Reviews with content warning for Grief - Nettle & Bone

Nettle and Bone shows the dark side of fairytales. It’s very graphic, twisted, shocking, and very real in a magical kind of way.

A while ago I read “The Hallow Places” by T.Kingfisher and fell in love with the way they brought stories to life. Now a bit (…a lot) later I finally return to Kingfisher and was not disappointed.

Like I said, Nettle and Bone is a rather twisted fairytale so let’s start at the beginning.

The opening sentence is probably one of my favorite openers ever. I don’t know what it is about it but I loved it and reread it multiple times, giddy to continue. The entire first scene was brilliant. You’re basically thrown into the story and from then on you learn more and more while following our protagonist, Marra.

Oh, Marra. I enjoyed and hated her. Being naive is a very core trait of her character if intentional or not I cannot tell since she stays that way from page one to the very last word. She was so naive it made me mad but even worse was her judgmental nature. She thinks she has another person figured out so quick and gets disproven in the next sentence almost every single time. And yet she doesn’t learn. She doesn’t grow from these mistakes but she keeps making them; judging by first glance. It was exhausting because as soon as Marra exploded you knew there was an explanation coming.
Marra is supposedly 30 years old but felt more like a young adult than anything else. So do the other characters.

And that brings me to Marra’s companions. I loved the dust-witch and adored Agnes and Finder as much as I adored Bonedog and the demon chicken. Each character was fleshed out as much as a supportive/side character can be in a 300 page long stand-alone. The dust-wife reminded me a lot of Gandalf in the way she never backed out or flinched when someone challenged her. I enjoyed her power a lot. Agnes was lovely and brought a lightness and mother-like feeling which only benefited the story. Then there’s Fenris. I didn’t quite enjoy his character. There is something about the instant fall-in-love that I cannot stand. The constant need to remind us how tall and big and beefy and swooning he is just made me roll my eyes. I’m someone that doesn’t enjoy romance in the main group; it always tends to feel shallow in a way, forced.
Yet this group of found family touched my heart in the end. I was sad to let them go.

Now to the writing. Like I said earlier, Kingfisher already captured my heart in The Hollow Places and did it once again. I was surprised by how well they managed to write such a different story since a lot of authors find their genre and stick with it. Kingfisher doesn’t care. They break out and try something different and I loved it.
They have a brilliant way of spinning words and creating worlds. They write beautifully, with so much heart, but not enough to make your eyes roll into the back of your head. They bring the world and special places like a goblin market to life so easily that it’s burned into your brain.

The topics in this story are dark and so real. Having such issues portrayed and justice served in a way that real life victims should be able experience too is a bittersweet feeling.

If you’re a fan of chill fantasy with a real edge, this is for you.

Kingfisher has found the perfect balance between quest fantasy and daring discussions of real life abuse and other important, horrible issues.

Kingfisher has hooked me and I don’t think I’ll be able to let them go even if they released me themself. I already have What Moves The Dead sitting on my nightstand, waiting to be read.

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purplepenning's review

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adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No

4.5

The trees were full of crows and the woods were full of madmen.

Given that perfect opening line, I wasn't quite prepared for how much chickens would factor into the story — but I'm not mad about it!

Nettle & Bone is a bizarre and brilliant, dark and funny fairytale in the hero's quest tradition. A tradition that it gleefully follows and subverts. It features a simple but stalwart 30-year-old almost-nun/princess, a sharp but secretive dust wife/grave witch, an honorable but disgraced warrior/diplomat, at least one evil but kind fairy godmother, a loving but impulsive dog of bones, and a grumpy demon-possessed chicken. Their quest leads us from a beleaguered middle kingdom by the sea to a haunted stronghold in the north — and through unspeakable lands, markets, and boarding houses in between. Driven, always, by familial love, loyalty, and justice, even in the face of ancient power, its corruption and abuses. Especially in the face of its abuses.

Nothing is fair, except that we try to make it so. That's the point of humans, maybe, to fix things the gods haven't managed.

I sometimes want a little more lushness and emotion in my fairytales, but only sometimes. I also love this matter-of-fact, face-the-fears, roll-with-the-bizarre, do-the-hard things approach. It gives me Granny Weatherwax and Tiffany Aching vibes — and anything approaching the genius of Terry Pratchett's witches is okay by me. Fans of Nicola Griffith's Spear and Emily Lloyd-Jones's The Drowned Woods should also enjoy this one.

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oliverreeds's review

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adventurous dark funny slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes

4.75

Very good; fantastic found family but the family is kind of shitty. i really loved this

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beautifulpaxielreads's review

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adventurous dark funny slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

Nettle & Bone was a curious book in many ways. Despite the fact that I gave it four stars, I'm still not entirely sure how I feel about it. I might edit this review one day when my feelings become clearer (but don't hold your breath on that one).

