The Binding

Book Title: The Binding

Author: Bridget Collins

Date Started: June 10th 2020

Date Completed: June 18th 2020

Genres: Fantasy, Romance, Historical

Quality Rating: Four Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Five Stars

Final Rating: Four Stars

Review:

The Binding is a carefully crafted story about two men, some books and a number of fires. I would recommend maybe skipping this review if you like to go into things with no context, though, as it's hard to talk about this book without touching on mild spoilers.

The story is based around the premise that books contain people's memories - the ones that they (or others) would rather be forgotten - and the 'binders' that have the ability to take them. It's a cool idea, and I actually would've liked to dive deeper into the world and all the little things that are mentioned: the trade of 'originals' and fakes (i.e. novels), the Crusades which supposedly involved burnings of binders etc. Though I do appreciate the focus on the main storyline - which is ultimately the heart of this book and a big strength.

One of the things that really impressed me was the inventive structuring of the story. It's quite complex when you step back and look at the timeline with all its little interwoven elements, but it feels very simple while you're reading it because it's so carefully and sensitively laid out. There were times when I was worried we were going to go down a cliched route, but then Collins mixed it up again and kept me engaged.

The one thing that was very predictable - and spoiler warning guys - was the romance. The two protagonists are very obviously in the hate-to-love trope from the moment they have a scene together. I think the fact that they're two men is supposed to throw us but, honestly, it's not particularly subtle once you 'get over' that. It's actually amusingly blatant. No less sweet, though.

There are some things that feel offbeat of a little obvious, but The Binding was a very enjoyable read overall. It's impressive how cool an idea the whole thing is based on, and Collins' retraint from making that a gimmick like so many other authors do. I look forward to what she comes up with next, and I certainly wouldn't turn down something set in the same world to see what else the concept has in its potential.

The Lost Future of Pepperharrow

Book Title: The Lost Future of Pepperharrow

Author: Natasha Pulley

Series: The Watchmaker of Filigree Street #2

Date Started: June 5th 2020

Date Completed: June 10th 2020

Genres: Historical, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Romance

Quality Rating: Four Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Five Stars

Final Rating: Four Stars

Review:

◆ Thanks to NetGalley for this eBook copy for review ◆

19th Century Japan, international politics, a clockwork octopus, female scientists and theatre owners, and ghosts. Um, yes. Yes, please. I read The Watchmaker of Filigree Street when it came out and, honestly, I don't remember what's happens - only that I loved it and its characters. The Lost Future of Pepperharrow will probably follow a similar fate because I loved it all over again, even though I was unsure what to expect.

A lot happens in this novel, but it did occur me towards the end that there's a lot of characters talking about what might happen to them amongst the actual action. Somehow, that's just as engaging as the actual investigating or peril, in no small part because of Thaniel and Mori's relationship to the supernatural and the tone built up in its vibrant world. There was an edge of puzzle-solving, it felt, reading, and while I don't think the audience is really given a fair chance to solve the mystery before the heroes, it's definitely a satisfying tool to keep them hooked.

From what I can tell, it felt like the history and Japanese culture was authentic, especially reading the notes at the back - Pulley clearly knows her way around Japanese politics and even the language, and it comes through. Of course, it's a fictional story with sci-fi/magical realist influences, but it really felt like the political and historical struggles were real too. In fact, it blended the ghosty science almost seamlessly and utterly believably.

There are great characters all round, but if you know me you'll know I won't be able to miss the chance to praise Pulley's female characters. Like seriously. The three main examples - Six, Thaniel's adoptive daughter; Dr Grace Carrow, Thaniel's ex-wife; and Takiko Pepperharrow (I would presume who the title refers to), theatre owner and [oops, spoilers] - are all vastly different, all flawed and scared of things, and all very strongly motivated and determined. Considering they aren't even the main protagonists, it is an enormous breath of fresh air to get that kind of complexity on the fringes of this epic tale.

Like its predecessor, The Lost Future of Pepperharrow is tender and gentle and badass - and unlike anything I've ever read. Part ghost story, part detective thriller, part literary fiction, threaded together with historical politics, romance and science boarding on steampunk, this book is an absolute delight.

