STAGS: Nine students. Three blood sports. One deadly weekend.

Product Information

About Olds's poetry, one reviewer for the New York Times said, "Her work has a robust sensuality, a delight in the physical that is almost Whitmanesque. She has made the minutiae of a woman's everyday life as valid a subject for poetry as the grand abstract themes that have preoccupied other poets." months later, Greer begins as a sixth form student as STAGS. She notes the heavy emphasis on the school emblem, the stag, as antlers bristle from every wall. The nature of the school is devout, very religious, and its mentioned Greer...is not. Yet another differing factor between her and the STAG students. Superb YA sequel for streetwise Greer & the elite students at archaic S.T.A.G.S. school. Suitable for adults too!

I feel like this would translate amazingly into film or TV - and the setting would be all the more breathtaking. Think Skins set in Downton Abbey with a dash of Mean Girls. Central to the story is teenager and scholarship student Greer MacDonald, who’s always struggled to fit in at her prestigious sixth form boarding school. St Aidan the Great, otherwise known as S.T.A.G.S, is an exclusive institution full of privileged, wealthy pupils that shun those who don’t conform to their upper class standards. Just as she resigns herself to the status of social exile, Greer receives a mysterious invitation to attend half-term weekend at the country manor residence of the most popular and moneyed boy at school, Henry de Warlencourt. So there was such a heavy ominous undertone throughout this and the emphasis here is heavily on the class divide and the over-privilege of the upper classes compared to there working class peers. There is an almost bigoted elitist bias towards what they see as lesser individuals as if the accident of there birth makes them somehow superior in some way.The cliché starts with the subject matter: family dysfunction, specifically divorce. This is certainly a legitimate subject for literature, but it’s not a promising one – it’s been done so many times lately that any book that wants to do it again should really do it differently than any other book has. This book doesn’t. Cliché continues with the title, which like too many recent verse collections uses a coyly clever pun (Stag’s Leap – the favorite wine of a couple – of whom the husband is the stag who “leaps” free by divorce – get it?) to place a friendly arm over the reader’s shoulder: I’m smart enough to make the pun, and you’re smart enough to understand it, so off we go together!” and then there's "Not Going To Him" that insane but human way we want to be comforted by the very person who delivered us the blow, because he is the one we are closest to--very like breaking an addiction: Following the events of STAGS, Greer, Nel and Shafeen are all in their final year at the school and preparing for exams. To help her get into Oxford, Greer chooses to directs a play which a mystery person slips under her door - which happens to be The Isle Of Dogs, a (real) play of which no copies exist. D.O.G.S begins where S.T.A.G.S left off and the second half of the autumn term with seventeen-year-old working class northerner and film buff, Greer MacDonald, and her fellow outsider friend, Shafeen and Chanel (Nel), preparing to face their final exams (Probitiones). And with Greer aiming for Oxford and two-thirds of her overall drama mark dependent on directing a play written prior to 1660, for once her encyclopaedic knowledge of films is no help. Short on ideas and with charismatic Henry de Warlencourt of the first novel still intruding on her thoughts, the convenient arrival of a handwritten manuscript for Act One of a tragedy entitled The Isle of Dogs under her dormitory door provides the answer. As Greer reads the first act she is drawn into a dark yet accessible Elizabethan allegory that seems to provide an incisive commentary on Tudor history and Queen Elizabeth I’s reign. The de Warlencourt estate is also used to show how upper-class life is unrecognisable to most people. Greer thinks she is in the Great Hall, and learns that she is in the boot room. The de Warlencourt’s wellies enjoy better accommodation than most working class families. The relationship between the team of servants to the family reminded me of Rebecca. Greer is politer to the servants than any of the ‘Medievals’, but like the second Mrs de Winter, her manners mark her out as somebody who doesn’t belong at Longcross.

Then we all go home and lie to the police about what happened, because who wants to tell them the truth, right?

