The Wild Girl is a documentary novel about one of the darkest periods of Romanian totalitarianism. Indirectly, Doina Ruști writes about the extraordinary power of the written word, which can save the world.
Gheorghe Glodeanu, Nord literar, no. 6, 2026
The ending confirms the author’s gift for creating a compelling story and rewards the reader once again with a major surprise that draws the narrative threads together, revealing previously unknown connections between the characters. Also noteworthy—especially since the novel lends itself to inclusion in school reading lists—are the coherence and clarity of the notes prepared by the book’s editor, Iulia Trăncuță: well-documented, concise, and highly readable explanations, dealing chiefly with aspects and terminology related to the historical and social context in which the novel is set.
A book for readers of all ages—this is The Wild Girl, Doina Ruști’s latest novel: a story with a fresh, bright, youthful air, luminous despite the upheavals of History, which innocence, a spirit of adventure, and true friendship can overcome. More
Sorin Iagăru Dina, Timpul
An impressive and profound book.
Nicoleta Trifan
The mystery of this wild being dominates much of the novel, which reads breathlessly. The girl proves to be a creature full of contradictions. She has no human speech, yet she solves complicated mathematical equations. She is agile. She slips away like a wild animal, yet she masters fields of knowledge that require long study and higher education.
In the second half of the novel, Tavi discovers her journal, and the girl’s story comes to light in her own words. Along with it, details and revelations from the national history of the 1950s emerge—horrible political and economic aspects the reader may never have suspected lay buried in the past of their own people. Aspects that terrify, especially in today’s context, when history seems—as it always does—to seek ways to repeat itself. And it seems to strike most fiercely at thinkers, at intellectuals, giving the impression that it prefers humanity to remain brutal, barbaric, forcing it to regress whenever it begins to evolve. To remain Wild.
The ending—I shall reveal it to you—carries light. For, however unjust history may be, in the end it bows before the will and the individual power to survive and to overcome it.
Gina Varga, Epithet
