The Nothing Girl (Frogmorton Farm #1)

I don’t write a lot of reviews because honestly although I read 2-3 books a week, I don’t like them enough to write a review and I don’t believe in writing bad reviews. Someone put a lot of work into writing and I am not going to tell them it sucks. So, this book was good enough for me to say I loved it. I can’t really say why I loved it, maybe it was just the style of writing or maybe it was the story, I just know I could not wait to read it every day and stayed up way too late to finish it one night and then was disappointed it was over. That rarely happens to me. The story is basic, a young woman with a stutter who is hidden away by her relatives who smother her with care, but keep her isolated from society. Her cousin, a beautiful but cruel girl, dumps her fianc for another man and the fianc in turn proposes marriage to our girl as a business arrangement, she has inherited money and he has a large family estate that needs lots of work and money. He uses her money to fix up the place and she has a home that she can rule forever with servants, etc. She accepts his proposal and her family loses their minds at the prospect of the gold digging ex fianc of their daughter. All kinds of problems ensue, including the re-appearance of old girlfriend, horses. donkeys, a felonious young boy they take in after he tries to rob them, evil cousins who want her money, and of course a growing affection for each other. And did I mention she has an imaginary companion in the form of a giant gold horse who she talks to and who talks to her offering great wisdom and love. Yea, I forgot that. Just read it, you will see it all makes sense in the end.

Fortunately for me, I had not read any of this author’s work before I read Nothing Girl, Little Donkey and Something Girl. Yes, I read all three books in a row….well, almost…I got the donkey out of sequence, but it worked out okay. I had no pre-conceived notion of what to expect. I don’t read reviews or the description on the books I select because I want to be surprised by the story. As I hit the 1-click button, my eyes caught the words “golden invisible horse.” I barely avoided cursing. I detest fantasy and/or science fiction. Happily, I was just too lazy to figure out how to return the book. I figured that if I sat through many seasons of Mr. Ed (1960’s TV talking horse), I could make it through this book.
I am a little stumped on how to portray this novel. I have read all of the other reviews and didn’t find anything that I thought did this book justice. It is a clever piece of writing with quirky characters and filled with wit. Comedic writing is difficult and often relies on in-your-face style humor. The dialogue was well-paced and fresh in the style of the screwball comedies of the 1940’s. Let’s hear it for substance over sex and cursing!
I am going to read the first book in the St. Mary’s Chronicles despite the genre. This author has talent. If I survived an invisible talking palomino, I am hoping I can deal with time travel. I write lots of reviews, usually very short and stick to the merits of the book, but I seem to have verbal diarrhea when it comes to this novel. I really liked it! A serious message wrapped in delightful packaging.

How can a book that starts out with the heroine trying to kill herself, be so funny? How can such a funny book, be so mysterious? How can the people in her life be so creepy, even her savior of a husband, who admits from the start he is marrying her for her money?

And what about Thomas, the magic horse who turns up just when he’s needed and whose wry observations are so helpful and so witty at the same time?

The “nothing girl” is never noticed by anyone, it seems, and yet as the story unfolds, she becomes more and more visible and essential to everyone’s happiness in the eccentric household of which she is mistress?

Jodi Taylor is a hilarious writer, and The Nothing Girl is not exception. (Be sure to get the Something Girl as well, the sequel.) And don’t miss Taylor’s insanely funny “St. Mary’s Chronicles” about a madcap gang of time-traveling historians who seem to always pick the wrong event to record for future historians! A solid 5 stars.

I read Jodi Taylor’s/ Isabella Barclay’s novel and so wanted more. Wasn’t sure what I would find when I chose The Nothing Girl, but it was a whole lot more than I planned for that’s for sure. I smiled, I cried, I thanked this author for the wonderful time I had devouring another one of her novels. Jenny and Russell are two hurt souls that in spite of hurting had developed an empathic sense that they used over and over for people and animals. It was a slowly developed caring process that two people walked through as they cared for others with a bit of suspense thrown in the mix to stir up the drama a little.
Jodi Taylor’s writing is delicious, filled with imagery and wonder; I thought that the idea of a talking horse would quickly finish this book for me, instead it made me long for a Thomas of my own. The thing is parts of Jenny and Russell is in all of us and perhaps this book helped some of us to see how we too can come out in the sunshine again after a great hurt and pain, a little at a time.

I have been a huge fan of the chaotic Chronicles of St. Mary’s Series since reading Just One Damned Thing After Another on 3 January 2016. By 23 January I had read all four then available volumes and not able to wait for the 5th in the series, I purchased The Nothing Girl because I just wanted to find and read anything written by Jodi Taylor. However, I must confess that The Nothing Girl remained unopened until last Saturday. Every time I picked it up and read the blurb I just could not bring myself to read it. What on earth was a guy like me buying a book like that? A young girl with a stutter and Thomas, her imaginary friend (or is it?) a golden horse! Everything on the back cover described the sort of book I would not touch with a barge-pole. Then Saturday came, all my books had dried-up and emergency resupply from Amazon Prime would not arrive until Sunday. Dammit! I picked it up and couldn’t put it down. I’m rather busy at the moment and have relatively little time to read, and I’m so dog-tired at night that I’m asleep before my head hits the pillow, so I have only managed to get through three-quarters of the book by Monday, but on Sunday I was back onto Amazon Prime to order The Something Girl, which is second in the Frogmorton Farm Series … I don’t know how Jodi Taylor does it, but it’s the second series she has me hooked on and if somebody had told me that four days ago, I would not have believed them. If there are any other male readers out there who are devotees of the Chronicles of St. Mary’s and had instantly dismissed The Nothing Girl, I think that nine out of ten of you will be surprised how much you really enjoy this book. Go on, give it go!

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