Lastly, typically I'm a fan of social culture/media references but this novel took movie references to the extreme. It originally was enjoyable but the novel eventually was fully saturated with unnecessary references. S.T.A.G.S. is the type of book that you remember as being better than it actually was because the premise is so good that you want to forgive it for any tactical errors. It was a strange creature, a blend of cheesy horror cast in the vein of the old Point Horror novels I used to devour as a preteen, but also hauntingly Gothic with passages so dramatic that I reread them a second time. Our main character is wholly unlikable. She's supposed to be nice, but she refers to one of the house keepers at the manor as a ' miserable hag'. The poor woman hasn't even done anything wrong! The only reason Greer doesn't like her is because on the first night at the manor Greer called her husband, and now assumes the woman hates her for it. I think the main attraction of their life was the property itself - as a fan of history I'd be seduced by the idea of being the mistress of an English stately home. Think Elizabeth Bennett at Pemberley! The movie references became annoying. The first one isn’t explained immediately. It’s just a random ‘It’, which totally pulled me out of the story.

MA Bennett's S.T.A.G.S. series is currently in production and there are now four books in the series, including the latest, T.I.G.E.R.S. Greer’s boyfriend and some of her friends are POC, and express to her how they feel targeted by behaviours, but Greer TOTALLY dismisses them - the author even makes out like Shafeen is completely paranoid and ridiculous for having these feelings.There was a lot of research involved, in an attempt to make Aadhish's experiences as real as possible. But even if I get it wrong, I think it is an important issue to discuss, for white writers as well as writers of colour. In films, you see, if someone's still alive, whatever state they're in, they leave the face uncovered - obvs - so the person can breath." Este libro me lo regaló mi mejor amiga, pero la verdad es que había llamado mi atención antes de eso. Me gustan los misterios en que un grupo de adolescentes intenta descubrir un crimen atroz que los afecta especialmente. Series como Scream, Riverdale o la española Elite, libros como The Dead List, One of Us Is Lying y Two Can Keep a Secret (Comentario al margen: Karen McManus se ha vuelto una escritora muy interesante por lo mismo, aunque debo decir que One of Us is Lying es mucho mejor que el otro, y Jennifer Armentrout escribe muy buenas historias de misterio, pero lamentablemente hace tiempo que no escribe novelas de este tipo). The winners of the Diverse Book Awards 2023 have been announced, with one winner from each of the four categories announced: Picture book, Children... I find this sort of thing as distracting and irritating as the sort of person? who in talking? to you puts a rising inflection? every few syllables? so it sounds? like they are always asking you questions?

Honestly, this book made me angrier than I thought was possible. And it wasn't because I didn't enjoy the book (which happens!) but because this book LIED to me. It's like that episode of Bob's Burgers: I love the trio of Greer, Nel and Shafeen. At the start, the three avoid each other. Each has their own motives. Greer is concerned about being ‘Medieval’. She wants to fit in with the group of popular students who eschew technology and modern day progress. Greer is afraid bonding with Nel and Shafeen might affect her chances. This is a brilliant thematic message. Most people live outside the world of STAGS and Longcross, but every secondary school has popularity groups. Anyone who has been the unpopular kid can relate to Greer. She’s so desperate to be popular, she is blind to the people who might be her friends. I won't describe how the story starts, and what happens. But I will say this what grabbed my attention to read on was the very first line. When someone's dead they're supposed to stay dead right?As much as Greer hates these little shits, she is delighted when she receives an invitation from their leader, Henry, for a weekend of "huntin' shootin' fishin'." Maybe they weren't so bad after all, she thinks, foolishly, if they're willing to accept her into their ranks. But when she arrives at Henry's sprawling manor, deep in the heart of the woods, she learns that the other kids invited aren't exactly prime material. They've also invited a distastefully nouveau riche girl named Chanel and an Indian boy named Shafeen who they've been viciously bullying all year. Then the accidents start happening and the story takes a sinister turn as Greer discovers just how much the Medievals relish power.