Talina in the Tower

Book Title: Talina in the Tower

Author: Michelle Lovric

Date Started: May 31st 2020

Date Completed: June 5th 2020

Genres: Historical, Adventure, Fantasy

Quality Rating: Three Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Two Stars

Final Rating: Three Stars

Review:

I adored Michelle Lovric's first children's novel, The Undrowned Child, when I was a kid - and it held up pretty well when I reread it. But sadly Talina in the Tower didn't have the same magic to it for me.

I'm aware that The Undrowned Child was quite fancily written for a children's book, but I don't remember having any trouble understanding it. Talina felt a lot more convoluted and quirky without actually feeling magical. It matches the grim darkness I was expecting from Lovric's previous books, but it loses the whimsy and spark that The Undrowned Child thrived on.

Of course, reading this book as an adult is bound to muddle up some of the enjoyment. I didn't feel much peril, but I suppose that's my age. The fact that nothing really happens, though, I think is more of a problem. There's no sense of momentum or cause an effect; lots of things just happen and I couldn't really keep track of them or how we were progressing at all. Maybe I'm overthinking it, but it might be a bit of an issue in a kid's book.

I imagine there's probably a crossover to The Undrowned Child at some point (pretty sure Gasperin was the protagonist's surname from that) and a lot of the reason I kept reading was to try and reach a point where Teo or another familiar face turned up. But I read 38% of the way through, and my enthusiasm wasn't quite enough to keep going anymore.

Uprooted

Book Title: Uprooted

Author: Naomi Novik

Date Started: May 23rd 2020

Date Completed: May 30th 2020

Genres: Fantasy, Adventure, Historical, Romance

Quality Rating: Five Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Five Stars

Final Rating: Five Stars

Review:

Uprooted blew my expectations out of the water, and I loved everything about it. There's familiar fairytales, different fairytales, old magic, new magic, everything you could ask of a fantasy novel and more. I've read and enjoyed some other Naomi Novik books very much in the past, but none of them come close to this.

Surprisingly enough, things go from bad to worse, and then even worse in this book. We're given a situation, the characters finally seem to have figured it out, and then something else terrible happens that they have to fight for. And as things get worse and worse for the characters, it gets better and better for the reader. I can't remember the last time I was so excited for the story not to be over, for the evil to become something completely unexpected, for the characters to be in peril again. And, looking back, so much happens to Agnieszka over the course of this book, but it doesn't feel rushed at all. I was blown along every single time, clueless to where we could possibly be heading next but very excited for it.

The story is really the triumph of this book, but the world itself is absolutely dripping with magic. It feels halfway between traditional fairytales and what we're maybe a bit more used to from high fantasy these days, but it was the kind of dark, gory fantasy that old folklore thrived off of. What's more, Novik plays with the morality of the world and its people; there isn't really good or bad, just grey areas that rely on the character to make the best decision in the situation, even if they don't have great options.

What really pulls you through this story is Agnieszka and Kasia and Sarkan - all of whom I love dearly. I could write an essay on how awesome Kasia is, especially considering she's not even the central character. That's left to Agnieszka, who is strong-willed and clever and out of her depth and scared and makes a ton of mistakes but does them magnificently and works damn hard to repair them. That's what you really want in a leading character, especially in a story that twists and weaves into a whole saga of battles and spells and misunderstandings.

The Name of the Wind

Book Title: The Name of the Wind

Author: Patrick Rothfuss

Series: The Kingkiller Chronicles #1

Date Started: May 16th 2020

Date Completed: May 23rd 2020

Genres: Fantasy, Adventure

Quality Rating: Five Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Five Stars

Final Rating: Five Stars

Review:

I've been hearing good things about this book for years, and honestly it was the size putting me off more than anything. Yet here we are; I read it in a week, for hours at a time because I simply didn't want to stop. It's the kind of book where I was completely immersed within seconds and looked up to find it an hour had already past. So I would say ten more minutes, and then it would be another hour later. Oops?

