Category: reviews

ARC Review: “The Witch of Tin Mountain” by Paulette Kennedy

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(thanks to Lake Union Publishing and NetGalley for granting me an ARC of this book)

Read if you like: dual POV across multiple timelines, generational stories, generational magic, generational curses, feminine wisdom, demons and divinity, grimoires, witchcraft, the Ozarks, atmospheric writing, thematic depth, folklore, myth, social and societal commentary, mother-daughter-granddaughter dynamics, and family-for-better-or-worse.

Content warnings: physical abuse, emotional abuse, parental neglect, misogyny, racism, rape, sexual assault (note: none of this is graphic, and it happens off-page, but the themes are continuous throughout the book, and they are part of the character’s backstories)

Goodreads Summary:

Blood and power bind three generations of women in the Ozark Mountains. So does an evil that’s followed them across the decades.

1931. Gracelynn Doherty lives peacefully on Tin Mountain, helping her adoptive granny work her cures. Despite whispers that the women are witches, the superstitious locals still seek them out, whether they suffer from arthritis or a broken heart. But when evangelist Josiah Bellflower comes to town touting miracle healing, full bellies, and prosperity, his revivals soon hold Tin Mountain in thrall—and Granny in abject fear.

Granny recognizes Josiah. Fifty years ago, in a dark and desperate moment, she made a terrible promise. Now Josiah, an enemy, has returned to collect his due.

As Granny sickens and the drought-ridden countryside falls under a curse, Gracelynn must choose: flee Tin Mountain and the only family she knows or confront the vengeful preacher whose unholy mission is to destroy her.

(Goodreads book profile here)

My Review:

This was one of those books where I opened it, read the first page, and then promptly put it away.

I get this feeling with books sometimes. The feeling that they’re going to change something for me. In me. They’re going to matter to me. I am 100% the intended audience, in one way or another, and I can feel it from that first page alone. If I was a literary agent, I suppose this is the feeling I would look for when offering representation. And so I need to put the book away, after reading that first page, and prepare myself for the journey I know I will embark upon once I read beyond that first page.

I waited three or four weeks, preparing—and then I read the whole book in one sitting, in one evening. I even began to murmur it aloud halfway through, reciting several paragraphs over and over again.

There was basically nothing that I didn’t love about TWOTM, but I’ll try to be succinct.

First off, this is the second book from Kennedy that I’ve read, and the craft felt significantly developed to me. The storytelling was a lot more intricate, yet also a lot smoother at the same time, which is no small feat. I absolutely love seeing authors progress and advance like this.

Ultimately, what really brought this book home for me was the suspense. The book starts of slowly, as we settle into the different timelines and multiple protagonists, and then around the 15% mark you start to feel that you’re “getting something”, but you’re not fully sure what that “something” is. Not yet. But you’re willing to wait for it. Because you trust the author, and you trust these characters, and you’re starting to see parallels and patterns that point to a larger picture. This is a story with multiple timelines, meaning that most of the suspense arises from how these timelines interconnect, and when they do so. If you don’t like this type of ping-pongy suspense and initial head-scratching, then this is probably not a book for you. If you love it, like I do, then it definitely is.

Relatedly, Kennedy does foreshadowing really well. She will drop a cue in one timeline that fits with a cue in the other timeline, thus forcing you to connect the dots across the timelines and characters. Put differently: one character in one timeline will know something that the other character desperately needs to know in their timeline. A lot of tension will splay out across this skewed timeline relationship. If this is not your cup of tea, you might wanna steer clear of the book. However, if it is, you wanna gulp down that tea and pour a second cup straight away.

The book is set in the Ozarks. In contrast to her debut, this is the author’s home, and this familiarity adds to the reader immersion of the story. There is an intimacy to the culture presented on the page that tells you of the deep love that the author has of this place. Of home. And that’s relatable to any reader, I daresay. We all feel for home, and for family, both at the worst and the best of times.  This book shows that.

As usual, Kennedy treats historical fact with respect and care. Her research is thorough, as the author’s note will tell you. She writes queer characters that feel true to their circumstances and times, while she also grapples with the themes of feminism and misogyny stretched across several generations and time periods.