Let me say one thing - the writing is excellent. It's crisp, sharp and elegant. T. Kingfisher is clearly an old pro at this style, and not a word is wasted. I also really appreciated how Kingfisher takes common fairy tale tropes and uses them in ways that are alternately hilarious and profound. The female characters in this book are all incredibly strong, courageous and intelligent, but each of them expresses these qualities differently.

The issues I had may have had a lot to do with the time I took to finish it, despite its relatively short length. The pace was definitely slower than I would have liked, and there were times when the phrasing was just a little too cryptic and philosophical for my taste - I want to be intrigued, not confused!

Overall, this was a well-written, thought-provoking fantasy, but I wish it could have moved at a slightly faster pace.

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smoakwithwifi's review

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adventurous dark funny mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

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bluejayreads's review against another edition

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4.0

I put this on my TBR list for a reason, I assume. However, by the time I actually got around to reading it, I didn’t remember that reason. And as I tend to do with books that are on my TBR list, I didn’t even bother to read the back cover before I started reading. So I really had no idea what to expect going into it. So I was pleasantly surprised with how enjoyable it happened to be and how much it felt like a genuine fairy tale, albeit a darker one.

The story moves very fast and seems shorter than it is. It goes back and forth between past and present, showing Marra’s quest to kill the abusive prince as well as the backstory – her life as a third-born princess and how she decided killing the prince was the way to go in the first place. It was a little confusing at the beginning as it went back and forth. Both storylines were interesting, but the backstory was told out of order so it wasn’t always clear where events fit in the timeline. Once I got oriented a bit better, I managed to fit the outlines of the story together and enjoyed it a lot.

I was somewhat expecting a YA book (I have a tendency to gravitate towards those in general) and all the accompanying tropes. So I was pleased to find that not only is this not YA, Marra turns all of the protagonist tropes on their head. She’s thirty years old. She hates being a princess not because she wants her freedom or anything, but because it’s a lot of pressure and politics and she’d rather knit and embroider at the convent. She’s incredibly innocent and considers herself a coward, but doesn’t recognize exactly how much she is willing to go through to save her sister. And as a final interesting bit, she’s slightly below average in mental faculties and aware of it, which was interesting and unique and in its own way a bit refreshing. She was a fantastically interesting and unique character, and also quite easy to like, if just slightly too bland to adore.

The rest of Marra’s questing party were quite fun. I loved the grouchy, powerful, knowledgeable old woman, and her relentless matter-of-factness was fantastically entertaining. The former knight who was trapped in fairyland for a while and not sure what to do now was okay, but incredibly bland – notable for being muscular and vaguely kind, but not possessing much in the way of personality. The fairy godmother was a later addition to the party, but she was rentlessly cheery and I enjoyed her quite a bit too. The chicken possessed by a demon and the dog made of bones who hasn’t really figured out he’s dead were both fun (mildly amusing and completely adorable, respectively), but were both more like pets than actual characters, no matter what the back cover said.

The plot moves very fast and the book seems a lot shorter than it is. The three “impossible tasks” are over and done with fairly early. It alternates the quest to collect allies and kill the prince who murdered one sister and is abusing the other with Marra’s upbringing as a third princess and in the convent. Despite the past having significantly less plot than the present, I found it just as interesting. All of the story itself was very good. It’s the details where things start to struggle, and most of them I noticed more in retrospect.

The magic was fairy tale-ish but the system was vague, which was fine for the kind of story this is. I really couldn’t get a sense of the world beyond “generic medieval-ish fantasy,” and even with Marra growing up in a convent I only got the vaguest sense of one minor deity-ish being. It was … fine, but I think there could have been more done with it. Also with the demon-possessed chicken – there’s a lot of potential in that idea that never played out. And there’s an interesting theme about trying to force people to receive your help when they don’t want it. It’s a very worthwhile message and an interesting idea to contemplate, but I don’t think Marra ever actually learned the lesson so I’m not sure it really counts as a theme in the first place.

Despite the shortcomings, I very much enjoyed the book. It struggles in the details, but the problems are easy to overlook while reading. Usually when a book has two storylines, I prefer one over the other, but both the past and present stories in this one were enjoyable, which is unusual and deserves major props. I appreciated a protagonist who isn’t whip-smart and is just honestly trying her best. It was a solid plot, good characters in general, a great protagonist, a mostly happy ending, some fun and interesting ideas, and some good emotions. The details may be lacking in retrospect, but it doesn’t affect the reading experience, and on the whole it’s a very good read.

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bugaboobear's review

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adventurous dark fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

The story was delightful. The characters were interesting and lovable and I'm a little sad to leave them now that I've finished the book.

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saramarinho's review

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adventurous dark funny mysterious sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? N/A
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

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