Tiger Lily by Jodi Lynn Anderson

Title: Tiger Lily
Author: Jodi Lynn Anderson
Release date: July 3, 2012
Publisher: HarperTeen
Pages: 304
Source: Publisher

Before Peter Pan belonged to Wendy, he belonged to the girl with the crow feather in her hair. . . .

Fifteen-year-old Tiger Lily doesn’t believe in love stories or happy endings. Then she meets the alluring teenage Peter Pan in the forbidden woods of Neverland and immediately falls under his spell.

Peter is unlike anyone she’s ever known. Impetuous and brave, he both scares and enthralls her. As the leader of the Lost Boys, the most fearsome of Neverland’s inhabitants, Peter is an unthinkable match for Tiger Lily. Soon, she is risking everything—her family, her future—to be with him. When she is faced with marriage to a terrible man in her own tribe, she must choose between the life she’s always known and running away to an uncertain future with Peter.

With enemies threatening to tear them apart, the lovers seem doomed. But it’s the arrival of Wendy Darling, an English girl who’s everything Tiger Lily is not, that leads Tiger Lily to discover that the most dangerous enemies can live inside even the most loyal and loving heart.

Tiger Lily is so not your Disney Peter Pan story.  It’s a rather dark, sorrowful reimagining.  The story isn’t the most exciting but fans of the original will enjoy it and everyone will adore Jodi Lynn Anderson’s magical writing.

Tiger Lily is a very unusual heroine.  She’s aloof, sometimes cold, and not always very likable. She’s oblivious to some of the things going on around her, especially when it comes to things involving boys.  Readers will have a hard time connecting to her at first but by the end it’s impossible not to love her.  My heart broke for her by the end.

Now Tiger Lily is the main character but the story is not told from her point-of-view.  Instead it’s told from Tinker Bell’s point-of-view.  Tinker Bell is an extremely loyal little fairy who is with Tiger Lily from the beginning.  There are gaps in the story when Tinker Bell wasn’t present but she is a reliable narrator even with those gaps.  She was actually my favorite character in the book.  She was smart, cunning, kind, and loyal.  She loved Tiger Lily very much and she wanted to see her happy. Her past could have been better developed but that wasn’t a huge flaw for me.

The story is not fast-paced.  A lot of readers will lose interest because it doesn’t really seem to go anywhere for quite some time.  There is very little action in the book and even that part manages to be slow.  The story is just a little too dull to get through quickly but it is worth it when you get to the end.

Now the story may not be super gripping but the writing is.  The writing completely blew me away.  I have never read anything by Jodi Lynn Anderson so I didn’t really know what to expect.  Even if I’d gone in with the highest expectations, her writing would have exceeded them.  This book is worth a read for the writing alone.

Overall, Tiger Lily definitely could have been better but I was very pleased with it as it was.  Fans of the original Peter Pan story will greatly enjoy it.

Looking for more reviews of Tiger Lily?
Emily’s Reading Room’s review
365 Days Of Reading’s review

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15 comments

  1. I enjoyed Peter Pan as a child, but I was not a diehard fan. Tiger Lily sounds like a great book, and I like that it is told from Tinker Bell’s point of view. The fact that there is great writing only makes me more excited to read it. I have been reading too many books with mediocre writing.

  2. I am a huge fan of Peter Pan, so I definitely can’t wait to read this one 🙂 The fact that it’s told from Tinker’s point of view really interests me. What a shame that Tiger Lily is a bit difficult to connect with, so I will keep that in mind ^^

  3. I am absolutely dying to get my hands on this book. Peter Pan was one of my favorite stories as a child. I was constantly dressing up as Tinker Bell for Halloween, but what really lures me about this book is that it is so OBVIOUS that it is a dark re-imagining of a beloved childhood tale. We all know about Peter Pan and Wendy Darling, so we can easily guess how Tiger Lily ends, but that won’t stop any of us from reading it because its allure is so strong. Every new review I see of this makes me want it more. Great review, though I’m a bit apprehensive that it’s a little slow at times.

  4. I always love when famous stories, like that of Peter Pan, are told from a different perspective. It makes the story appear fresh to me, and I can’t wait for this one! Tiger Lily has always been one of the characters in Peter Pan that intrigued me, so this is definitely right up my alley.

  5. This seems to be a wonderful retelling of Peter Pan. I’ve never been a fan of the story of Peter Pan, but Tiger Lily will make me overlook my dislike of Peter Pan and Wendy.

  6. I love Peter Pan, and I love how the love story is turned on its head in a way here.

    Must read!

    Lovely review 🙂