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A review by ellelainey
Greenwode by J. Tullos Hennig
3.0
Book 1: Greenwode
POV: 3rd person, multi-character
Pages: 370
Star rating: ★★★☆☆ (3.5)
This was a difficult one, because there were times when I was kind of bored reading it, wondering when it would end, and there were times that I was completely intrigued by the story, needing to know what happened next.
The story is a take on Robin Hood, which is fine, but I don't really know much beyond the movies, so I can't comment on whether it's sticking true to the legends or history. But, if you take it on the basis of “rob from the right to feed the poor” then this story has twisted that to become “take from the Christians to better the Pagans”. But, more on that later.
Strangely, the story is told like a play, with a Prelude and Entr-acte's. And, to be honest, most of the Entr-acte's were completely unnecessary in the format they were in. They're classed as, literally, “between the acts”, but most of the time they showed things that were relevant to the overall story, so I don't understand why they were separated the way they were.
The multi-POV meant that we got to see everything that was happening, but I'm not entirely sure that some of the POV's were needed. Marion continually gave us her POV, to show how Rob and Gamelyn's moods appeared to someone on the outside, who didn't know what was going on between them, but we really didn't need to see that to get the point. Similarly, most of the time Marion was with one or the other and didn't need her own POV, nor did her mother. I get that we needed Adam's POV, to see what happened with George, and the Abbess showed us her plans for Gamelyn clear enough. But there were plenty of times I read a POV and just wondered why it was needed, because it didn't add anything to the story or our understanding of it.
To make things even more confusing, the story was told in the usual past tense, but slipped into present tense during so-called “dreams”, memories and hallucinations. The first time it happened, the change was clearly marked in italics, but the second wasn't and the third...well, I have no idea what happened to the third, because it slipped in and out of italics like nothing on earth. It really jarred the reading to slip into a different tense, for no obvious reason, when the past would have worked just fine. But the fact that they were so haphazardly arranged made it difficult to know when they'd pop up and when I'd have to switch my thinking from one tense to another.
The speech, I'll admit, reminds me more of old-fashioned Glaswegian than anything close to English or Welsh, but I got the feeling that it would be hard for people to read and understand if they weren't familiar with any of the British dialects that still sound this way, which could hamper their enjoyment of the story.
For me, I think the real problem was that there was a mixture of lack of information (timeline/ages) and an overabundance of information (the religions), while the story continually repeated the same “scenes” over and over again, just with new words (sometimes) and the same results.
I found the first 10% to be a little haphazard. A lot was going on, there was no clear timeline and there were quite a few “filler” scenes that weren't necessary, such as Gamelyn learning to use a bow, missing Rob on his visits and such. I understand the point of these scenes was to show us the growing affection between Gamelyn and Rob that even they were unaware of, but it was actually done a lot better later in the story, before the feelings grew complicated, but during scenes that actually had a lot more bearing on the overall story arc. This was another problem of repeated scenes – Gamelyn being disappointed to find that Rob wasn't there, hinting at feelings – where only one of the few had an actual impact and was necessary to the story.
The story began by digging right into the action, with Rob discovering Gamelyn, but then stagnated for about 10-15% until Rob was blooded. After that Prelude, things didn't go much of anywhere for a while and then, after Rob was blooded, there was a whole lot of dancing about and doing nothing until he and Gamelyn finally realised how they felt about each other.
I also have to admit that while I found Rob completely enchanting and Gamelyn intriguing, they acted like teenagers hopped up on their hormones half the time. Their chemistry together was kind of beautiful at times and exhausting at others. There were times when I cried over them – after the Green and after the nightmares – but there were equally enough times when I just wanted them to get it over with already, confess their love and runaway together, because it was taking such. a. long. time.
Because the timeline doesn't tell us how old they are, ever! it made it hard to judge whether they really were teenagers or not. There's the hinted implication that they were ten years old when they first met – but it doesn't show up until nearly 70% of the book, so we spend all that time not knowing how old they are. By physically going back to check the years between their first meeting and the “several years ago” jump into the future, it seems to have been ten years that passed, but since all we knew was that Rob hadn't reached 15 yet, in the Prelude, he could have been 20 or 24 or anything in between. He could even have been 18 or 19 by the time Chapter 1 came about. To be honest, I just don't get why it wasn't hinted at or downright spelled out in the story; it wouldn't take much effort to slip in, “you're five years from being fifteen” or “he was twenty now”. It just would have cleared up so much.
