Wren
If fear is your only weapon, it’s useless here.
The blurb, the dedication, and the first chapter all suggested the story was going to be focused on healing, but I would call it more of a “painkiller” one. The difference, for me, is that healing can get messy and hurt sometimes, while painkillers simply make everything stop hurting and can put you in a pleasant haze where you get to ignore whatever is wrong. Which is exactly how this book feels. And don’t get me wrong, I definitely feel stories like this have their place and their purpose, but apparently, I happen to prefer the ones that don’t shy away from the messier parts of healing, even if there’s lots of coziness and gentleness around the characters. Stories like The Spellshop and Violet Thistlewaite Is Not a Villain Anymore, for example.
Regardless, there were a lot of nice moments here. I liked the overall vibe of the fairy tale village, the absolutely adorable baby griffon, all the fairy-like beings in the forest and the bog. The writing itself is pretty atmospheric, with the kind of descriptions that really pull you in, and the author really, really commits to creating something unapologetically and self-indulgently cozy. So while this wasn’t a particularly memorable experience for me personally, it was undeniably a pleasant one, and I can still recommend it to those who are after this kind of vibe.
If fear is your only weapon, it’s useless here.
The blurb, the dedication, and the first chapter all suggested the story was going to be focused on healing, but I would call it more of a “painkiller” one. The difference, for me, is that healing can get messy and hurt sometimes, while painkillers simply make everything stop hurting and can put you in a pleasant haze where you get to ignore whatever is wrong. Which is exactly how this book feels. And don’t get me wrong, I definitely feel stories like this have their place and their purpose, but apparently, I happen to prefer the ones that don’t shy away from the messier parts of healing, even if there’s lots of coziness and gentleness around the characters. Stories like The Spellshop and Violet Thistlewaite Is Not a Villain Anymore, for example.
Regardless, there were a lot of nice moments here. I liked the overall vibe of the fairy tale village, the absolutely adorable baby griffon, all the fairy-like beings in the forest and the bog. The writing itself is pretty atmospheric, with the kind of descriptions that really pull you in, and the author really, really commits to creating something unapologetically and self-indulgently cozy. So while this wasn’t a particularly memorable experience for me personally, it was undeniably a pleasant one, and I can still recommend it to those who are after this kind of vibe.