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mandypandy087 's review for:
The Wicker King
by K. Ancrum
The prompt blinking above this review asks me what I think, but thinking is logic and right now I'm just pulsing waves of feeling.
First off let me thank the publisher and net galley for this e-arc in exchange for an honest review. The forthcoming reactions are personal and my own and they do not challenge or diminish anyone else's feelings about their reading experience.
The short, simple statement is that I loved it. I will probably reread this several times and cradle the bound paper and ink version when I get my hands on it. The Wicker King is very much a darker, more grown up parallel to The Bridge to Terebethia and God help me I think I love this one more than one of my childhood staples.
The format is not going to be for everyone, and that's okay. The chapters are short some of them only a page long, and they have a very "free association" feel to them. My interpretation as I was reading was that it was August writing things down, recalling and reexperiencing the events in spastic flares, some of them short and abstract, others long and detailed, all of it about what in this experience mattered to him. The format makes sense to me, because it's puzzling together a story that dissolves into craziness and broken minds and spirits. Something about it made me focus in more on the reading, made my heart race because I could feel the clock ticking down. I absolutely fell with ease into the structure, but that's just me.
For the first few chapters I was wary about the characters. Even though the story is told from August's narrative it felt like Jack was the only fully formed character, the only one I was going to care about. I was wrong. August is, as many others call him, a complex character. But in dealing with Jack's hallucinations, he is experiencing hid own descent into instability, into issues that have been blooming under his skin always and don't all wrap around his best friend. What he is willing to do for this other person in the name of a world he himself cannot say is heartbreaking and heartwarming at the same time. August is not a bad guy. He's a child that had to grow up and step up against dire circumstances unfinished and without guidence. He uses people sometimes, because he's just trying to survive, not because he thrives on hurting those around him. And Jack...Jack's experience is goosebump inducing and quotes from him made me burst into tears more than once. I also really fell in love with Rina. My only wish is that we'd seen even more of her because her openness and wisdom and being a safe space until it was time to close the door added something I can't explain but utterly cherished.
I can't say more without fear of accidentally trekking into spoiler-y depths, but ugh that's only the tip of my emotional iceburg. I love Jack and August's relationship, even during the times when I was questioning whether it was more harmful than helpful to them and the sense of "found family" in this book gave me moments of warmth between the tear jerk moments.
First off let me thank the publisher and net galley for this e-arc in exchange for an honest review. The forthcoming reactions are personal and my own and they do not challenge or diminish anyone else's feelings about their reading experience.
The short, simple statement is that I loved it. I will probably reread this several times and cradle the bound paper and ink version when I get my hands on it. The Wicker King is very much a darker, more grown up parallel to The Bridge to Terebethia and God help me I think I love this one more than one of my childhood staples.
The format is not going to be for everyone, and that's okay. The chapters are short some of them only a page long, and they have a very "free association" feel to them. My interpretation as I was reading was that it was August writing things down, recalling and reexperiencing the events in spastic flares, some of them short and abstract, others long and detailed, all of it about what in this experience mattered to him. The format makes sense to me, because it's puzzling together a story that dissolves into craziness and broken minds and spirits. Something about it made me focus in more on the reading, made my heart race because I could feel the clock ticking down. I absolutely fell with ease into the structure, but that's just me.
For the first few chapters I was wary about the characters. Even though the story is told from August's narrative it felt like Jack was the only fully formed character, the only one I was going to care about. I was wrong. August is, as many others call him, a complex character. But in dealing with Jack's hallucinations, he is experiencing hid own descent into instability, into issues that have been blooming under his skin always and don't all wrap around his best friend. What he is willing to do for this other person in the name of a world he himself cannot say is heartbreaking and heartwarming at the same time. August is not a bad guy. He's a child that had to grow up and step up against dire circumstances unfinished and without guidence. He uses people sometimes, because he's just trying to survive, not because he thrives on hurting those around him. And Jack...Jack's experience is goosebump inducing and quotes from him made me burst into tears more than once. I also really fell in love with Rina. My only wish is that we'd seen even more of her because her openness and wisdom and being a safe space until it was time to close the door added something I can't explain but utterly cherished.
I can't say more without fear of accidentally trekking into spoiler-y depths, but ugh that's only the tip of my emotional iceburg. I love Jack and August's relationship, even during the times when I was questioning whether it was more harmful than helpful to them and the sense of "found family" in this book gave me moments of warmth between the tear jerk moments.