister and she loves her regardless. I absolutely adored Bee. So much of what she says and sees is left to interpretation – is it real or not? – but she believes in it entirely, and I loved her incredible imagination and way of seeing the world.

‘The fear did not weaken me. It made me strong, made me angry, made me brave.’

I think this is a brilliant middle-grade book – it reads fairly young, but not in a patronising way, and I can imagine many younger people thoroughly enjoying it and relating to it. Both Grace and Bee are interesting and well-thought out characters, and the story is all about exploring their relationship, alongside deeper themes of death, grief, and fear. And the ending is a misty-eyed delight; it brings everything back to magic, to hope, to knowing that the storm will pass. Some things remain unclear and I think that is the beauty of magical realism – it’s up to you, in the end, to decide what was real and was not.

As soon as I saw that there was a new book from Sarah Moore Fitzgerald, I knew that I had to read it; I adored her other books and how she sensitively but effectively deals with difficult topics. The List of Real Things is no different - it's a wonderful story that focuses on grief, family relationships and friendship.

One thing I love about Sarah's books is how they're on the border of Middle Grade and Young Adult and are very much magical realism books; the characters are not-quite teens but are faced with situations that are difficult and there is an element of fantasy within a contemporary setting.. This makes them the perfect choice for more advanced younger readers, as well as a nice read for older readers.

Overall, I'd definitely recommend The List of Real Things for anyone who's a fan of Sarah's other books, as well as people looking for a good book to dive into. Because of the subject matter and style of writing, fans of Sunflowers in February by Phyllida Shrimpton and Vicky Angel by Jacqueline Wilson should love this one and not hesitate in picking it up!

A heart-warming story about loss, grief and family. Beautifully written with very appealing and realistic characters. The special relationship between the two sisters is particularly poignant. Suitable for readers 10+.

At its heart, The List of Real Things is a story about coping with grief. Gracie and her six-year-old sister Bee are living with their grandfather and their uncle after their parents' deaths several years ago, and things spiral downwards when their grandfather died. I found the summary to be a little misleading, as it took quite a while for the book to kick off and reach the catapulting event of the grandfather's death, and Gracie's new boyfriend seemed like an unnecessary addition to a story about family and grief. I struggled to believe that Bee was six when she spoke more like a wise old ninety-year-old, but her character was one full of hope and optimism when it came to life and death. I imagine this book could help children and young teens who are struggling with loss.

Full review posted on my blog, literarylydia.wordpress.com

Just gorgeous and wonderfully written, this is a tale of loss and love that fills your heart with joy and sorrow at the same time. Had me weeping in public...but they were happy tears. Brilliant!

This a very hard book to put my finger on. It's a story of loss and trying to get through life the best you can and how these two very young people and the people around them deal with it. It's not a book I would usually pick up but the synopsis drew me in with the promise of "The line between truth and fantasy is more complicated than it seems." That being said this is very much a contemporary book but I did enjoy the way the "fantasy" is linked to the story although the is it/isn't it real concept is a very well trodden troupe. Nether the less despite it's faults this simple read has the power to inspire and comfort. 

I found the writing a challenge to get on with at first. There is one scene in particular that stood out to me when two people are arguing and it's literally just dialogue back and forth with nothing in between. I lost track of who was saying what and it felt it was lacking emotion with no description of how these two people were saying these words or what they were feeling as they said them. it felt especially strange as the author at other times feels like an absolute poet, this book is filled with some fantastic, very profound feeling quotes.  For example; "He was trying to look cheerful but sad people have invisible weights pressing down on them, and when they breathe in it sucks air out of the room and everyone feels it." These kind of lines gave this book such an extra depth but it meant that at other times certain parts felt flat in comparison. 

The plot for this book is rather simple, fairly predictable and a smidgen over done. Saying that however I did enjoy the way this particular idea was carried out. I will admit that I grew very frustrated with the plot for the first half, if not two thirds of the book as we would start done one part of the story and then there would be no real conclusion, no continuation, it would just end and something else would happen. On reflection I feel however that it did fit with the narrator being a fourteen year old, her mind didn't focus on one thing too long if she didn't deem it important, she would make her point and move on. Although these parts frustrated me I now feel that actually this may have been really clever.  The last third of the book played out very much as I thought it would from the beginning but I still found it mostly satisfying to get that conclusion and again the language and prose made this last part much more enjoyable. I will also add that this book made me cry at seven in the morning, I was a wreck. 
I found it hard to put my fingers on some of these characters. The narrator is Gracie who is fourteen and the story mainly focuses around her and her sister Bee who is six. The young age of the characters does make this book feel more like a middle grade book then YA but I'm almost thirty and it spoke to me so I feel this isn't too much of a problem and just makes it a nice simple read. Bee did confuse/irritate me to begin with as the way she spoke was very strange and felt so unlike a six year old that I would often forget how young she was. "Quite right...and as you know under normal circumstances I wouldn't dream of it, but Gracie this is an emergency of gargantuan proportions!" This is just one of the examples, Bee talks in large words, convoluted sentences and is a lot deeper than any six year old I've ever met. On reflection though I think this is meant to show that she is a little strange and perhaps picked up from spending a lot of time with her elderly grandfather. I got a bit more used to it in the end but it never really stopped pulling me out of my immersion if she went over the top a little too much. Gracie was a very stereotypical fourteen year old girl with a strange little sister and there was a point when I honestly hated her but I understand that she really is just a fourteen year old and some of this did some horrible, selfish things when we were younger we wouldn't dream of doing now. Other characters such as their Uncle Freddie, Grandfather Patrick and Aunt Lucy felt like real people with a sprinkle of stereotypical sprinkled on top for flavour but this worked, especially with Aunt Lucy who I liked the ambiguous feel of. 

I feel like for such a simple read I had to get quite deep with my reflections on this book to really get much out of some parts. It was nether the less though a sweet book all the same that does what says on the tin. Reminding me of a very simple, slightly differently themed Perks of Being a Wallflower. It's a very hard book to classify as the plot and ideas are so simple but not necessarily inherently bad. There were parts I enjoyed, there were parts I didn't but I mostly enjoyed reading it and do not regret doing so.

Emotional and brilliant magical realism. I wasn't completely invested into it, but I really liked the story of family and love!

A quick, quirky read with plenty of charm, though characters feel a little under developed & some aspects of the plot could have been more fully explored. Worth trying for fans of magic realism.