Reviews

I read RJ Barker's other series, and I am always impressed by how his worlds and characters are distinctly RJ Barker ones without being repetitive. Beautiful and mysterious places with beautiful and mysterious plants and animals.

tdowney's review

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adventurous dark medium-paced

3.5

At its best when in the wyrdwood describing the spooky weird and dangerous environment - I would have liked more of that. The magic/nature of the place was interesting and well done although the animals had more tentacles than I expected for a story with no seas/bodies of water.

Lots of lore dumps (especially early on) and some repetitive story beats makes it feel like the book could have been edited down a bit. I found the backstory segments to be especially repetitive. I also found the politics to be a bit weak. Once it picks up pace it is generally better but it takes a while to get there

laelyn's review against another edition

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3.0

I'm new to RJ Barker's works but I heard good things about it, and I also heard his newest series starter being likened to 'Princess Mononoke' so here I am, happily devouring yet another new series when I already have too many unfinished ones on my shelf. It is what it is, nothing I can do about it, I have never learned and will never learn to say no to a good book.
And that is what 'Gods of the Wyrmwood' turned out to be, fortunately: a really good book. The world Baker explores is an intriguing one, the world building detailed and expansive. I was at times a little lost, admittedly - the lore is often served in huge info dumps, yet also often goes badly or completely unexplained so I wasn't entirely sure how to picture the things and creatures we meet - Segur is a big example of this, the animal friend of our main character that I couldn't for the life of me describe to you or even just picture in my mind. I also felt like there was an overabundance of tentacles on about every single creature. Still, I really enjoyed exploring Crua. I loved the societal structure, the different approach to gender and family.

The characters are complex and well-written, some more than others. We primarily follow Cahan, a clanless loner with a mysterious past, and I absolutely adored him. The writing in this one is generally a little detached, which doesn't make it easy to really connect with the characters, so I wasn't intensely emotionally attached to Cahan - but he's a great, complex, intriguing main character that I want to know more about and hope to follow again. Almost as much as him I loved Udinny, a monks of a forbidden and almost entirely unknown goddess that befriends him along the way. Her story is incredibly interesting. The other characters have interesting aspects to them (Venn, a nonbinary trion with special powers, being chief among them) but are, so far, a little lacking. This might be remedied by the rest of the trilogy though. Cahan definitely outshines them all easily for now. Well, all of them but one: The forest is an entity all on its own, and it's (as is usual for mysterious old woods) the most interesting character in the whole book.

The book is well-written, the pacing is mostly alright. The first about 25% of the book feel too dran out, too slow-paced and read more like exposition following exposition following exposition. Then the speed picks up and the plot really gets going. There are some story beats that feel repetitive, but all in all it's very well-crafted. The book could definitely have been condensed, the exposition could have been woven into the narrative a bit better instead of being served in description-heavy dumps. But the world is intriguing, the main character complex and likeable, the atmosphere and vibes especially in and around the Wyrwood are just perfect. I will definitely read the sequel. 3,5 stars.

Many thanks to Orbit and Netgalley for the arc!