Tag: fantasy

Review: Uprooted by Naomi Novik

E.F. Sunland

I told one person I was looking for fantasy recommendations and received a massive reading list. Naomi Novik’s Temeraire series was also recommended, but I won’t review all nine books here. Most books in a series share common strengths/pitfalls so I’ll do a big round-up post if/when I finish. In the meantime, I read Novik’s Uprooted which is wonderful for being a single, self-contained book and not another series. At 439 pages, it’s not even long for its genre. read more

Review: The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden

E.F. Sunland

The Bear and the Nightingale hits many pitfalls of Chosen One stories, but I didn’t notice until the cheesy climax because it’s such an entertaining read. It’s snowy, moody, and packed with magic—the superstitious, fairy-tale kind. The opening scenes depict a family sitting around and telling old stories of Morozko (Frost). It sets the tone well and is an entertaining way of providing key background information for the main story, which takes place in a small Russian town next to the woods. In this town, Vasya is born with sight that allows her to communicate with the household spirits. They need her help because a priest is dissuading townsfolk from the old ways. Hungry for lack of offerings, the spirits warn they may no longer be able to protect the townspeople from the dark powers that are stirring in the woods. This is where Vasya comes in. read more

Review: The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman

E.F. Sunland

My first thought upon finishing Neil Gaiman’s The Ocean at the End of the Lane was “why isn’t this a short story?” I was satisfied to find Gaiman’s answer in the acknowledgements section:

This novel began, although I did not know it was going to be a novel at the time, when Jonathan Strahan asked me to write him a short story. I started to tell the story of the opal miner and the Hempstock family (who have lived in the farm in my head for such a long time), and Jonathan was forgiving and kind when I finally admitted to myself and to him that this wasn’t a short story, and I let it become a novel instead.

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