Jessica
I never really got into this book because the first two POV characters (Miryem and Wanda) were just so cold-hearted at the beginning, even though they were both described as having rough upbringings (in different ways) that made them that way. As the book went on, they both developed an ability to care about a wider layer of people than just themselves and their mothers, so that was good. And you could say that I complain all the time about fantasy feudal settings that idealise feudalism, and at least this novel depicts feudalism as brutal and hard... which is like, yeah it does... but maybe what I really want is to not read books about feudalism at all, I dunno.
Anyway, the book engaged me enough to read it to the end, but in addition to the hard-to-like characters, I did find it fairly complicated with a lot of overlapping subplots and POVs (not all of whom had very distinct voices – I confused Wanda with her youngest brother Stepon more than once, since the book never uses chapter headings or anything to tell you whose POV you're about to read), and in the end I did not even understand the magical process by which the villain was defeated. I wouldn't say this book is bad, just that it never grabbed me, which was disappointing after how much I loved "Uprooted".
I never really got into this book because the first two POV characters (Miryem and Wanda) were just so cold-hearted at the beginning, even though they were both described as having rough upbringings (in different ways) that made them that way. As the book went on, they both developed an ability to care about a wider layer of people than just themselves and their mothers, so that was good. And you could say that I complain all the time about fantasy feudal settings that idealise feudalism, and at least this novel depicts feudalism as brutal and hard... which is like, yeah it does... but maybe what I really want is to not read books about feudalism at all, I dunno.
Anyway, the book engaged me enough to read it to the end, but in addition to the hard-to-like characters, I did find it fairly complicated with a lot of overlapping subplots and POVs (not all of whom had very distinct voices – I confused Wanda with her youngest brother Stepon more than once, since the book never uses chapter headings or anything to tell you whose POV you're about to read), and in the end I did not even understand the magical process by which the villain was defeated. I wouldn't say this book is bad, just that it never grabbed me, which was disappointing after how much I loved "Uprooted".