The Girl Who Could Flyby Victoria Forester

You just can’t keep a good girl down . . . unless you use the proper methods. Piper McCloud can fly. Just like that. Easy as pie. Sure, she hasn’t mastered reverse propulsion and her turns are kind of sloppy, but she’s real good at loop-the-loops. Problem is, the good folk of Lowland County are afraid of Piper. And her ma’s at her wit’s end. So it seems only fitting that she leave her parents’ farm to attend a top-secret, maximum-security school for kids with exceptional abilities. School is great at first with a bunch of new friends whose skills range from super-strength to super-genius. (Plus all the homemade apple pie she can eat!) But Piper is special, even among the special. And there are consequences. Consequences too dire to talk about. Too crazy to consider. And too dangerous to ignore. (goodreads.com)

This book was a gift from a friend who was pretty sure I would like it. I honestly wasn't sure I would as I read the first pages. I almost put it down after the second chapter because I thought the book was going to be rather dull and I didn't think I would like the characters.Boy was I fooled.Enter Dr. Letticia Hellion who runs I.N.S.A.N.E. (seriously). Once Piper is taken away from her parents and sent to this school of other strange powers, the book picks up a bit. And then it picks up A LOT and I couldn't put it down and I was both horrified and fascinated and scared and touched all at once.The book goes from boring, Little House on the Prairie beginnings to horrific underground testing on "different" creatures, plants, animals and humans.For the love of gods people, I cried over the death of a CRICKET!A cricket that was hardly the focus of the story and was sort of just... there. A slight mention once he's discovered and another mention that Piper still had him. And yet the big scene with the cricket had me in tears. Flowing down my face and sniffly nose type of tears and I had to put the book down, compose myself and come to terms that I was crying over a bloody cricket! The scene was beautiful in a very emotional way.I came to care a ton about the children who were being held at I.N.S.A.N.E. and horrified at the testing and experiments that were happening to the other creatures. I grieved for the lost of a "student" without even knowing her all that well, but her personality and brightness was so well conveyed that I felt the grief and shock of her leaving as much as the kids in the story must have.I was horrified at the torture that was afflicted on the children, though it was never actually graphically depicted, the allusion to it was just as powerful.I didn't think there would be a happy ending at all once I was more than three quarters of the way through the book. I was surprised by the ending and finished the book with shaking hands and shaky breath.This book was way more powerful than I thought it was ever going to be and it left me thinking of the book all day and night and even this morning. I am so very happy that I was gifted this book because the book, I think, is a wonderful gift to the literary world.And all this for a middle grade book.I'm not sure if I would have been able to handle this book when I was 10 or even 12. I think it's something that a parent should read with their child if they have delicate constitutions like I did (and still do - ha!). There is death and torture but they are not gratuitous nor graphic. It's more of an emotional roller coaster ride through the book, one that I am very happy I took.This book isn't quite dystopian, though the "school" gives off a strong dystopian vibe, though the rest of the world outside of the facility is just your average, every-day, run of the mill world. But I think the story might appeal to those who tend to enjoy the misery, fear and trapped feelings that dystopian books tend to have. ;)