Ava Reid

Well, it took a bit of time to get to it, and even longer to read it when I did. It was an OK read, although I had some reservations about it:

-I was't keen on the first person narrative
-I felt it was overlong
-It was mis-titled; it should have been The Wolf-Girl and the Woodsman, but I suppose it would have been too long. I kept wondering when the wolf was going to put in an appearance.

I did enjoy the story, being Hungarian mythology rather than the more usual Western European based fantasy. As a first novel, it wasn't bad; better than the other first novel I read last year.

Recommended with some reservations.… (mehr)

A very epic fairytale with all sorts of pagan and other religious influences. The story was a bit all over the place at times and I genuinely didn't know what to expect next. Reminded me of ACOTAR with the sassy illiterate protag, but otherwise not much connecting those two properties except the fantasy-romance part. Other aspects were very Game of Thrones-y (killing off characters randomly and the court intrigue and such). This book felt a bit long and drawn out at points (like a LOTR travel journey sequence) but it all seemed essential to later plot developments so it was worth getting through them. There were a lot of beautiful and riveting descriptions of the places, landscapes, and costumes in the book as well as the monsters, witches, and other creatures.
The violence done to many animals and people in the book is excessive as hell and was rough getting through, however, so a big content warning about that. The ending isn't necessarily happily ever after either and is more open-ended and realistic than most fiction I have read based on a similar pseudo-medieval period. Could've been worse, but the book didn't really blow me away either.… (mehr)