by Laura Noakes
publisher’s synopsis
Cosima Unfortunate has spent all her life at the Home for Unfortunate Girls – a school where any disabled children, or children deemed different, are sent, whether their families want it or not. It is there that she meets her friends – Pearl, Mary and Diya – and they start to practise mini heists involving the theft of cakes, biscuits and other sweet goodies.
But when Cos finds out that Lord Francis Fitzroy, the explorer behind the Empire Exhibition, is planning to adopt them, she and her friends plot the biggest heist of their life. Instead of fondant fancies, they’re going to steal Fitzroy’s prized tiara, containing the legendary Star Diamond of India! But, as they start preparing for the day, Cosima finds herself drawing ever closer to discovering the one secret she’s always wanted to know – the truth about her parents…
What I Liked
-I liked the disability representation. Noakes did a nice job of having the girls’ various disabilities be a part of their character, rather than just their character. It was a part of who they were. And while I do not have any of the disabilities represented in the novel, the representation felt pretty authentic from my perspective.
-Noakes did a nice job with the plot and keeping the reader curious about multiple things–but no spoilers from me!
What I Struggled With
-The characters felt a little too much like caricatures/classic character archetypes. For example, the Stricts were the classic, ill-treating matrons overseeing the home, and Cosima was the spirited, adventurous orphan girl. If Noakes had expanded the characters a little more or maybe subverted the character roles a little, I think it could have added a little bit of freshness to the novel.
-The main characters did not feel like they were twelve-year-olds. They felt too mature and too smart to be that old. This is something I’m finding more and more as I read middlegrade novels, which might simply be because I’m not part of that target audience and therefore struggle more with that suspension of disbelief. So, middlegrade-aged readers might not have a problem with this. I’m just old. 😉
-Pearl’s forgeries–maybe I simply haven’t spent enough time with rope, but I struggled to believe how she could create passing forgeries of cakes and jewels out of rope.
Other
-I really would have appreciated a historical note at the end. The novel is set in the 1800s, and talks about children with disabilities having to be taken from their families to live in homes. I confess that I didn’t really know about that aspect of history before picking up the novel, so I would have appreciated a historical note about that at the end, explaining a little bit more about it, and why it was a rule.
Overall
Cosima Unfortunate Steals a Star has the vibes of Oliver Twist and Annie with a dash of heist adventure. I think I would have enjoyed it more if I was still in the target audience age, as it reminds me of the stories I loved growing up. That being said, it’s still a fun story.
Cautions: brief mentions of children being born outside of marriage
*Note: Cosima the Unfortunate Steals a Star is published in the UK. I actually bought my copy while at an airport, but it looks like you can also purchase it online in the USA.
Hailey Huntington 
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