The Witch of Tin Mountain is a book that discusses how otherness has historically been treated as something to fear—and that this fear is hard to shake, even in more modern times. Like the very antagonist of the book, this fear simply takes a different shape. It evolves. And this, in turn, demands that we must always stay vigilant of this fear. Exactly as the protagonists of the book must also stay vigilant of it. I promise you that the thematic resonance and clarity and impact of this book will knock you off your feet by the time that you’re done reading it.

This book is like a bonfire—when it catches flame, it roars.

And if you stand too close, you get burnt.

Like the witches of the past.

And, perhaps, like the Witch of Tin Mountain herself.

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ARC Review: “Wind Daughter” by Joanna Ruth Meyer

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(thanks to Page Street Publishing and NetGalley for granting me an ARC of this book!)

Read if you like: Fairytales with a big F, Inuyasha (Kagome’s quest, specifically), Howl’s Moving Castle (the love story), atmospheric setting, sentient nature, sewing as symbolism, to cry both happy and sad tears, empathy/empaths as a thematic core, bees, wolves, snow, doorways, playing with time

Triggers: Death (non-graphic), blood (non-graphic)

Goodreads Summary:

In the dark, cold reaches of the north lives a storyteller and his daughter. He told his daughter, Satu, many stories–romances like the girl who loved a star and changed herself into a nightingale so she could always see him shining–but the most important story he told her was his own. This storyteller was once the formidable North Wind, but he lost his power by trading it away in exchange for mortality–he loved her mother too much to live without her. The loss of his magic impacted more than just their family, however, and now the world is unraveling in the wake of this imbalance.

To save the North, Satu embarks on a perilous journey to reclaim her father’s magic, but she isn’t the only one searching for it. In the snow-laden mountains, she finds herself in a deadly race with the Winter Lord who wants the North Wind’s destructive powers for himself.

Satu has the chance to be the heroine of her own fairy tale, only this one has an ending she never could have imagined.

A hauntingly beautiful fairy tale about love and loss, this Echo North companion novel is perfect for fans of the Winternight Trilogy.

(Goodreads book profile here)

My Review:

Meyer has a supremely uncanny ability to get to the emotional core of her books within seconds. I know that if I read a book from her, I will cry. And, lo and behold, I teared up in the first chapter of Wind Daughter. To that end, it didn’t do much to dry my eyes that the main character is an empath. As the personification of the North Wind, she feels as deeply and volatilely as a wind sweeping across the unending tapestry of the world—literally and figuratively, mind you.

Meyer’s Wind Daughter is, at its essence, a fairytale about fairytales. Think “one story to save all stories.” Or “one story that ties together all the stories of the universe”. Love and empathy are at the forefront as the power that stitches all of these stories together until they become one. This is in large part due to Satu North’s nature as an empath. She uses her empathy as her greatest strength, which is also the thematic core of the book.

Meyer’s writing style in this book is slightly different from the style in her previous books. I believe this might be a conscious choice on her part. A stylistic choice. She uses a lot of telling rather than showing—perhaps to enhance the storyteller feeling of the narrative? I suspect she wants the reader to feel as if they’re being told this story orally by a storyteller of old, just like fairytales were told originally. And she achieves that just perfectly, in my opinion, helped along by the seemingly endless mythos of Satu’s world.

Because I promise you: this is as symbolically rich and imaginative a world as they come.

I mentioned before that the thematic core of the book is that love gives you strength—but it’s not only love. It’s all feelings. Meyer dedicates this book to everyone who feels “too much”, and the book truly is a lover letter to everyone who feels, unashamedly, and rejoices in it.

For Satu North, her primary character development lies in accepting that she can still be lonely even if she gets easily overwhelmed in crowds. She is allowed to feel lonely while also wanting to be alone. The greatest lesson that she learns is that loneliness is not the same as being alone. That existing is not the same as living. She also has smaller lessons to learn, such as the fact that her parents aren’t flawless, and that sometimes your worst enemy is really your best friend (yes, we have a glorious enemies-to-lovers trope here).

As a companion piece to Meyer’s Echo North (2019), we also have recurring characters in this book. I was most impressed by Echo North herself. While she felt familiar to me, she also felt like she was fully grown-up, thus presenting herself as a plausible mentor figure for Satu North.