As characters, I loved Rob. He was very much the “Robin Hood” cheeky chap, with a dark task to undertake and a lot of responsibility on his shoulders. I equally loved Gamelyn's daring and his banter with Rob, the way he was so completely oblivious to their chemistry with each other, until jealousy shoved it in his face. However, what I didn't love was the constant, repetitive “my God versus your God” arguments and Gemelyn rushing into Rob's arms right before/after calling it a sin.
I didn't see the point of Marion at all. She added nothing to the story that was worth anything – she was an alternative love interest, when Gamelyn's family questioned his visits to their croft; she was supposedly Rob's anchor and as equally gifted, yet did absolutely nothing with those gifts of worth; she fought the “independent woman” battle with her father, which came completely out of the left field and had no effect on the story. The only useful thing Marion ever did was act as a buffer between Rob and Gamelyn, spending time with Gamelyn when they were younger and teaching him how to use a bow and arrow, while Rob was off becoming the Hooded One. The more of the story I read, the more Marion became “surplus”, because even when her tynged spoke directly to her and warned her to go to Rob, urgently, to save lives, she dilly dallied for days, allowing the end of the book to happen when it should have been prevented. So just what was the point of that warning or Marion, in the end? It's not even as if she “tried” and failed to see it through; she was too chicken to do it, then when circumstances fell so that she ended up going anyway, she told NO ONE about the imminent danger or what had to be done. Marion kept quiet for far too long and, in the end, became just as much an impetus for what happened at the end of the story as the Abbess. Only, she actually drove the story forward.
There was a heavy theme of Paganism vs Christianity in the book that was – as an atheist, I felt – unfairly slanted towards paganism. There was only one instance of the Pagan belief being “bad” or “evil” through physical actions, but even that was justified away, as though that made it okay. The entire time that Christianity was shown on page, it was either because of Gamelyn floundering over whether to hold to his beliefs or not or because Christians were evil and hunted the Pagans, to murder them all. I get that it's a very real part of history that can't be overlooked, especially in the context of the story, but there was never once where Christianity was shown in the same favourable light as Paganism and it was noticable.
For me, the blurb gave too much away and told us things that never actually happened. This part “A peasant from Loxley will wear the Hood and, with his sister, command a last, desperate bastion of Old Religion against New” is never actually explored in the story. For about 80% of the book Rob's only intention was to learn his gifts, take care of his family and be with Gamelyn. He never once had any intention of fighting or commanding anything. He briefly mentioned, about 80% in, that he thought their people deserved better, but it was never within the context of actually doing anything about it.
I was stunned by the ending. I hadn't expected that everyone would survive, but when those who did die were such prominent characters, it really surprised me. I just know there's going to be a whole lot of inappropriate laying blame and feeling responsible for it, because certain people didn't do what they said they would or what they should have done. And, to be honest, I'm not looking forward to it.
Then, just when I thought it was over, after four pages of Author's Notes, there's an extra story! “Night Before Acre” is stuck in around 96%, called “a tale of the Wode” and features Gamelyn. I have NO idea why it's stuck so far at the back and I only looked, because I wondered why there was still another 4% after the author's notes, though if I'd been more awake at the time, as it was 3am when I looked, I probably would have thought it advertisements and not bothered to look. Again, this is told in present tense until Gamelyn “wakes” (from what is not italics, but is apparently a dream). The few pages are actually important, so I have no idea why they're not included even as an Epilogue, but shoved right to the back of the book. Yet, at the same time, they kind of make me angry, because it implies that Gamelyn's become something that he knows better than to become and made everything before then pointless.
Overall, this story was just too choked with niggly little problems, for my to give it anything over the 3.5. I liked the romance, the chemistry and the overall plot, but because of these niggles, there was no real “enjoyment” as such, of the process of reading the book. I didn't devour it. It was actually a read that felt laboured and endless, right until the end. With the repetition of events, conversations and themes that, in the end, not all proved necessary; the boring and predictable way Gamelyn floundered over stupid decisions only for them to end in disaster, as I knew they had to, because everything he did ended badly; and the abrupt, cliffhanger ending; it was just a little too predictable in places and tedious to go through the repetitions over and over again.
~
Favourite Quote
“But he had trusted. Gotten in too deep and then dove further, let Gamelyn's innocence cozen him, let that lovely body and what Rob had thought was a heart laid open in juniper-green eyes crack open the carapace of his own heart. Just a crack. Just a possibility.
Just wide enough to bleed him out.”
“From fear into love. It was enough to be here, be with Rob, think of him and deny Hell...no, embrace Hell.
