Reviews with content warning for Death - Uprooted

Reviews tagging 'Death'

Uprooted by Naomi Novik

124 reviews

asahome's review against another edition

4.25

A woman befriends the woman who will be taken by the wizard, only he takes her instead. She's mad at him for taking her and also mad at him for not taking the other girl.

I like how they handled the

conflict resolution

at the end. It was a very realistic approach to what happens in my opinion

after war if you want their to be peace and not just a pause in the physical conflict

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erinmichele_reads's review against another edition

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adventurous

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes

5.0

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katiecoconut21's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.25

Uprooted by Naomi Novik is a beautiful re-telling of a Polish fairytale. Anyone who says it's a retelling of Beauty and the Beast is lying to you; the only similarities are very shaky at best.

I enjoyed it perhaps moreso as a retelling than some other books, and my only critiques are nit-picky, but ultimately, ended up taking away some of the magic of the story for me.

The lack of magic-system development particularly bothered me. For some reason, Agnieszka

is better at Baba Jaga's magic than the magic practiced by the Dragon, Sarkan

. That's exactly it though...for some reason. Emphasis is not really placed on why this is the case, and I feel like it is largely due to a magic-system that wasn't fully thought through. In most cases, it just felt like a reason for why Agnieszka is different.

Going on that vein, the

budding romance between Agnieszka and Sarkan

felt out-of-the-blue for me. Just because there's forced proximity doesn't mean love will follow.fairytale. I honestly felt more chemistry between Agnieszka and Kasia than I did otherwise (though Kasia was easily my favorite character).

The pacing was a bit off. The ending felt rushed for me, especially because Agnieszka's time

at court

felt so slow, and we weren't even introduced to

the Wood-Queen

until the book was almost over, making me feel like I was going to have to read a sequel, despite explicitly seeking out a standalone novel.

Having said all that, Uprooted is still a very enjoyable novel overall, especially for those who enjoy re-tellings from less famous fairytales.

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ohno_joreads's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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kefredriksen's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional fast-paced

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

5.0

I adore this book so much. I really liked the mature fairy tale vibes it gives. I found the characters to be well developed, interesting, and lovable, though, I would classify this as a plot-driven story mainly. The writing style is stellar. It uniquely balances the line between easy-to-read and what I consider more 'classic' fantasy prose. I got super sucked in. Loved the world building, loved the dynamics between the characters, and loved the ending!

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callitz's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful medium-paced

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

5.0

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sehenry20's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional hopeful tense medium-paced

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

4.75

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camiclarkbooks's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.5

It reminded me of an adult version of Hannah Whitten’s “For the Wolf,” but I did find that book more enjoyable.

It’s clear Nokik is a talented writer, her descriptions are lovely and evocative. However, I was uncomfortable with the attempted sexual assault near the beginning of the book and couldn’t really move past that since it was unnecessary to the plot.

Her characters were well written but were boring and took their sweet time to do anything.

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silversparkles50's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.0

This was hard to get through for me. I didn't like the fact the main character was instantly the best at magic, I hated the verbally abusive love interest, there was a sex scene that came out of nowhere that seemed out of place, the story was too complicated. I liked the premise and some of the writing, but it was way too long.

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freyagame's review against another edition

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medium-paced

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

2.5

I read this when I was 15 and thought it was aggressively mid, came back to it and am a little horrified that my opinion hasn't changed.

Overall nice world building and scenery but never really decides if it wants to be high fantasy and I think it really suffers as a result. It is clear that Novik is a very talented writer, the prose is really great but is let down by plot structure IMO. Not helped by the MC being incredibly annoying in the first half of the book with some weird development leading into conclusion.

We are never told why she is able to do magic that no other wizard can, there is seemingly no reason.

Most of the plot is driven by what's happening with her best friend who we are told is very amazing but who is actually very boring and sleeps mostly until she needs to swing a sword around. Their relationship is really bizarre: a few moments early on that lead to some great conflict but these threads are all dropped.

However, the final chapter was incredibly sweet and did bring it back a lot for me, I'm a sucker for a village boogie.

Romance and magic system a bit nonsensical and underdeveloped (interesting age gap!) I really do think you could squeeze the entire romance plot into the content of about 5 pages, it never really goes anywhere: he's written entirely out of the second act and receives next to no development as a result. A travesty honestly. Also an instance of sexual assault that is kind of brushed under the rug once the plot get rolling, dissapointing. Random very slow 100 pages or so in the middle that get very political, a bit of a standstill that doesn't gel fabulously with the first section of the book. Generally good vibes if you don't think too hard about anything and just roll with it. If looking for fun fairytale is a great pick but a bit of a shallow fantasy otherwise ://

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