The Wolf and the Woodsman

Book Title: The Wolf and the Woodsman

Author: Ava Reid

Date Started: March 7th 2021

Date Completed: March 27th 2021

Genres: Fantasy, Historical, Romance, Adventure

Quality Rating: Three Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Four Star

Final Rating: Three Stars

Review:

◆ Thanks to NetGalley for this eBook copy for review ◆

Reid's novel felt very YA beside the books it compares itself to. That's not necessarily meant as a bad thing, but I do think the modernist, teenage style interferes slightly with the traditionally timeless fairytale tone. I don't think the 1st person present tense helps either; Èvike comes across rambly and preachy when giving away lore and worldbuilding, as well as presenting her as knowing everything there is to know for the sake of the prose, but then of course not letting her behave in that way for the sake of the plot.

This book is like four different stories in one; the last two are compelling, the first two not so much. Reid integrates a lot of really nice fantastical aspects from Hungarian and Jewish history and mythologies, but they're all used as placeholders to hurry the story along. In trying to do an epic akin to Novik or Arden in one book, Reid has lost the magic of folklore and wonder that make those stories such spectacles.

As much as I moan about comparing books to one another, Évike and Gáspár essentially follow Nina and Matthias' story from Six of Crows. I love that storyline and I think there's lots of room for variation, but I just wasn't convinced enough by the characters (who are frequently inconsistent and sometimes passive) for them to even begin treading a new path.

The Wolf and the Woodsman is worth the read if it sounds like something you'd like, but ultimately some creative choices left me underwhelmed and much preferring other authors in the same genre that execute their stories with more finesse and heart.

Abhorsen

Book Title: Abhorsen

Author: Garth Nix

Series: The Old Kingdom #3

Date Started: March 15th 2021

Date Completed: March 18th 2021

Genres: Fantasy, Adventure

Quality Rating: Five Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Five Star

Final Rating: Five Stars

Review:

I enjoyed Abhorsen the most out of The Old Kingdom series; having been a little underwhelmed by the previous two books (despite still enjoying them), Abhorsen was pure magic to read and enjoy.

Nix has written such a cool universe, with on-point world-building confidently executed, expanded on expertly with each instalment without taking over the story. Lirael and Sam are great protagonists, both powerful and engaging in their own right, worthy of being passed the torch from Sabriel and Touchstone (who both have their own little snippets which were probably my favourite parts). And what an ending! It ties together the old and the new, empowers the right people but allows everyone to have a heroic hand in it too.

I felt a little down at the end of the last book's cliffhanger but Abhorsen made up for it with its well-rounded narrative. It didn't feel like a bigger book chopped in half, it was its own story and had the right momentum and pay off to bring the trilogy (that yes, is expanded further, but really these are the core three) to a satisfying end.

Sorcerer to the Crown

Book Title: Sorcerer to the Crown

Author: Zen Cho

Series: Sorcerer Royal #1

Date Started: March 1st 2021

Date Completed: March 10th 2021

Genres: Fantasy, Mystery, Historical

Quality Rating: Three Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Four Star

Final Rating: Three Stars

Review:

I had high hopes for this book, and while it was an okay story with glimmers of originality - and a whimsicality to it that I love and wish would be more common in fantasy novels - it was a little slow and dense for my tastes. Part murder-mystery, part magic school (somehow some romance ends up in there), there's a lot of things going on that all weave into each other a little too conveniently for me.

I have a note in my book about the flippant way the narrator talks about women being delicate, blatant classism, and how freely use racial slurs, even though it's all portrayed as bad - and yes, I understand it's commenting on the backwards attitudes of the world it's set in. As this shifts later into the book as the characters become more mature, I'm not going to fully go into it here, but the first chunk of the book gave me pause and wasn't the most fun to read because of it.

What I think made this book inaccessible for me was how awkwardly the prose was written. There are some sentences that nail the old-fashioned language and rhythm, but the rest of it is so jumbled and dense that the characters' arcs and meaning come across as second best. It makes the whole thing, though written in a very complicated way, actually come across quite childish as everyone seems way more shallow than they're intended to be.

There's actually a wonderful diversity in this book, and nice dynamics between the characters - I just wish there wasn't such obvious, pedantic and over-explanatory narration plastered all over it and that we were given the space to watch the characters do their thing instead.

Sorcerer to the Crown was a fun, kinda-easy read, but it would've been more enjoyable for me if the writing had been smoother. I was given the sequel for review by the publisher, so will likely continue the series if only to complete that - but with this story wrapped up (conveniently) very well, I'm interested where Cho will take the characters next.