Reviews tagging 'Sexism'

Drowned Country is a sequel to the fantasy novella Silver in the Wood. As such, this review will include major spoilers for that book, so don't read this is you don't want to be spoiled for the first one.

What Worked For Me

Revisiting this World: I tore through Silver in the Wood, and picked the sequel up literally the next day, so. Suffice it to say I thoroughly enjoyed the first one and wanted the experience of being in this world and these characters to keep going. There's nothing necessarily groundbreaking about how Tesh writes about The Wood, and the prose isn't more descriptive or purplish than the average book. But the world of the Wood is just... cozy and creepy and dreamy and eternal, and has such a place-sense. My only complaint is how much time in this short secondary novella we spent away from the Wood.

The Angst: Make no mistake this is an a n g s t y book. Potentially disappointing to some readers, the story begins after Silver and Tobias have had a falling out and effectively broken up. Silver is still stuck in the forest, sulking as his mother would say, and doesn't seem to be able to keep himself whole the way that Tobias was. As such, while Silver's POV is dry and witty and very much still human, there's an underlying sense of impending eternity which underlines Drowned Country, making it feel at times heavy and sad. But, I love angst and sadness, and this was done in the exact perfect way for me for most of the book. And I really enjoyed the contrast in perspective and tone between this book and the last, and between how Tobias dealt with his situation vs how Silver is now.

What I'm on the Fence About

Silver's Voice: In contrast to Tobias, Silver is quick-witted, sarcastic, and very much feels like a person tied to person things. There are times that he gets lost in the Wood, but most of the time it feels more like reading a character in a Victorian-era novel who isn't in the very unique position he's now in. Sometimes this worked well, and sometimes it felt incongruous.

What Wasn't My Thing

The End: The ending certainly isn't bad, and it is earned. Just for my taste, it seemed to wrap things up in a different direction than I personally would have gone in keeping with the concept of the Wood and its centrality to the duology. But I suspect I'm probably in the minority about this.

Who This Is For

As mentioned, Drowned Country is hugely spoilery for Silver in the Wood, and both books are very short. It's really a necessity to read Silver in the Wood first. In terms of people who've already read Silver in the Wood, I think it's best to read this if you have lingering questions about what might happen to these characters in the end, if you can handle a lot of angst and the characters being emotionally isolated for most of the book, or if you just really really loved Silver in the Wood and want more of that universe. Drowned Country is only a tiny bit longer than the first one, so it's really not that much of an investment if you're curious.

Content Warnings

I read this so quickly that it's hard to remember, but I feel confident there's gore and monstery stuff, and probably some aspects that are body horror or adjacent. The relationship between Silver and Tobias is still an age gap in the fantastical sense, despite their shift in circumstances, and I'd note that Silver does feel young reading from his perspective, while Tobias still reads as vaguely middle-aged to me. (I think the book says they're like mid-20s and mid-30s respectively? I don't entirely remember).

Content Warnings