The Starless Sea

Book Title: The Starless Sea

Author: Erin Morgenstern

Date Started: December 1st 2019

Date Completed: January 10th 2020

Genres: Fantasy, Mystery, Adventure, Romance

Quality Rating: Five Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Four Stars

Final Rating: Five Stars

Review:

Erin Morgenstern's books are stories that have honey drops of wonder pouring off of them. They're falling stars of mysteries that you desperately need to know the explanations to, but can't bear to finish. They're the experience of being a child and reading a fairy tale for the first time and being beside yourself because nothing will ever be the same again.

The damn creativity that this woman possesses, grapples with, and reins in to command, is so rare to find, especially in Western countries that have forgotten a lot of their storytelling roots. But Erin has a tangible love of stories, and fate, and magic, and endings, and belief and wonder. As well as a passion for newer ways of storytelling; video games and blockbuster movies and all the things technology offers us. She picks everything like a meticulously woven thread, and weaves it into her own story where it belongs - never forced, never purposeless, but naturally.

For most of The Starless Sea I was shouting 'what the hell is going on' at the pages in front of me. In the, I'm-going-to-keep-reading-right-this-second-because-I-need-to-know way (even though it took me more than a month to read because being an adult sucks). And honestly, that confusion grew the further into the book I went, and am I still entirely sure what all the metaphors were about? Hell no. But never have I been so content in uncertainty, to go along with a story that leaves me so utterly dumbfounded, but so utterly besotted.

The synopsis of this book is probably obsolete, but it is a story about stories. About storytellers. About redefining what a story is, what is should be, what it can be. Confused yet? It is dense and it is beautiful. It is about the son of a fortune-teller who walks away from something and then realises he was always walking in that direction anyway. It is about the man he falls in love with, the woman who decides his fate, the girl who is seeking him. There is a pirate who is also a rabbit, a man that is lost within time, and a Persian cat. It is a masterpiece and it loves anyone who opens its covers. I recommend you're the next one to do so.