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witcheep's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
This book is a dark adventure of folktale-inspired worldbuilding that relies heavily on body horror laced into the magic system and cruel characters ruling over others. The body horror and brutality made me wince, the extent of them were too much for me. However, the book is also a tale of fragile hope building between Évike and Gáspár, the main characters with two very different world views learning to understand and support each other. Their deepening relationship and shifting worldviews were what kept me reading the book further.
"What would you have me do?" he asks. "You have already ruined me."
The worldbuilding showcases a colonizing worldview where the ruling religious group deems other religions, cultures, and ethnicities inferior and something that should be purged. The oppressor-religious group is content on using the other groups to their own benefit, though. They take the others' magic, lives, and even their folklore, but bend it so that it fits their own religious world view. This changing of stories takes the voice away from the original people, hiding them.
You can't hoard stories the way you hoard gold, despite what Virág would say. There's nothing to stop anyone from taking the bits they like, and changing or erasing the rest, [--]
The ruling people of the world do this even to their own kings: their legacy is carved in stone only after their death, when he kings themself won't be able to have a say in it anymore, so the living may decide what kind of kingdom they have left behind. Words have power, and the rulers are very strict with who gets a say in anything important. Hence, the cruelty of rendering other people voiceless extends to every level of the society, making power a fleeting thing instead of a lasting impression.
Reid brings up the topic of picking parts of someone else's folklore and rebuilding it to fit one's own needs multiple times. She seems to have a message that this kind of cultural appropriation is bad, but cannot be stopped. She flashes different possibilities of the groups either being forcefully assimilated into the ruling religious ways, staying separate and against each other, or finding a way to mix and coexist.
Maybe by doing so Reid wants to justify her own usage of source material and research for this book: Reid herself has clearly used this strategy of reusing stories while writing this book. She has combed through different mythologies, religious and cultural lore and histories, and uses them quite loosely as her material, combining them into her fantasy world and disregarding some parts or facts altogether. Reid uses at least jewish lore, Eastern European mythology, history and names, and Finnish national epic Kalevala. I was first intriqued by this, but the execution left me wanting a retelling more true to the elements of the original tales or an altogether more original lore to this fantasy world.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror
Moderate: Religious bigotry, Death, Cultural appropriation, Torture, Xenophobia, and Bullying
Minor: Fire/Fire injury
kellimalea's review
adventurous
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
I think this is a great fantasy novel for someone who is interested in an adventurous story, but doesn't want to commit to a big series. I definitely think the story could have been fleshed out into multiple books, but it doesn't suffer from lack of content. The development of relationships between people would probably make more sense if it had been stretched out over multiple books, but I think it all still works well. I love that this story draws from Hungarian and Jewish folklore/history, as these aren't common sources for most American literature. I thought the world building was phenomenal. I would recommend this book, with the caveat that it is a dark and heavy read, so may not be everybody's cup of tea.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Blood, Torture, Violence, and Gore
Minor: Colonisation, Animal death, Xenophobia, Cultural appropriation, Antisemitism, Genocide, Racism, Classism, Death, and Sexual assault
k_galloway's review
dark
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.25
a promising start that fizzled out about a quarter of the way through. beautiful visual writing, almost poetic at times, that’s foiled by a scatterbrained storyline, horrendous pacing, and a string of plot devices in place of an actual plot. the love story exists in a repetitive, long-winded loop of conversation that feels more taxing than enjoyable to read. this could have been about 200 pages shorter and it wouldn’t have made a difference to the story.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Xenophobia, Violence, Religious bigotry, Antisemitism, Cultural appropriation, Gore, Racism, Animal cruelty, and Animal death
howl's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
medium-paced
- Strong character development? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
3.5
i was disappointed to discover that this book is young adult in wolf’s clothing: a supposed adult fantasy novel that reads like innumerable young adult science fiction/fantasy novels i’ve encountered before, with heavy-handed first-person narration, an isolated heroine besieged by mean girls (even though they’re all supposed to be 25), and a scary magic man (who turns out to be a prince, of course) with whom she goes on an adventure while they grudgingly fall in love. once i got over my initial irritation i did start to enjoy it quite a bit, enough that i actually looked forward to reading more. the combination of first-person and present tense was still rough, and this book contains an astonishing number of similes (a near-constant distraction), but overall i enjoyed the dangerous traipse through the countryside and the snare of politics at the capital. i also didn’t really mind the romance, formulaic as it was; unrealistic romance can be fun to read, and i can definitely see why certain tropes therein are so popular. i’m often put off by m/f enemies-to-lovers if the man is too much of an asshole, but i didn’t think this was too bad compared to some other examples i’ve encountered. ultimately, however, i thought the best part of the novel may have been the heroine’s reconnection with her jewish heritage; it was so lovingly described and it imparted the most positive emotion i felt while reading. other aspects i found effective were some of the more gruesome surprises this book had in store (perhaps the only way it really asserted itself as adult besides the characters’ ages) and the integration of folktales that prefigured certain events. the latter reminded me of the bear and the nightingale, a comparison made by the publisher which otherwise fell a little short for me, besides the mystical eastern european setting and the fact that there is one character who seemed to have been very heavily inspired by bear’s konstantin: nandor, a blue-eyed, stunningly beautiful, and charismatic zealot buoyed by a larger supernatural power. overall it was a decent reading experience despite the flaws in the writing.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Antisemitism, Blood, Body horror, Child abuse, Cultural appropriation, Death of parent, Genocide, Physical abuse, Racism, Religious bigotry, Self harm, Violence, and Xenophobia
Moderate: Sexual content
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