Girl Underground by Morris Gleitzman

Girl Underground Reviews

• 
  Nan

  If I wasn't forced by my "hateful" English teacher to read a book in the library. I would have never read this book. I loved it! I seriously fell in love with the character. And it makes me think of what I can do to those people. They shouldn't be locked up like animals! Aussie classic!
• 
  Jessica Suann

  I had to read this book for school and found it really boring and dull but that was just me. It was interesting about the assylem seekers though.
• 
  Anna Davidson

  A funny adventure story with some serious undertones that are very relevant in Australia today - the treatment of refugees. Morris Gleitzman is the master of writing about difficult subject matter in a light-hearted way that still honours the seriousness of such topics. Themes of friendship, loyalty and standing up for what you believe in.
• 
  Lynne

  I love the writing of Morris Gleitzman. He's not only entertaining, he writes about social justice issues in a way that's easily accessible to children. This book deals with asylum seeker children in detention, highlighting the fact that even the kids in our society are capable of seeing injustice and calling it out for what it is.
• 
  Sarah

  I felt irritated by the author's obvious ulterior motive, ie to 'educate' kids about the issue of assylum seekers in australia. And in any case I thought he presented the issue in a very biased and one-sided way. I don't profess to know much about the issue or have an opinion on it either way but the whole way through I kept thinking "I want to hear the other side of the story." The kids were made out to be the goodies and the adults were The Baddies, so whenever the kids asked the adults questions they'd just sort of umm and ahh and dodge the question. It was unrealistic.
• 
  Sally

  Sweet story of a young girl who tries to do the right thing. With a friend she makes at her new school, she tries to help refugees who are kept in a prison-like environment and the story is how she tries to help them without getting her family in trouble.
• 
  Gabby

  This book is really good. It is about a girl called Bridget and a boy called Menzies on their mission to free 2 refugee kids from a refugee detention center. I really like how Bridget and Menzies don't give up on their mission even though they wen through much trouble on their journey.
• 
  Carla Matthews

  Disappointing. Loved Two Weeks with the Queen but this was too political and too unrealistic. Shallow characters and an unbelievable narrative that trivialised the issue more than making a political statement.
• 
  Nikita

  This book was an ok book, it was exciting, but it was quite boring sometimes!
• 
  Reading-Girl2

  Introduces more to 'boy overboard' and shows what one person can do if they feel passionate enough.
• 
  Kayla.M.F

  Morris Gleitzman-Pure Genius
• 
  Mia Jade

  Girl Underground is a great book. It has two main characters who travel around Australia and go to Parliament House in Canberra. I would say that the book is aimed at children 8 years and older, although I know adults who enjoyed it as well. The genres are action and adventure with a bit of drama. I especially liked the introduction of this book because of the great hook, ‘I should be arrested for this’. This first line had me wanting to read more right from the beginning.
  
  The story is about a girl named Bridget and a boy called Menzies who come from totally different family backgrounds but come together to save refugees in the ARDC (Australian Refugee Detention Centre). It is about how their friendship is formed, how they plan to free the people locked inside, with lots of shenanigans along the way.
  
  Bridget is a kind, determined and brave girl and her best friend Menzies is similar because he is also kind, determined and full of courage. They are both kind hearted which is shown by them wanting to help free the refugees and showed determination when they walked for hours to get to the ARDC, then dug a huge hole to save kids who are locked inside the detention centre.
  
  Main themes of the book are power and friendship. Power was demonstrated when Bridget and Menzies manage to get a towns worth of people to stand up for them and friendship is especially shown on pages 29-30, but I won’t give it away and let you enjoy it yourself!
  
  Girl Undergound is an amazing book. It has great messages behind it, such as to never take friends for granted, and to stand up for people who aren’t able to do it for themselves. If I had to change one thing about the book, I would make sure that it didn’t jump too much from topic to topic which it did at times, otherwise it was great!
  
  I hope you enjoy this book as much as I did. It made me feel both happy and sad while I was reading it, and I didn’t want to put it down. I rate Girl Undergound by Morris Gleitzman 9/10.
  
• 
  Pharlap

  Girl from a family involved in not perfectly legal business enters an expensive private school. Her main (only) concern is that she may reveal a murky nature of her father's business to the world.
  In the boarding house she meets a son of a politician, who (son not the father) is concerned with well being of children living in a refugees camp. No, it is not Manus Island, it is in Australian outback, year 2004. What struck me is that in the book mail posted in the Australian outback reached Canberra in couple of days. Now it would be week.
  Children of this concern will be familiar to people who read A boy overboard by the same author.
  Unfortunately this sequel is much weaker than the first part.
  It is dominated by this overwhelming scare of betraying the real nature of Dad's business and by list of all countries from Albania to Mongolia, which produce cheap imitations of products with renowned labels.
  
• 
  Jodie Thomson

  Loved this book so much! As well as raising the very real issue of Australia's dodgy immigration detention policies, this book tackles the topics of what it means to be a good person and how to do something about the things that concern you. Briget and her crim family are a funny and brilliant contrast to those who should know better. Perfect book for junior readers and anyone who likes a laugh.
• 
  Siwa

  Good book. I like the way that Bridget has such a strong political opinion. I wish there was a sequel as good as this to a Girl Underground.
• 
  LiA

  It is written with easy, simple language. The story is actually a lot better than what I expected. It's been long since I have finished any single book.
• 
  Molly Sawyer

  It is a great book!
• 
  Aidan

  Alright ok but a bit messy still nice to read
• 
  Jemma (Aussie BookWorm)

  I read this with my class, we were all hooked! I do wish that it had a more concrete ending though.
• 
  Octavia

  Gletizman once more continues his boring storytelling as he becomes energetic in his second book, which continues his first book in his all-over dull, monotonous, tedious, lacklustre writing style which does not add more context to the previous one, which is already egregious and does not deserve a sequel.
  
  Arguably, the protagonist, this time an Australian girl, Bridget, is even duller in her storytelling than Jamal. There is really no sentiment or touching parts in this boring book (which it definitely can accomplish), and, therefore, virtually no parts of the book are redeemable- poorly developed characters and a deeply flawed plot- although Gletizman is delivering a somewhat important message.