Because if Rob was going to Hell, Gamelyn wasn't going to let him go alone.”
~
POV: 3rd person, multi-character
Pages: 370
Star rating: ★★★☆☆ (3.5)
This was a difficult one, because there were times when I was kind of bored reading it, wondering when it would end, and there were times that I was completely intrigued by the story, needing to know what happened next.
The story is a take on Robin Hood, which is fine, but I don't really know much beyond the movies, so I can't comment on whether it's sticking true to the legends or history. But, if you take it on the basis of “rob from the right to feed the poor” then this story has twisted that to become “take from the Christians to better the Pagans”. But, more on that later.
Strangely, the story is told like a play, with a Prelude and Entr-acte's. And, to be honest, most of the Entr-acte's were completely unnecessary in the format they were in. They're classed as, literally, “between the acts”, but most of the time they showed things that were relevant to the overall story, so I don't understand why they were separated the way they were.
The multi-POV meant that we got to see everything that was happening, but I'm not entirely sure that some of the POV's were needed. Marion continually gave us her POV, to show how Rob and Gamelyn's moods appeared to someone on the outside, who didn't know what was going on between them, but we really didn't need to see that to get the point. Similarly, most of the time Marion was with one or the other and didn't need her own POV, nor did her mother. I get that we needed Adam's POV, to see what happened with George, and the Abbess showed us her plans for Gamelyn clear enough. But there were plenty of times I read a POV and just wondered why it was needed, because it didn't add anything to the story or our understanding of it.
To make things even more confusing, the story was told in the usual past tense, but slipped into present tense during so-called “dreams”, memories and hallucinations. The first time it happened, the change was clearly marked in italics, but the second wasn't and the third...well, I have no idea what happened to the third, because it slipped in and out of italics like nothing on earth. It really jarred the reading to slip into a different tense, for no obvious reason, when the past would have worked just fine. But the fact that they were so haphazardly arranged made it difficult to know when they'd pop up and when I'd have to switch my thinking from one tense to another.
The speech, I'll admit, reminds me more of old-fashioned Glaswegian than anything close to English or Welsh, but I got the feeling that it would be hard for people to read and understand if they weren't familiar with any of the British dialects that still sound this way, which could hamper their enjoyment of the story.
For me, I think the real problem was that there was a mixture of lack of information (timeline/ages) and an overabundance of information (the religions), while the story continually repeated the same “scenes” over and over again, just with new words (sometimes) and the same results.
I found the first 10% to be a little haphazard. A lot was going on, there was no clear timeline and there were quite a few “filler” scenes that weren't necessary, such as Gamelyn learning to use a bow, missing Rob on his visits and such. I understand the point of these scenes was to show us the growing affection between Gamelyn and Rob that even they were unaware of, but it was actually done a lot better later in the story, before the feelings grew complicated, but during scenes that actually had a lot more bearing on the overall story arc. This was another problem of repeated scenes – Gamelyn being disappointed to find that Rob wasn't there, hinting at feelings – where only one of the few had an actual impact and was necessary to the story.
The story began by digging right into the action, with Rob discovering Gamelyn, but then stagnated for about 10-15% until Rob was blooded. After that Prelude, things didn't go much of anywhere for a while and then, after Rob was blooded, there was a whole lot of dancing about and doing nothing until he and Gamelyn finally realised how they felt about each other.
I also have to admit that while I found Rob completely enchanting and Gamelyn intriguing, they acted like teenagers hopped up on their hormones half the time. Their chemistry together was kind of beautiful at times and exhausting at others. There were times when I cried over them – after the Green and after the nightmares – but there were equally enough times when I just wanted them to get it over with already, confess their love and runaway together, because it was taking such. a. long. time.
Because the timeline doesn't tell us how old they are, ever! it made it hard to judge whether they really were teenagers or not. There's the hinted implication that they were ten years old when they first met – but it doesn't show up until nearly 70% of the book, so we spend all that time not knowing how old they are. By physically going back to check the years between their first meeting and the “several years ago” jump into the future, it seems to have been ten years that passed, but since all we knew was that Rob hadn't reached 15 yet, in the Prelude, he could have been 20 or 24 or anything in between. He could even have been 18 or 19 by the time Chapter 1 came about. To be honest, I just don't get why it wasn't hinted at or downright spelled out in the story; it wouldn't take much effort to slip in, “you're five years from being fifteen” or “he was twenty now”. It just would have cleared up so much.
