Ten Thousand Stitches

Book Title: Ten Thousand Stitches

Author: Olivia Atwater

Series: Regency Faerie Tales  #2

Date Started: November 17th  2024

Date Completed: November 19th 2024

Genres: Fantasy, Historical, Romance

Quality Rating: Three Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Three Star

Final Rating: Three Stars

Review:

◆ Thank you to NetGalley for this ebook for review ◆

I usually hate the 'X meets X' style taglines, but I have to say on this occasion that Bridgerton meets Howl's Moving Castle (original Dianna Wynne Jones version) is the perfect description for Olivia Atwater's book - just add a sprinkling of Cinderella and you know exactly what you're getting in for.

Ten Thousand Stitches was cute and fun, with enough of its own quirks to take seriously. Of course the logic of the class justice is half there for the commentary and half just to be convenient for the plot, but it works hard enough to characterise our heroine and ensemble to keep the suspension of disbelief. When you mix in a generous helping of faerie - and clearly a love of embroidery, which I massively enjoyed - it becomes really quite entertaining.

I do feel like the novel felt very short, more like a long fairy tale, which was a bit of a shame as you knew every beat before it really had a chance to happen. We move at such a pace through the whole story that suddenly it's over - and I could have happily read another 100 pages at least!

Nettle

Book Title: Nettle

Author: Bex Hogan

Date Started: November 16th 2024

Date Completed: November 17th 2024

Genres: Fantasy, Adventure, Romance

Quality Rating: Four Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Four Star

Final Rating: Four Stars

Review:

◆ Thank you to NetGalley for this ebook for review ◆

I'm on a bit of a readathon-style mission to review a bunch of NetGalley ARCs before the end of the year, and I'm pleasantly surprised to say it's made finding books like this one really enjoyable. Nettle took a couple of chapters for me to buy into the narration style, but once it got going I found it really fun.

This novel takes all those classic fragments of faerie stories and combines them into an exciting and alluring adventure. It does justice to those elements with the prose heightening everything to their full, magical potential, exploring the human side to being enchanted to dance forever, being tricked into eating faerie food, and finding the loopholes to solve impossible tasks.

While I spotted the twist right from the beginning (it's not particularly subtle), the way the plot threads were tied up was massively satisfying even if you've seen it coming for 200 pages. I would call this a children's book above YA honestly, and I would've adored it as a pre-teen as an introduction to this sub-genre.

Everything You Need is in the Library

Book Title: Everything You Need is in the Library

Author: Michiko Aoyama

Date Started: November 14th 2024

Date Completed: November 16th 2024

Genres: Contemporary

Quality Rating: Three Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Three Star

Final Rating: Three Stars

Review:

◆ Thank you to NetGalley for this ebook for review ◆

I realise it's sort of unfair how closely this novel feels to The Cat Who Saved Book, but I also can't see much beyond it. These little chapter stories about how books can mend the fissures between us, nurse our discontent with the modern world, and ease the lost parts of ourselves trying to be happy are always sweet, but not always distinctive.

These sorts of Japanese books read like short story anthologies - which aren't my favourite, but I do like the way they link seemingly separate stories with a common connection that makes us appreciative of the way all our lives intersect with one another. The Japanese temperament to find relief from mindless business and stress is enviably beautiful; one single, simple thing turns the modern world on its head and anchors us in what really matters.

The quiet slowness of this type of story - the soulful devotion to books and the effort of those who care for the roofs over their heads - is always special. They always seems to say, 'it's going to be okay. Keep trying, someone is listening and rooting for you.' Even if it's not the most original one out there, it's still a comfort to read.

Nettle & Bone

Book Title: Nettle & Bone

Author: T. Kingfisher

Date Started: November 5th 2024

Date Completed: November 14th 2024

Genres: Fantasy, Adventure

Quality Rating: Three Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Three Star

Final Rating: Three Stars

Review:

◆ Thank you to NetGalley for this ebook for review ◆

If you've been aware of my reviews for a while, you'll know I am a sucker for fairy tales and their retellings. Even if they're nothing new, I still love devouring their quests and riddles - Nettle & Bone is no exception, but sadly wasn't on the highest peaks of the pile.

My main challenge with this book was that there were no stakes, and thus not much momentum. Everything happens rather easily, and Marra (out protagonist) often doesn't have much to do with the resolutions. Even the darker themes of systemic domestic abuse and individual exposition - something that felt like it had the opportunity to nuance the plot - sadly didn't really turn up in the story itself. The whole thing felt rather TV, which was a bit of a shame given the 30-year-old protagonist.

I enjoyed the old-fashioned fairy tale world with its bone dancers, fairy forts, and angry ghosts. The best part was the first few chapters, where we are thrown right into the middle of Marra pursuing the impossible tasks she has been given. It felt creative and atmospheric, but unfortunately once we walked out of the mist (with Marra only completing two of the three tasks, no less), everything became quite straightforward.

