Empress of the World Paperback – May 26, 2003

One of the defining books of my teenage years, Empress of the World will always hold a very special place in my heart. I realized with a start recently that while I still have my dog eared and beaten up hardcover copy on my shelves, I still hadn't purchased a digital copy! With a birthday giftcard I fixed that right away. Unfortunately I discovered an eBook that wasn't up to snuff, with myriad formatting issues and (worst of all) a lack of extra content as is promise by the cover. This doesn't have the promised forward by David Levithan, nor the additional comics that were included with the reprint of the physical book. It's the formatting issues that force me to take away one star - switching erratically between Nic's handwriting (often for strike throughs) and standard text was the biggest offense. I hope Penguin will take the time to correct these formatting errors soon!

I remember reading this when I was a young, young teenager just discovering that girls could love other girls. I remember crying at the end, moved to tears because finally there was a book for girls like me. Decades later, after listening to this again, I still remember how very Important this book was to me & why I loved it so much.

Good characters, witty dialogue, an endearing love story. Empress of the World is great. Ryan's prose is smooth and flawless, you get quickly immersed in Nicola's way of thinking and looking at the world, which is not something easy to do for any writer.While it was evident the character of Battle was the intended "goal" of the story, I thought Nicola was a much more interesting person and puzzle. Perhaps that's just my personal taste, but it was her who made this book be so worthwhile.It may not be a life-changer book, but it's definitely a highly recommendable one. The kind of read that will make you laugh, smile and get all mushy inside.

The plot could use more exposition and detail, but the characters are accurate for the age they represent and the dialogue reflects that. The characters are all likeable, but there was room for development that wasn't expanded on. It's a great book if you're looking for short and sweet about two girls discovering themselves and each other.

I enjoyed the book, but I just could not get into the characters that much. Not much background on the characters and really didn't know anything about them. I guess my expectations were really high after reading the reviews. Maybe if I read the sequel it will make this story a little better.

I think I thought this wasn't a teen novel but turns out it is. No matter! This is still a really cute summer romance camp story well told about two girl who meet and fall for Each other! I enjoyed reading a classic tale with a gay twist!

I may be out of the high school reading level now, but I still enjoy reading young adult novels. I was excited to get started with this book based on the great reviews. Unfortunately, I found myself having to force myself to finish this. The novel had potential, but I felt like the author made the characters try too hard to be likable and in turn, made them seem unreal to me. I would skip out on this one.

This book has becoming one of my favorites in my collection since it really shows some of the inquiries that a girl goes through as she realizes her attraction to the same sex. The binding is very good and as long as you take care of your books it should last you a long time. I know several people whom have read this book and enjoyed it. It is a good book for teen to adult ages to read.

Empress of the World by Sara Ryan was a bit different that I expected it to be. It was an interesting story and I really enjoyed getting to know this brilliant cast of characters, but sometimes I felt let down a bit by the structure of the novel between narrative and diary entries.Our main character, Nicola, has been sent to a summer camp for gifted youth. She's interested in becoming an archaeologist and has signed up for classes at the Institute. On her first day, she meets a group of people that quickly become friends throughout this eventful summer.We have Katrina, this wonderfully outgoing computer nerd, Isaac, the nice guy with a huge crush on Katrina, and of course, there's Battle. Battle who is this beautiful girl who is smart and cool and slightly mysterious. Nic finds herself immediately attracted to Battle, which begins Nicola's questions about herself and her sexuality as she examines her feelings for Battle and the people around her.I really liked Nicola as a character and narrator. I thought Battle and Katrina and Isaac were all believeable and realistic characters. I could definitely relate to the feelings of first love as being confusing and overwhelming. I especially loved this thing between Nic and Battle. It was very sweet and beautiful as Nic and Battle spent more time together and Nic realised how much she was attracted to Battle physically but also towards her as a person and her personality. I loved the beauty of how this this relationship builds up.My only issue with this as a story, is sometimes Nicola's diary entries that she writes as a way of making sense of the world in an archaologist's way really breaks the flow of the narrative. Especially after a really sweet and tender moment between Nic and Battle - going between that and a journal entry felt jarring. The diary entries left me feeling distanced from the story and towards the end, after a big conflict, I couldn't quite find myself again inside these character's heads and hearts. Still, the first half of the book more than made up for the second and I'm very glad that I read this book!

I bought this for my little sister (aged 14) as some of the things she was saying about girls being pretty made me think she might need some support but I didn't want to force anything out of her before she's ready. As a very clever girl too I thought other things in the book would resonate with her as well. Perfect to give as "part of a bunch of books I was done reading". As a pan 20 something I rather enjoyed it too.

The book was enjoyable enough, though I didn't feel compelled to keep reading. I was between 3/4 stars. It decided on 3 as I did, towards the end, care about the outcome for the characters. But it's just no where near as good as other books of a similar genre that I have read recently.

It was absolutely amazing. I couldn't put it down, fantastic

At times when reading this book I was unsure if the editing had been done properly, although I throughly enjoyed the story.