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A review by kellysavagebooks
The Waking Forest by Alyssa Wees
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Rhea has visions of a forest no one else can see. The Witch calls the forest home, and children visit her there to have their wishes granted.
The first half of this book was great. I really enjoyed seeing the two storylines intertwine, and the spookiness really hit. I adored the Witch storyline especially--the strange, dark fantasy elements, the flower in her chest that she plucks petals from to grant wishes, her collection of little pieces of people that she takes as payment. The prose was dreamy and flowery, perfect for the story (overdone once in a while, sure, but overall really fed the tone of the book). Unfortunately, all the dreams and visions and intertwining timelines are resolved at the midpoint. And then we just have a magic-princess-needs-to-save-her-kingdom-from-the-big-bad-baddie YA fantasy thing, and it feels like a completely different book. There were very few things from the second half that I enjoyed, and most of the lines or moments that I found really corny were in that part. After everything, it was just...unsatisfying. It's difficult to describe without spoilers, but one of the biggest disappointments was that our protagonist ends up feeling like a very inconsistent person, and a lot of her got left behind by the end. Also! I was really hoping for some kind of contextualization for the symbolism and body-horror-esque aesthetic of the Witch, and that also just kind of didn't happen.
Katelyn Levering did a great job with the narration. I'm easy to spook, but I'm also quick to laugh if dramatic stuff is over-acted in audiobooks. Katelyn delivered the spook very well, and I really felt Rhea's uneasiness and was never yanked out of the story. The best narrators make you forget you're not just listening to the character, and I think Katelyn pulled that off with this one.
All in all, this baby gets three stars for the stuff that I did like and for all its potential.
Thank you to NetGalley for the audiobook ARC in exchange for an honest review.
The first half of this book was great. I really enjoyed seeing the two storylines intertwine, and the spookiness really hit. I adored the Witch storyline especially--the strange, dark fantasy elements, the flower in her chest that she plucks petals from to grant wishes, her collection of little pieces of people that she takes as payment. The prose was dreamy and flowery, perfect for the story (overdone once in a while, sure, but overall really fed the tone of the book). Unfortunately, all the dreams and visions and intertwining timelines are resolved at the midpoint. And then we just have a magic-princess-needs-to-save-her-kingdom-from-the-big-bad-baddie YA fantasy thing, and it feels like a completely different book. There were very few things from the second half that I enjoyed, and most of the lines or moments that I found really corny were in that part. After everything, it was just...unsatisfying. It's difficult to describe without spoilers, but one of the biggest disappointments was that our protagonist ends up feeling like a very inconsistent person, and a lot of her got left behind by the end. Also! I was really hoping for some kind of contextualization for the symbolism and body-horror-esque aesthetic of the Witch, and that also just kind of didn't happen.
Katelyn Levering did a great job with the narration. I'm easy to spook, but I'm also quick to laugh if dramatic stuff is over-acted in audiobooks. Katelyn delivered the spook very well, and I really felt Rhea's uneasiness and was never yanked out of the story. The best narrators make you forget you're not just listening to the character, and I think Katelyn pulled that off with this one.
All in all, this baby gets three stars for the stuff that I did like and for all its potential.
Thank you to NetGalley for the audiobook ARC in exchange for an honest review.