My mind is taken up with a lot of story theory, particularly around structure, at the moment. And The Name of the Wind turned out to be an exceptional cure for that. It, somehow, breaks all the rules and fulfils them at the same time. It seemingly has no goal, it wanders everywhere, it's like an epic with no end, only fuelled by secrets and mystery. And that works so well and I can't quite work out why - and that's its own kind of magic.

The world is vibrantly rich, mixing a lot of the staple elements of high fantasy since Tolkein with other things too. It feels familiar enough to sink into, with enough of its own uniqueness to be exicting. Book lovers aren't really rare, and music and theatre play their parts in exposition a lot of the time, but it's so nice to see these things weighed in so heavily and so personally in a protagonist. Instead of just giving the world a bit of flavour, it colours it completely.

Kvothe, himself, is a great fantasy hero. He's a good person but with all the thrilling ruffian qualities of an alluring fantasy protagonist. Yes, I'm inclined to a lot of the things he is so of course find him engaging, but he's compelling from so many standpoints - and we're only a third of the way through his tale up until his mid-20s! This is in no small part to do with the fact that all the characters are investable, even if they aren't likeable. They feel like complimenting or opposing forces to him and his journey, and to the world in general.

I don't feel like I've made the best job of praising this book; I was honestly considering not writing a review at all and just leaving a five-star rating, but being stuck indoors with no paid work for the foreseeable future is as good an excuse to attempt a review as any. The Name of the Wind was exactly what I expected and more. I may be putting off The Wise Man's Fear for a while, in no small part because of its length, but also because the final book still hasn't been released and I can't see myself being able to hold back for too long.

A Pocketful of Crows

Book Title: A Pocketful of Crows

Author: Joanne M. Harris

Date Started: May 14th 2020

Date Completed: May 16th 2020

Genres: Fantasy, Romance, Fairytale, Historical

Quality Rating: Two Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Two Stars

Final Rating: Two Stars

Review:

A Pocketful of Crows was not a fun read for me, to put it lightly. To summarise if you don't want to read all my rantings: whatever it was trying to achieve it didn't, and whatever else was added to the mix along the way wasn't enough to help me get on with it. There are minor spoilers ahead because I had to get out why this book was so utterly infuriating for me, but I'd be surprised if you couldn't see them coming from the first chapter anyway. The book's saving grace was that it was over quickly.

The first thing became apparent to me was the fact that there's no description. Anywhere. Which is really bizarre, especially for a book that's selling itself so strongly on being a fairytale. You can't just list things like mountains and rivers and trees and think that counts as magical. Sure, traditional fairytales don't overload themselves with extensive details about how everything looks or feels, but they are absolutely overflowing with imagery. There is no rhyme or reason to what is listed (it's the same things over and over again, but they don't enrich any metaphors or even give us a specific sense of place or aesthetics). They're just included, I assume, to sound 'mystical', but with no motivation behind them, it fails.

To carry on with the misunderstanding of what a folktale or fairytale is, it feels like nothing happens in this book because we skip over the actual story events. Yes, you're right, fairytales do act in a detached and out-of-time fashion, but they still work because we 1) have the metaphors and imagery to fill in the blanks, 2) are already placed in a situation that we recognise and can fill in other blanks, and 3) are not being overloaded by other information. 80% of this book is listing the same things over and over again, and our unbearable protagonist speaking her mind. It's too much, it's distracting and pointless. I'll also make a point that Harris clearly thinks she's retelling Cinderella (the book itself is literally referenced and comparisons to the protagonist are made again and again), but it's actually a very derivative Little Mermaid narrative, and I'm not sure the author noticed that was what she was writing.

So, okay, structural and technical aspects aside, was the book really that bad? Well, honestly I don't know because I found it hard to care because the characters have no conscience and therefore no fears. Which, actually, means yes. Okay, I get that the protagonist falls in love and is then scorned when she's rejected (clichés abound if you haven't noticed) to the point of wanting revenge. Fine. But if not one really considers their morality or has a moment of doubt (the other characters as well), then there aren't any stakes. So what if they ruin someone else's life? They don't seem to care, and neither does anyone else. 'That's fine, though, because it's a first-person narration so we understand the character's innermost thoughts.' No, we don't. I also think it's a completely stupid idea to use a first-person perspective when the main 'excuse' the book falls back on all the time its supposedly timeless, detached folktale style - which is the exact opposite of what first-person prose achieves. Don't even get me started on the 'I have no name' trope, because you do. You have loads of them whether you like it or not, you can't just ignore them if they bind you because it suits the later narrative.

