Reviews with content warning for Violence - A Flame in the North

Reviews tagging 'Violence'

A Flame in the North by Lilith Saintcrow

3 reviews

vigil's review

adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

I think the writing style and limited autonomy of the protagonist (due to her status as glorified hostage, misogyny, and the reality as

human mortal among inhumans or other immortals)

but i found it to be a very intelligent portrayal. often times author's can fall into the trap of making a woman to anachronistically modern, or a helpless waif who has never thought to move against a man or the patriarchy in her life. solveig reads honestly as a woman who works to have her voice and feelings heard, but believably still of her time.

i really do love a travel fantasy story so this book really just hit all the marks for me. I do think there is a small issue of repetitiveness in sol's inner monologue, but i'm not going to detract that from the star rating. mostly because i fully believe it's getting a worse rep than it deserves. don't let the archaic prose style intimidate you, this book is excellent and rather readable once you grow use to the style.

very interested in what comes next for this series. i definitely recommend it for those who enjoy both folklore / mythology inspired fantasy (bear and the nightingale, spinning silver, and possibly circe come to mind) and who enjoy poetic complex prose.

also, sol and arn have a vibe right??? i’m not crazy am i?? but also sol x eol and sol x aeredh have hints through the book… i’m happy with anything so long as arn and sol aren’t pushed aside, romance or not.

Content Warnings

sarrie's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous challenging dark mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

TL;DR - I LOVED this. It is difficult to read, but I think it’s 100% worth it. Lord of the Rings, with a Viking flavor, and a female Gandalf as the lead is my best comp for this. Love, love, love it.

A Flame in the North tells the story of Solveig who, after her brother kills a man, is traded to another clan for a year and a day. This clan of takes her North, to where she believes is their home, but it is instead the beginning of an epic journey. She and her sworn Shieldmaiden face threats straight from the old ballads as they travel, finding themselves nearly lost in the cold north.

This is a journey book, in the purest most basic form. So if you don’t enjoy journey’s definitely pass this one up. It’s also dense and difficult to read. Lilith Saintcrow takes a very classic style with her writing. It’s meaty and she introduces and uses quite a few new world specific words and terms, and more archaic language and sentence structure at times.

Is all that worth moving through to get to the end? Yes, hard yes. I adored this. It took me so long to read and when I did I almost pre-ordered the audio AND the physical. I wanted the book for my shelf and I wanted to hear it again in my ears. This is a journey of cold you can feel, political maneuvering that will leave you furious and intrigued, and a few moments of heartbreak.

6 out of 5 little squat man rune statues. This is going to be a best book of the year. Pick this up if you are interested.

Content Warnings

maregred's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark mysterious slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.0

While the synopsis checks all of my interest boxes, I unfortunately couldn’t get into this book. The pacing was uneven and the text was dense. There was no real urgency to the story, even during the battle scenes or when the main character, Solveig, discovered something important.

Though written in the style of older epic fantasies, the inner dialogue was meandering and repetitive. There was too much telling instead of showing.

For example, in the middle of a battle, Sol would go on a tangent about songs. Or when relaying an important conversation, Sol would then tangentially think about different types of drinks. There was also the mystery of how her trunk traveled, and readers are constantly reminded how curious she is.

I did like the Lord of the Rings and Norse mythology influences. I also liked a lot of the characters, especially Aeredh and Arneior. The magic system is interesting but the reader is left just as clueless as Solveig.

While I’m not sure if I’ll continue the series, this made a for a good winter read.

I received this copy from Orbit Books and NetGalley for an honest review.

Content Warnings

More...