Reviews - Hild | The StoryGraph

1.01k reviews for:

Hild

Nicola Griffith

3.92 AVERAGE

madzie's review against another edition

3.75

challenging emotional tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Griffith is clearly a very talented writer who has a great way with words. I would give this book a much higher rating if I weren't so creeped out by the incest. I'm still not sure why that had to be in there.

skaeya_winch's review against another edition

DNF

dendriterevolt's review against another edition

challenging emotional reflective tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Loveable characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I have no idea what to rate this. I think I’ll wait for the sequel to finalise my thoughts.

tmawhir's review against another edition

3.25

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: No

mamaloewl's review against another edition

DID NOT FINISH: 9%

There are so many middle English words I don’t know that it became too tedious to enjoy. Maybe another time. On vacation. Or snow days.

daniela1207's review against another edition

3.0

Despite constantly feeling like i needed someone to explain like i was 5, this book was charming. the prose was poetic and lush— sometimes bordering on too much for my taste, though. the thing i liked most about it was getting to see the day to day lives of women in this time period, and getting to see the main character come of age in this environment as well. i could tell it was well researched and period accurate which was very immersive.

ctdewalt84's review against another edition

4.0

This book is a little slow-going at the beginning, but it definitely rewards your patience. The reason it was a bit of a slog for me initially was primarily because of the archaic character and place names. In fact, sometimes I was unsure whether a name was for a character or a place, so there was quite a bit of stopping and sorting it out. It also didn't help that many of the character names were similar, as well. I should have known what I was in for when I saw a glossary AND a pronunciation guide in the back of the book. I admit that I got hopelessly lost in the politics and intrigue of the book. Perhaps a better knowledge of early, early British history would have helped. To me, that era is a jumble of Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Picts, and Celts all wandering the isles and wrestling over territory. That being said, however, Hild is filled with compelling characters, not the least of which is Hild herself. The reason I was willing to slog through, and in some cases ignore, the confusing bits is because from the get-go I cared about the characters. There are some women-to-be-reckoned-with in this book, who use every power at their disposal to gain a little control over their lives in this often harsh and lethal world of men. Yes, Griffith has done her homework on this one, but I didn't mind getting a bit of an education from her through her very detailed rendition of life back before Great Britain was Great Britain. As is usual for Griffith, there are some truly lyrical parts of this book, particularly in the sections where Hild connects to and grounds herself in the natural world.