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Beauty Queens

Audiobook
1 of 1 copy available
1 of 1 copy available
From bestselling, Printz Award-winning author Libba Bray, the story of a plane of beauty pageant contestants that crashes on a desert island.

From bestselling, Printz Award-winning author Libba Bray, the story of a plane of beauty pageant contestants that crashes on a desert island.Teen beauty queens. A "Lost"-like island. Mysteries and dangers. No access to emall. And the spirit of fierce, feral competition that lives underground in girls, a savage brutality that can only be revealed by a journey into the heart of non-exfoliated darkness. Oh, the horror, the horror! Only funnier. With evening gowns. And a body count.
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  • Reviews

    • Publisher's Weekly

      March 21, 2011
      Bray follows her Printz Awardâwinner, Going Bovine, with an only slightly less absurd premise in this out-there satire about a planeload of teen beauty queens who crash onto a (not so) deserted island. Lord of the Flies with an evening gown competition, anyone? Led by the indefatigable Miss Texas, Taylor Rene Krystal Hawkins, the 14 surviving contestants must rely on competitive moxie. Despite the large cast, Bray makes the Misses distinctive, though each is more a stand-in for a particular brand of diversity than a fully dimensional teenager (one's black, one's deaf, one's gay, one is a boy in the process of becoming a girl). Poor Miss New Mexico stands out because she has a serving tray embedded in her forehead. ("Bangs are the new black!") Halfway through the ordeal, a boat full of shirtless, reality TV pirates runs aground, allowing for some smoking hot scenes. Fun footnotes, contestant profiles, and scripted commercial breaks are interspersed. There's a lot of message, but every time the story veers toward sermonizing, Bray corrects with another crack about our media-saturated, appearance-obsessed, consumer-driven society. Ages 13âup.

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Author-narrator Libba Bray starts with this premise: What would happen if a plane carrying Teen Dream Beauty Queens were to crash on an (almost) deserted island, leaving a handful of girls with no chaperones? She ends with an expertly crafted tale of girl power, a social commentary, and a hilarious spoof on popular TV shows and classic books. As narrator, Bray puts her theatrical background to good use, changing accents, register, and pitch so smoothly and consistently that listeners will forget there's but a single narrator. From the Texas drawl of Taylor Rene Krystal Hawkins (gun-carrying homecoming queen) to the Yankee accent of Adina Greenberg (feminist journalist from New Hampshire), Bray gives each character a distinct, recognizable voice. The addition of thoughtful sound effects makes this "un-turn-off-able." C.B.L. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award (c) AudioFile 2011, Portland, Maine
    • The Horn Book

      July 1, 2012
      The premise of Bray's uproariously funny and sharply observant novel is this: on their way to the Miss Teen Dream competition, a planeload of beauty pageant contestants crashes on what appears to be a deserted island. While the surviving Teen Dreamers valiantly cope with the basics (finding food, water, and shelter; practicing their pageant skills), they become pawns in a massive global conspiracy involving a rogue former Miss Teen Dream winner; a megalomaniacal dictator; and a Big Brother-ish pageant sponsor, The Corporation. The scope of the plot is mind-boggling, the list of characters is dauntingly long, and many of the plot turns require much suspension of disbelief, but Bray's tour-de-force audio performance sparkles with the reflected light of a million sequined gowns. Her distinct and lovingly caricatured voices for the many over-the-top characters, chirpy footnotes, and sanitized Corporation messages and commercial breaks enhance the experience of the book. Bray's quieter message about the power unleashed when teenage girls think society isn't watching carries more weight when Bray herself gives those girls voices. Also, when Tina Fey decides she's tired of parodying Sarah Palin, someone should give Libba Bray a call. kitty flynn

      (Copyright 2012 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

Languages

  • English

Levels

  • ATOS Level:4.4
  • Lexile® Measure:690
  • Interest Level:9-12(UG)
  • Text Difficulty:3

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