Reviews with content warning for War - Das dunkle Herz des Waldes

I thoroughly enjoyed the two books by Naomi Novik that I’ve read previously (Spinning Silver and A Deadly Education), and like I do every time I encounter two books by the same author that I love, I immediately set out to read all of that author’s other works to see if any of them are less good.

So far, no. Uprooted is just as good as the others.

Admittedly, it started out a little rough. The entire back cover is more setup than actual plot, and it’s skimmed over, mostly as exposition, in chapter one. But I kept going, because I wanted it to be good and because I remembered Spinning Silver was heavy on the exposition in the beginning and then it turned out fantastic.

The same thing happened here. What started as a very simple story – the wizard-lord of the valley takes a girl every ten years and the protagonist is taken – gradually unfolds like a blooming rose, revealing deeper and deeper levels of complexity and magic. The corruption in the Wood is sentient, plotting. It wants to take the valley and move on to take the world. The Dragon stands against its power, holding it back with fire and magic.

And then comes Agnieszka, brave and stubborn and full of deep caring for her people and rooted deep to the land the Wood wants to claim. She has to do two things the Dragon considered impossible before he would take her seriously, but she doesn’t give up and she is amazing. Agnieszka grows, the Dragon softens, and the characters are inseparable from the story and the land.

Since what’s on the back cover is so little of the story, I feel like I can’t say too much without spoilers. Which really sucks, because there is so much to the plot (the audiobook was 18 hours) that I would love to talk about. This book doesn’t follow standard story structures, which makes it feel more real – I can’t map it onto any fiction-writing templates, it ebbs and flows like real life. There were no less than three places that I thought must have been the climax and then saw there were several more hours of story to go. And I absolutely adore that in the end, even the antagonist was worthy of compassion and violence wasn’t the answer. (I don’t feel like that’s a spoiler since you won’t even know what antagonist I’m talking about until the last hour and a half of the book.)

I don’t often have the patience for audiobooks longer than 10 hours or so, but Uprooted deserved 18 hours of my attention and I would have happily given it more. Like the other two of Naomi’s books I’ve read, its delicious complexity slowly unfolds into something dark and rich and beautiful. I can’t put into words my adoration of this book but trust me: Read it.

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jenny_librarian's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious medium-paced

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

3.0

Interesting world, boring-as-hell characters.

I had zero emotional attachment for the characters in this book. At most, I can say that Agnieska and Kasia's relationship had some potential, but the way it's tackled, Kasia's just a pawn to further Agnieska's development. As for the "love interest", well Sarkan has all the red flags of a horrible partner (calls her an idiot constantly, doesn't display any kind of warmth towards her except when they're sleeping together, etc.) without any chemistry with Agnieska whatsoever. I might call them f**k buddies at best, but there's no love there -- or a very unhealthy kind.

The Wood itself was a great concept and pretty much the only reason I kept reading, until the end when I got so bored I skimmed the last 50-or-so pages. Take all the sexism, patriarchy and shitty relationships and there might have been something worth 435 pages. As it stands, it was just okay.

Seriously, though, what is it with fantasy writers who can't ever let go of patriarchy and sexism? You create a whole-ass world with magic, but you can't be bothered to stop objectifying women and seeing them as currency? There was no need for the near-rape scene and the passive misogyny in every single chapter.

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