Reviews

A wonderful book for some escapism and adventure. The ending was really beautiful and tied together all the seemingly-random mythology throughout the book.

readacorn's review against another edition

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4.0

Trotz des Verbots ihrer Tante betreten die Geschwister Martha und Samuel den nahe gelegenen Wald. Dort ist nichts so ist, wie es scheint. Hinter jedem Baum lauern tückische Gefahren: Hinterhältige Pixies, die vergiftete Suppen kochen, Furcht einflößende Huldren, die anderen nach dem Leben trachten, Trolle mit zwei Köpfen, Trolle, die sich ein Auge teilen. Sie alle würden ein glückliches Leben führen, wäre da nicht der "Veränderer", der mächtige Herrscher des Waldes, der allen Wesen seinen Willen aufzwingt. Doch er hat die Rechnung ohne Martha und Samuel gemacht.

Muss mir mein Hang zu Kinderbüchern in letzter Zeit zu denken geben? Jedenfalls konnte mich Haig von der ersten Seite an fesseln und mir hat die Lektüre echten Spaß bereitet. Sowohl die Protagonisten als auch die Schattenwald-Figuren, wie der Wahrheits-Pixie sind zauberhaft gezeichnet und werden vom Leser sofort ins Herz geschlossen. Eine schöne Kinder-grusel-geschichte.

storywarden's review against another edition

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4.0

Well, that made my drive times much more enjoyable! A student actually recommended this to me, and I'm glad he did - I wouldn't have tried it otherwise. The narration was spot on, it was quirky and witty, and I found all the characters to be realistic and, in many ways, sympathetic. Even the "bad guy" gave me several moments of "aw, poor guy!"

Anyway - a fun little fantasy tale, never takes itself too seriously, my kind of story.

halcyon_rising's review against another edition

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4.0

I think this marks my eighth book by Matt Haig. That probably means he is in or is nearing the top 3 of my most read authors by now. I’m good with that.

Sam Blink and the Shadow Forest starts like a typical Disney movie does:

Spoiler

you get rid of the parents in a violent way so the children can be manoeuvred around into a plot.

;)

Said plot takes our children, Sam and Martha, from the U.K. to Norway where their Aunt has a few rules for them to follow. One of them? Never go into the forest that's standing right there, staring at you, beckoning you over.

Spoiler

So Martha walks into it, and then a little bit later Sam and the dog Ibsen do as well, and then in goes the Aunt. But they are all lost to each other.

In the forest live dangerous creatures, under the control of our villain-to-defeat, the Changemaker.

Spoiler

(Don’t worry, we’ll get him.)

We are introduced to white horses, witches, Trolls, Truth Pixies, Tomtegubbs, huldres, Slemps, rabbits, etc. While most of these creatures are normally good-natured, their shadows (read: souls) have been stolen by the witch who works for the Changemaker, and that turns them uncaring and evil. They do the bidding of their boss, and his command is that no human that enters the forest will walk out of it alive again.

Spoiler

How will the new family find each other again in this big forest, how will they evade capture and how will they defeat the evil Changemaker that rules the entire forest?

You’re going to have to read this story to find out. :)

I’d definitely recommend this book and the follow-up to this. Happy reading!

joymarieanderson's review against another edition

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4.0

Another delightful story from Matt Haig! What a clever world with lovable characters. I cannot wait for the second in the series.

alicepages's review against another edition

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2.0

The blurb, and the cover, had me believing I was in for a Lemony Snicket inspired adventure full of wit and satire, unfortunately, while the style attempts to mimic the dark, casual format of A Series of Unfortunate Events, it just isn’t able to commit. The author blinks in and out of addressing the audience with chatty writing, dipping frequently into traditional third-person story-telling, creating a confusion of styles that don’t sit well together. Just when one is starting to flow, the other will usurp it, and so-on and so-forth throughout the novel. There are two ‘note-from-the-author’ chapters displaced here and there, which are funny, but appear as a hurried after-thought – something to give a chatty vibe, which just isn’t there. Add to this, needless pages of script-style writing, and the mix is pretty heavy going.

Over-all the writing is juvenile; Haig info-dumps character descriptions (and repeats those descriptions several times in the space of a few paragraphs), and the dialogue is clumsy and unrealistic. He also breaks the show-not-tell rule throughout. The first chapter is both clever and surprising, but after the initial hook, I found myself struggling to carry on. The plot is a good adventure, once you get about a third of the way in, journeying the enchanted landscape of a magic forest, and is unique in its use of Norwegian folklore. For children this would be a pretty fun and engaging story, but it’s placement in the teen/YA shelves is a little baffling. The jokes are cliché and childish, the characters overstated and shallow. While I did enjoy some of the quirky adults, such as a Norwegian cheese-shop owner, and a two-headed troll, I couldn’t relate to either of the child protagonists.

It’s a fun read, with good-hearted adventure, and a cushy moral undertone. It’s a story to read to young-children before bed.

seasarahread's review against another edition

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3.0

Creative but I really only stuck with it because I love Matt Haig and plan to read all his books. A decent kids book just not one I loved.

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