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tobereadbookshelf 's review for:
Weyward
by Emilia Hart
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I feel a rant coming on, I’ll try to keep it brief. The “feminist” message this book was strongly pushing was that men are evil or at best, indifferent observers to the evils of other men. Cancel me if you want, but I’ve gotta say - I am not here for it. The traumas depicted in this book may be fictional, but they are very near to reality for many women. I firmly believe that those stories should be told and that we should shine light on the evils of this world, but I am against making blanket statements or writing off an entire group of people for any reason.
“Perhaps I will leave them to my daughter. I like the thought of that: a long line of Weyward women, stretching after me. For the first child born to a Weyward is always female, my mother told me. That is why she only had me, just as her mother only had her. There are enough men in the world already, she used to say.” -Alma
Men are first boys. Could they not instead choose to raise the men they wanted to see in the world? To teach them to see things more clearly? To share what they knew of nature and to nurture a love for it in their boys as well? The saving grace of this book in my opinion was that Alma’s sister broke this cycle and had a second child - a boy. He was a breath of fresh air after reading so many pages that sought to vilify the male gender. He was human and therefore imperfect, but no one could deny that he loved his sister. How could anyone argue that their relationship did not enrich her life and her world?
Also, they were in fact witches, were they not? And they did in fact murder people using the connections they had with nature. I think the argument the author is leaning on is that “witch”is a label created by men. I was perplexed then that the author did not include some small magics throughout the story to support their magic being “good” or at least not innately evil. The way the story was laid out, it almost supported a need to fear them in my opinion. If you are picking this up in search of magic, look elsewhere. Frankly, there is hardly any magic to speak of in this book and what is included is less than impressive.
Sigh… maybe I rated this too high. I’m really struggling to understand the hype for this one.
“Perhaps I will leave them to my daughter. I like the thought of that: a long line of Weyward women, stretching after me. For the first child born to a Weyward is always female, my mother told me. That is why she only had me, just as her mother only had her. There are enough men in the world already, she used to say.” -Alma
Men are first boys. Could they not instead choose to raise the men they wanted to see in the world? To teach them to see things more clearly? To share what they knew of nature and to nurture a love for it in their boys as well? The saving grace of this book in my opinion was that Alma’s sister broke this cycle and had a second child - a boy. He was a breath of fresh air after reading so many pages that sought to vilify the male gender. He was human and therefore imperfect, but no one could deny that he loved his sister. How could anyone argue that their relationship did not enrich her life and her world?
Also, they were in fact witches, were they not? And they did in fact murder people using the connections they had with nature. I think the argument the author is leaning on is that “witch”is a label created by men. I was perplexed then that the author did not include some small magics throughout the story to support their magic being “good” or at least not innately evil. The way the story was laid out, it almost supported a need to fear them in my opinion. If you are picking this up in search of magic, look elsewhere. Frankly, there is hardly any magic to speak of in this book and what is included is less than impressive.
Sigh… maybe I rated this too high. I’m really struggling to understand the hype for this one.