Literary Devices in Beauty Queens
Symbolism, Imagery, Allegory
Setting
In her Acknowledgments, Libba Bray leaves us a clue about how she dreamed up the setting. "Further thanks should go to Josh Goldblatt," she writes. "You're right that 'the villain should have a sec...
Narrator Point of View
The narrator of this book has god-level mind-reading skills. The story slips in and out of the points of view of a huge cast of characters, often in a single chapter. Chapter Eight, for example, st...
Genre
The world of Beauty Queens is an exaggerated one: it's just a little weirder than our own. We learn a lot about it through the footnotes, which provide bits of trivia on the culture of the world: "...
Tone
There are plenty of sentences in this book that are straight-up funny, and suggest that Libba Bray must've had a really good time writing this book. She's at her funniest when describing the bumbli...
Writing Style
A lot of this story is dialogue. The girls have discussions to figure out the next step to ensure their survival. The language is simple, and so are the changes from scene to scene. Bray gives us t...
What's Up With the Title?
The title Beauty Queens is no mystery. There's no poetic metaphor that hints at the deeper meaning within the book. Beauty Queens is the type of title that simply tells you the subject of the story...
What's Up With the Ending?
The final number is almost a montage. In their getaway yacht, the girls are partying. While Shanti DJs, each beauty queen gets to walk the runway in their own ensemble, dancing their own way. While...
Tough-o-Meter
As far as writing goes, Beauty Queens is very straightforward. The sentences and vocab aren't complicated, and much of the story takes place through the dialogue between the beauty queens. The lens...
Plot Analysis
Please Stay CalmThe conflict in this book is pretty immediate, but we do get a prologue told in the voice of The Corporation. It describes the pageant queens travelling, excited, toward their compe...
Trivia
The Miss America pageant started in 1921 as a way to entice tourists to Atlantic City, New Jersey. We guess the boardwalk wasn't enough? (Source) Until 1948, Miss America was crowned while wearing...
Steaminess Rating
We couldn't put it better than The Corporation: each racy scene is "an honest, consensual expression in which a girl might take an active role when she feels good and ready and not one minute befor...
Allusions
William Golding, Lord of the Flies(15.52-57)Charles Dickens (22.43-56, 22.79)Prometheus (29.10) Andromeda (29.12-19)