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A review by theabigaillo
Uprooted by Naomi Novik
4.0
the cons first (and there are quite a lot):
1) i swear to god, if i hear about another YA heroine who is clearly just so completely utterly ordinary except i'm gonna start a fucking riot
2) novik's writing was pretty good overall, but sometimes, the magic metaphors were just weird. like, i get that she had to come up with a different one every time someone used magic, and there was magic on pretty much every page, which meant a lot of different metaphors, but come on. they were just ... odd.
3) romance? completely unnecessary.
4) the first few times agnieszka talked about how she was oh so clumsy and managed to get dirt everywhere on her clothes, i'll admit that i thought it was cute. the 100th time she said it, i kind of wanted to strangle her.
5) did agnieszka really think people at court weren't gonna be mean? like, really? i truly wanted to tear my hair out for about a chapter.
6) novik: your readers are smart. we can figure things out. now please, for the love of all that's holy, stop making agnieszka figure things out around 10 pages after i've already figured it out because it's annoying as fuck, and i want it to stop.
now, you may be wondering: "if abigail has so much shit to say about uprooted, why did they rate it 4 stars?" and honestly? can't really answer that. objectively, it should probably be 3 stars, but there was just something about the last 25% that pulled me in, even if it wasn't actually developed as much as it should have been. (side note: if you think that plot was fast, wait until you read my man sanderson -- that shit will have you reeling.) i also loved the overall messages -- violence & destruction of war, the power of love, and the fleeting nature of time -- even if the execution was a bit heavy-handed sometimes. god, the more i write this review & think about this book, the more i think it should be 3.5 stars, but i truly enjoyed it too much to rate it anything lower than a 4. sue me.
tl;dr: it's basically [a:Brandon Sanderson|38550|Brandon Sanderson|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1394044556p2/38550.jpg], but worse. magic system isn't as fleshed out, characters aren't as developed, plot isn't as well-paced, all that shit. but did i still really like it? yes. why? who knows.
1) i swear to god, if i hear about another YA heroine who is clearly just so completely utterly ordinary except
Spoiler
she's actually literally the most powerful wizard to ever walk the face of the earth2) novik's writing was pretty good overall, but sometimes, the magic metaphors were just weird. like, i get that she had to come up with a different one every time someone used magic, and there was magic on pretty much every page, which meant a lot of different metaphors, but come on. they were just ... odd.
3) romance? completely unnecessary.
Spoiler
also: romance between a 150+ year old and an 18 year old? always weird and creepy, no matter what agnieszka says. i don't think it actually rose to the level of verbal or physical abuse, and i think sarkan's backstory was explained well enough that his behavior was understandable (if not justified), but he should still definitely have actually apologized for how he treated her, because damn. he was just a bitch sometimes.4) the first few times agnieszka talked about how she was oh so clumsy and managed to get dirt everywhere on her clothes, i'll admit that i thought it was cute. the 100th time she said it, i kind of wanted to strangle her.
Spoiler
also, why was the reason for that "agnieszka is magic"? how does that make sense? you can't throw that away in a sentence and expect me to gloss right over it. i don't think so.5) did agnieszka really think people at court weren't gonna be mean? like, really? i truly wanted to tear my hair out for about a chapter.
6) novik: your readers are smart. we can figure things out. now please, for the love of all that's holy, stop making agnieszka figure things out around 10 pages after i've already figured it out because it's annoying as fuck, and i want it to stop.
now, you may be wondering: "if abigail has so much shit to say about uprooted, why did they rate it 4 stars?" and honestly? can't really answer that. objectively, it should probably be 3 stars, but there was just something about the last 25% that pulled me in, even if it wasn't actually developed as much as it should have been. (side note: if you think that plot was fast, wait until you read my man sanderson -- that shit will have you reeling.) i also loved the overall messages -- violence & destruction of war, the power of love, and the fleeting nature of time -- even if the execution was a bit heavy-handed sometimes. god, the more i write this review & think about this book, the more i think it should be 3.5 stars, but i truly enjoyed it too much to rate it anything lower than a 4. sue me.
tl;dr: it's basically [a:Brandon Sanderson|38550|Brandon Sanderson|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1394044556p2/38550.jpg], but worse. magic system isn't as fleshed out, characters aren't as developed, plot isn't as well-paced, all that shit. but did i still really like it? yes. why? who knows.