As characters, I loved Rob. He was very much the “Robin Hood” cheeky chap, with a dark task to undertake and a lot of responsibility on his shoulders. I equally loved Gamelyn's daring and his banter with Rob, the way he was so completely oblivious to their chemistry with each other, until jealousy shoved it in his face. However, what I didn't love was the constant, repetitive “my God versus your God” arguments and Gemelyn rushing into Rob's arms right before/after calling it a sin.
I didn't see the point of Marion at all. She added nothing to the story that was worth anything – she was an alternative love interest, when Gamelyn's family questioned his visits to their croft; she was supposedly Rob's anchor and as equally gifted, yet did absolutely nothing with those gifts of worth; she fought the “independent woman” battle with her father, which came completely out of the left field and had no effect on the story. The only useful thing Marion ever did was act as a buffer between Rob and Gamelyn, spending time with Gamelyn when they were younger and teaching him how to use a bow and arrow, while Rob was off becoming the Hooded One. The more of the story I read, the more Marion became “surplus”, because even when her tynged spoke directly to her and warned her to go to Rob, urgently, to save lives, she dilly dallied for days, allowing the end of the book to happen when it should have been prevented. So just what was the point of that warning or Marion, in the end? It's not even as if she “tried” and failed to see it through; she was too chicken to do it, then when circumstances fell so that she ended up going anyway, she told NO ONE about the imminent danger or what had to be done. Marion kept quiet for far too long and, in the end, became just as much an impetus for what happened at the end of the story as the Abbess. Only, she actually drove the story forward.
There was a heavy theme of Paganism vs Christianity in the book that was – as an atheist, I felt – unfairly slanted towards paganism. There was only one instance of the Pagan belief being “bad” or “evil” through physical actions, but even that was justified away, as though that made it okay. The entire time that Christianity was shown on page, it was either because of Gamelyn floundering over whether to hold to his beliefs or not or because Christians were evil and hunted the Pagans, to murder them all. I get that it's a very real part of history that can't be overlooked, especially in the context of the story, but there was never once where Christianity was shown in the same favourable light as Paganism and it was noticable.
For me, the blurb gave too much away and told us things that never actually happened. This part “A peasant from Loxley will wear the Hood and, with his sister, command a last, desperate bastion of Old Religion against New” is never actually explored in the story. For about 80% of the book Rob's only intention was to learn his gifts, take care of his family and be with Gamelyn. He never once had any intention of fighting or commanding anything. He briefly mentioned, about 80% in, that he thought their people deserved better, but it was never within the context of actually doing anything about it.
I was stunned by the ending. I hadn't expected that everyone would survive, but when those who did die were such prominent characters, it really surprised me. I just know there's going to be a whole lot of inappropriate laying blame and feeling responsible for it, because certain people didn't do what they said they would or what they should have done. And, to be honest, I'm not looking forward to it.
Then, just when I thought it was over, after four pages of Author's Notes, there's an extra story! “Night Before Acre” is stuck in around 96%, called “a tale of the Wode” and features Gamelyn. I have NO idea why it's stuck so far at the back and I only looked, because I wondered why there was still another 4% after the author's notes, though if I'd been more awake at the time, as it was 3am when I looked, I probably would have thought it advertisements and not bothered to look. Again, this is told in present tense until Gamelyn “wakes” (from what is not italics, but is apparently a dream). The few pages are actually important, so I have no idea why they're not included even as an Epilogue, but shoved right to the back of the book. Yet, at the same time, they kind of make me angry, because it implies that Gamelyn's become something that he knows better than to become and made everything before then pointless.
Overall, this story was just too choked with niggly little problems, for my to give it anything over the 3.5. I liked the romance, the chemistry and the overall plot, but because of these niggles, there was no real “enjoyment” as such, of the process of reading the book. I didn't devour it. It was actually a read that felt laboured and endless, right until the end. With the repetition of events, conversations and themes that, in the end, not all proved necessary; the boring and predictable way Gamelyn floundered over stupid decisions only for them to end in disaster, as I knew they had to, because everything he did ended badly; and the abrupt, cliffhanger ending; it was just a little too predictable in places and tedious to go through the repetitions over and over again.
~
Favourite Quote
“But he had trusted. Gotten in too deep and then dove further, let Gamelyn's innocence cozen him, let that lovely body and what Rob had thought was a heart laid open in juniper-green eyes crack open the carapace of his own heart. Just a crack. Just a possibility.
Just wide enough to bleed him out.”
“From fear into love. It was enough to be here, be with Rob, think of him and deny Hell...no, embrace Hell.
Because if Rob was going to Hell, Gamelyn wasn't going to let him go alone.”
~