One thing that I am genuinely confused about (along with the magic rules, but that just wasn't thought through enough) was the fact that the heroine is actually everything she is villainised to be. Isn't she? She is a witch, in some form, right? She has cursed the castle. She has done all the things they've said she did. Of course, I get the feeling we're supposed to think they've making her a scapegoat, but I just don't get it. Sure, they're acting in an exaggerated way because of the misogynistic society, but they're aren't actually fabricating anything. I don't get it. My only conclusion is that Harris is trying to make us see anyone but the heroine as an enemy (which is ironic, because I can't bear the protagonist at all). Don't even get me started on the 

I thought this book was just bad when I was reading it. But then I got to the end where there's this meta-narrative backstory, and I realised that had been the problem the whole time. Harris had been forcing and manipulating everything so that the final 'twist' worked, and in doing so completely sacrificed her story. Somehow, that makes me less frustrated than everything else, because it's just misjudged rather than having no skill. But wow, that was on big mess of a book just so you could have your feminist twist - which honestly doesn't feel particularly feminist. And I don't mean that because it has a female character who is capable of wickedness, or there are women that are selfish, those things are perfectly valid. I say it because there are dozens of sexist clichés thrown into this thing, and at the end it's all dismissed like it never happened, and the women are practically deified, and it's just not that simple. Implying so is honestly patronising.

Sabriel

Book Title: Sabriel

Author: Garth Nix

Series: The Old Kingdom #1

Date Started: May 12th 2020

Date Completed: May 14th 2020

Genres: Fantasy, Adventure

Quality Rating: Four Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Four Stars

Final Rating: Four Stars

Review:

Sabriel is, of course, a classic in the genre of fantasy adventure books. One that I never got round to reading as a kid for whatever reason. That was probably unfortunate; I probably would've loved this novel when I was younger. As it is, I enjoyed reading the book, and will continue with the series, but wasn't blown away.

The Old Kingdom is put together with some pretty cool ideas, complex yet well-explained and intuitive. There's quite a magic system for the Abhorsens and Charters Mages and Clayrs and Royals and... But I kept up with it for the most part. I also think Nix had a nice amount of worldbuilding while staying focused on the story, which is often an issue with a lot of fantasy novels released today. Authors get so caught up in trying to explain every detail behind their world or magic systems that they forget they're telling a story about people. Nix knew what the reader would be able to work out for themselves, gave just enough detail to give the world flavour, and then got on with it.

It's impressive how long the book goes with Sabriel by itself and still manages to be engaging. Sabriel's internal monologue, or at least her prose, was blissfully practical and intelligent; the temptation to make your hero dum just to give them an obstacle when they're on their own is one many an author gives in to. Nix just raised the stakes, and it works better on both ends. I will admit that I had more fun once Mogget and then Touchstone had been added to the mix, just for a little more friction, you know.

A mention has to go to the title-character and heroine herself. Like I said, she's practical and intelligent, just faced with higher stakes than many novels. Perhaps her lack of hesitancy at some points lost a deeper emotive impact, but honestly I loved the fact that she was just a badass and faced her obstacles head-on. She still failed, but she didn't wallow in self-pity, she just got on with it. The fact that her gender isn't even commented on is frankly kinda revolutionary, especially in a book from the 1990s (this book is older than me, oh no).

I think why this book didn't get five stars for me was the fact I wanted more from it. It felt very simple, even though it weaved a good story with a lot of worldbuilding around it. Maybe I was expecting more, or perhaps something more different to other fantasy books I've read (because it definitely wasn't anything I hadn't seen before - though arguably this was the predecessor to those other examples). As I mentioned, had I read this as a child/early teen it probably would've been on my favourites list - I would encourage you to put it in the hands of young readers if you can.