Nettle & Bone was a pleasant enough read, but does it offer anything new to the fairy tale retelling craze? Not really.

The Bone Hunters

Book Title: The Bone Hunters

Author: Joanne Burn

Date Started: October 27th  2024

Date Completed: November 5th 2024

Genres: Historical

Quality Rating: Four Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Five Star

Final Rating: Five Stars

Review:

◆ Thank you to NetGalley for this ebook for review ◆

Fossils, fossil, fossils, what better thing to do than discover and fawn over them. I've been to Lyme once - very briefly on a film location recce - but reading this book I felt the sharp sea air again, the pebbles shifting underfoot. Staring up at the towering cliffs waiting to topple over themselves and onto you, and the white hot excitements of what exists within the stones surrounding you. It feels folkloric even then, and I suppose it is in a lot of ways, something that is even played with a lot in this novel.

The Bone Hunters is far more grim than its synopsis will have you suspect, but it's not keenly dramatic for the sake of it. Each beat has its place in the plot and in Ada's story, and creeps up a cliff small step by small step until you stand at the peak staring at the blackness below. In only 400 pages, an expansive tale unwinds itself with relationship morphing in new directions neither Ada nor I saw coming. (And some of my favourite representations of female/male friendships I've read in a long time.)

Ada's character was a significant highlight of the novel; the balance between headstrong determination and active awareness of her precarious situation was so well developed her quietness spoke volumes in every chapter. It's rare to find a character (let alone a woman) realistically shown to be confident and loyal to herself but still be fought with worry about her place in the world - yet so many of us are like this.

The Anning inspiration is very clear from the start, but I really like the creative license used to tell a slightly different story while paying homage to the mother of geology. I hadn't heard of Joanne Burn before this Netgalley arc but I will be looking up their books now - as is the magic and privilege of being a book reviewer.

The Colour of Revenge

Book Title: The Colour of Revenge

Author: Cornelia Funke

Series: Inkheart #4

Date Started: October 12th  2024

Date Completed: October 27th 2024

Genres: Fantasy, Adventure

Quality Rating: Five Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Five Star

Final Rating: Five Stars

Review:

Inkheart was always special in a way so few stories achieved - who could possibly top the idea that reading aloud could make the story real? That you could speak your most beloved, most feared, most magical characters, objects, worlds into being? It's so simple, as most good stories are, and I was not alone in being entirely enraptured by it as a child (made all the more precious because my mum read the whole thing to me at the time, too).

But, as much as I loved Mortimer, aspired to be Elinor, and felt very much like Meggie, who didn't really want to see the mythic heroes from the ink world on a true adventure of their own? Who didn't want to meet the Motley Folk, escape danger with the Black Prince, witness the Fire-Dancer's mastery of the flames? There were flickers of it in the original trilogy, but our wish is granted fully here and now. The Colour of Revenges is so immediately immersive - the prose, the imagination, the characters painting you into the story within mere moments and fragments of paragraphs - that the idea that you could speak aloud these characters and they would become real feels just as true as the first time I read about a battered book called Inkheart and the world inside of it.

I feel ambivalent about the continuation of beloved series - I do like letting a story be over at the original destination but, at this point, so many of them have done it and brought with them lovely new stories. There's a moment, towards the end of this book, where two of our most beloved heroes about about stories; where new ones start and old ones end. Literal or philosophical, it's something that could be a materialistic meta media moment it not spoken with feeling. But the enchanted inweave of Inkheart only ever speaks with feeling, even when she speaks through her characters; "In my experience, the story never ends. Only the heroes change."

The Haunted House on Hollow Hill

Book Title: The Haunted House on Hollow Hill

Author: Derek Landy

Series: Skulduggery Pleasant

Date Started: October 7th  2024

Date Completed: October 11th 2024

Genres: Fantasy, Mystery, Adventure, Action

Quality Rating: Four Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Four Star

Final Rating: Four Stars

Review:

I always marvel at how quickly Derek must write for the main series and these spin-offs to come out in such quick succession. I enjoyed the podcast version of this story a lot, but I find it hard to follow audio-only media so decided to read the books as well (I conveniently drifted off to sleep on the episode the killer was revealed so it made both experiences satisfying).

You can tell that the novel has been written for an audio production, the scenes dance around a little unnaturally for prose - but it's also very creative with the sound landscape and design. Of course that makes the podcast version really interesting, but it's also fun to see the way it weaves into the fabric of the narrative even when written.

These little mystery spin-offs are always fun and realised to the point they don't feel gratuitous. Derek is so good at creating new casts of characters, it feels new every time. I also really enjoyed that Valkyrie and Skulduggery are rarely the protagonists but instead feature in someone else's story. It makes the universe all the bigger and exciting.

Ultimately, The Haunted House on Hollow Hill wasn't my favourite instalment in the Skulduggery series (saga, is it big enough to call a saga yet?) but it was still fun, and actually really cool to see them trying new forms of storytelling for the series that make it all the richer.