Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens is a riveting novel that takes place in the Outer Banks, North Carolina in the 1950s and 60s.  It is a story about a little girl, Kya Clark, who was abandoned by her family and was forced to survive on her own in the marsh where she lives.  However, Kya is not completely alone.  Jumpin and Mabel, an African American couple, helped her as much as they could with the little they had, since there was segregation during this time period.  Kya also met Tate Walker, one of her brother’s old friends, and he taught her how to read.  Kya also gets involved with Chase Andrews; and when he was found dead, Kya was an immediate suspect.  

Although this book moves quite slowly in the beginning, I find the plot extremely clever.  I give a lot of credit to the author, Delia Owens, because she wrote about various topics that require former knowledge before writing it.  She went into detail with subjects such as biology, civil rights and segregation, court trials, and poetry.  So if you like science, history, and even some romance, this is definitely the book for you.  Life science was a major aspect of the novel because Kya lived in a marsh where she developed a relationship with nature and the many organisms that constantly surrounded her when people wouldn’t.   

Moreover, a movie for this novel came out last year!  Compared to the book, the movie not very different at all.  I think the characters are portrayed exceptionally and the casting is brilliant.  Kya in particular, was almost exactly how I pictured her.  She is played by Daisy-Edgar Jones, whose talent is mind-blowing since she is British and for this role, she had to master an American southern accent.  Daisy-Edgar Jones also stars in the film Normal People, which is based off of the excellent book by Sally Rooney.  In my opinion, the book is better than the movie; it usually always is with every story.  The trailer to Where the Crawdads Sing will definitely encourage you to watch the movie, even if you haven’t read the novel.  

Overall, Where the Crawdads Sing is wonderfully written; it contains quotes such as “If anyone understood loneliness, the moon would.”  Also, “Time is no more fixed than the stars.  Time speeds and bends around planets and suns, is different in the mountains than in valleys, and is part of the same fabric as space, which curves and swells as does the sea.”  There are even more nature references and poetic lines in the novel.  I hope this review convinces you to read this book, because I think everyone should read a story like this one especially as a teenager.