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4.01 AVERAGE
4.01 AVERAGE
adventurous
challenging
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Content Warnings
Moderate: Animal death, Body horror, Child death, Confinement, Torture, Transphobia, Violence, Outing, Dysphoria, Injury/Injury detail
adventurous
dark
inspiring
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Much darker and more dire than I expected. Not some happy youthful journey of self exploration with a touch of magic. Full of violence, gore, death, cruelty, loss, lies, politics, and horror. Needs an enormous content warning for intentional misgendering and blatant transphobia. Overall a really creative fantasy story that's paced pretty well, but this isn't the celebration of trans inclusion that I was hoping for.
adventurous
relaxing
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Loveable characters:
Complicated
As I understand it, this is Magpie (as I was originally introduced to her)'s first full-length novel. I have read and enjoyed a number of her previous works, and this is a really excellent work of anarchist fantasy fiction.
Well-plotted, well-paced, and a pleasure to read—and the first really interesting, original "fantasy" setting I've seen in a long time. It takes a lot of known tropes that would be otherwise be potentially boring or overdone (knights, witches, etc) and reinvents each in some way. Furthermore, although the anarchist themes are clear (the witches tend to be anarchists in one sense or another, the knights tend to be, you know, knights), they're not simplified. Not all witches are good, not all knights are bad, and no one way of thinking is "correct" (outside, perhaps, of simply not oppressing others).
The Sapling Cage has a simple core hook—the protagonist wants to be a witch, but only girls can be witches—and drives a strong narrative about a young person discovering/inventing herself. If I'm not mistaken, it's the first in an intended trilogy ("Daughters of the Empty Throne") and I look forward to continuing the story, though this book definitely stands on its own.
Edit: oh, and by the way, the cover art is really outstanding!
Well-plotted, well-paced, and a pleasure to read—and the first really interesting, original "fantasy" setting I've seen in a long time. It takes a lot of known tropes that would be otherwise be potentially boring or overdone (knights, witches, etc) and reinvents each in some way. Furthermore, although the anarchist themes are clear (the witches tend to be anarchists in one sense or another, the knights tend to be, you know, knights), they're not simplified. Not all witches are good, not all knights are bad, and no one way of thinking is "correct" (outside, perhaps, of simply not oppressing others).
The Sapling Cage has a simple core hook—the protagonist wants to be a witch, but only girls can be witches—and drives a strong narrative about a young person discovering/inventing herself. If I'm not mistaken, it's the first in an intended trilogy ("Daughters of the Empty Throne") and I look forward to continuing the story, though this book definitely stands on its own.
Edit: oh, and by the way, the cover art is really outstanding!
adventurous
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
I enjoyed this until right at the end which unfortunately felt so anticlimactic and flat for me and it lost all the books’s earlier potential
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Another disappointing read. Too much happens while not enough happens at the same time. I know that makes literally no sense but hear me out. The first like half of this book is Witches on a Hike. We don't spend enough time with any of the characters to really develop an emotional attachment. Our characters are just walking through the woods for chapter after chapter. There are brief mentions of other characters which are so fleeting and inconsequential it becomes incredibly hard to parse who is who, especially with all the fantastical names. On a similar note, the character growth felt forced and rushed. Most of the plot actually happens at the end of the book. I love me a slow burn, but how can I be invested when pretty much nothing of note happens for the majority of the beginning of this novel. It could've been a good time to make each character well established so their payoffs and arcs felt really resolute in the end, but most of the beginning chapters we're stuck inside Lorel's head where no one likes her and she thinks the trees are pretty and she wishes the witches would teach her magic. It's exhausting at a point. Mainly it seems like a pacing issue, where not enough emphasis is put on the important moments.
This culminates to create the ending where it feels rushed at a breakneck speed. A complete 180 from where we started at the novel. This novel neither built up it's plot slowly bit by bit until the satisfying climax, nor did it have engaging action at every turn to keep the reader turning the page. It starts slowly and then random shifts gears and speeds through the entire rest of the conflict. It's like the author had reached the word count and then realized they still hadn't gotten to where the first novel needed to be and just slammed the rest of it in the last five chapters.
I hate to be harsh, but I had such high hopes for this book. Based on the synopsis and cover I thought that this would be a perfect fit for me. All the ingredients were there, there was potential for this to be one of my faves, but it just didn't land.
This culminates to create the ending where it feels rushed at a breakneck speed. A complete 180 from where we started at the novel. This novel neither built up it's plot slowly bit by bit until the satisfying climax, nor did it have engaging action at every turn to keep the reader turning the page. It starts slowly and then random shifts gears and speeds through the entire rest of the conflict. It's like the author had reached the word count and then realized they still hadn't gotten to where the first novel needed to be and just slammed the rest of it in the last five chapters.
I hate to be harsh, but I had such high hopes for this book. Based on the synopsis and cover I thought that this would be a perfect fit for me. All the ingredients were there, there was potential for this to be one of my faves, but it just didn't land.