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A review by kberry513
Across the Wall: A Tale of the Abhorsen and Other Stories by Garth Nix
5.0
I almost gave this a 4 star rating because it wasn't all Old Kingdom stories, but rather a mixture of short stories of various worlds.
One of my favorites is the Three Roses, the story of a gardener who lost his wife and planted a rose to remember her by, which has bloomed the exact black of her hair; the king comes and takes it and it lasts only a short time at the palace, so he goes back and the gardener has a rose the color of his dead wife's eyes, etc. etc. The last time the palace jardinier comes to get a rose, he asks the gardener why he allows the king to take the flowers and if he's afraid he'll forget his wife, but the gardener responds that he sees her everywhere and will always have her with him, but since the king has never known such love and has no memories of it, he grows the flowers for him.
I also liked knowing what happened to Nick post Abhorsen and it sounds like it leads right into the new book that comes out next month.
The Hansel and Gretel retelling was awesome; I could have read a whole book about that.
Charlie Rabbit, which was about two little boys and a stuffed rabbit needing to get to safety during an airstrike, was heart wrenching, as was Hope Chest - I want to know what happened to Alice May Susan Hopkins after she liberated her home by killing a bunch of people. That plus Margaletta's ruthlessness in From the Lighthouse was very demonstrative of Nix's penchant for "dark justice" type endings in his works. I also liked his satiric take on fantasy series, My New Really Epic Fantasy Series
One of my favorites is the Three Roses, the story of a gardener who lost his wife and planted a rose to remember her by, which has bloomed the exact black of her hair; the king comes and takes it and it lasts only a short time at the palace, so he goes back and the gardener has a rose the color of his dead wife's eyes, etc. etc. The last time the palace jardinier comes to get a rose, he asks the gardener why he allows the king to take the flowers and if he's afraid he'll forget his wife, but the gardener responds that he sees her everywhere and will always have her with him, but since the king has never known such love and has no memories of it, he grows the flowers for him.
I also liked knowing what happened to Nick post Abhorsen and it sounds like it leads right into the new book that comes out next month.
The Hansel and Gretel retelling was awesome; I could have read a whole book about that.
Charlie Rabbit, which was about two little boys and a stuffed rabbit needing to get to safety during an airstrike, was heart wrenching, as was Hope Chest - I want to know what happened to Alice May Susan Hopkins after she liberated her home by killing a bunch of people. That plus Margaletta's ruthlessness in From the Lighthouse was very demonstrative of Nix's penchant for "dark justice" type endings in his works. I also liked his satiric take on fantasy series, My New Really Epic Fantasy Series