But I also want to stress that this is a companion novel. That is to say, some of the worldbuilding and the lore may be difficult to follow if you haven’t read Echo North. And this difficulty is enhanced by the writing style that has a fast pace and rarely lingers, as in true “oral storyteller fashion”.

Lastly, if we talk comparisons, Howl’s Moving Castle comes to my mind almost instantly. The love story has the same tragic, but hopeful feel. Whimsical on the surface, but dark underneath. It also specifically centers around a love that is literally broken up by time, exactly as Howl’s and Sophie’s. And that’s all the spoilers I’ll give you for that comparison.

I also couldn’t help but be reminded of Inuyasha. As regards the plot, that is. Satu North goes on a journey to collect fragments of her father’s broken magic, exactly as Kagome went on a journey to collect necklace shards. And while Kagome travels through time, Satu North is chased by a magically unraveling universe (aka time).

And if you now want to be chased by Satu, then this is the time to pre-order this magnificently woven and tapestried book. It’s worth it. If anything, then only so you can fully understand my constant use of sewing terminology in this review. Apologies.

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ARC Review: “The Sleepless” by Victor Manibo

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(thanks to Erewhon Books and NetGalley for granting me an ARC of this book!)

Read if you like: existentialism, mystery, angst, politics of all kinds, relatable/”lower” sci-fi, murder investigations, anti-capitalism, unreliable narrators, psychology, amnesia, anarchy, the power/cost of love, workaholism getting its due, intellectual worldbuilding

Triggers: workaholism, profanity, alcoholism, narcotics, violence, corruption

Goodreads Summary:

Journalist Jamie Vega is Sleepless: he can’t sleep, nor does he need to. When his boss dies on the eve of a controversial corporate takeover, Jamie doesn’t buy the too-convenient explanation of suicide, and launches an investigation of his own.

But everything goes awry when Jamie discovers that he was the last person who saw Simon alive. Not only do the police suspect him, Jamie himself has no memory of that night. Alarmingly, his memory loss may have to do with how he became Sleepless: not naturally, like other Sleepless people, but through a risky and illegal biohacking process.

As Jamie delves deeper into Simon’s final days, he tangles with extremist organizations and powerful corporate interests, all while confronting past traumas and unforeseen consequences of his medical experimentation. But Jamie soon faces the most dangerous decision of all as he uncovers a terrifying truth about Sleeplessness that imperils him—and all of humanity. 

(Goodreads book profile here)

My Review:

Manibo has created a deeply intellectual novel that explores the common existentialist question:

“What if we had more time?”

What if we never had to sleep, for instance? What would that mean for us? For those we love? For history? For culture? For politics? For the environment?

Humankind has always been obsessed with legacy. With time. With immortality. And Manibo’s book is centered on what that obsession might mean for a modern, diverse society.

Manibo’s answers to all these questions are successful, in my opinion, because he manages to root the answers in a world that feels concurrent (despite technically being set in the future). I could see this happening. I could believe it. And this is because I’m given a solid social, cultural, and political framework that felt relatable. If I woke up tomorrow and was told that Manibo himself is sleepless and that this is his way of breaking the news to us, then I wouldn’t bat an eyelash. I’d say “duh!”

Moreover, Manibo also succeeds at providing answers that consider all angles. There is no antagonist and protagonist here. There are just individual people believing in whatever they believe in, for whatever personal reason. Just as in real life. It’s a stark reminder that politics are made up by individuals. Politics is all about what individuals want, and how they achieve it via allies and opposition. It works on a much more singular scope than what it pretends to do, and Manibo reminds us of this.

If we delve into the actual plot of the book, Manibo specifically addresses how capitalism exploits the existentialist fear of “so much to do, so little time”. He addresses toxic work culture, unethical business practices, and corrupt politicians. He also highlights the sustainability debate and how a world of sleepless people will negatively impact the environment.

But this isn’t just a book of high stakes; it’s also a book of low stakes.

The low stakes are the personal stakes of the protagonist, Jamie, a journalist who is thrown into a murder investigation. The novel is a whodunit scenario in which Jamie must solve the details of the murder to prove his innocence in the matter. The murder is of his boss and mentor, meaning that Jamie’s arc is largely centered on loss and grief. Throughout the book, Jamie must decide what he’s willing to personally sacrifice for professional success. He goes from being a workaholic who is in denial of his situation, to a workaholic who attempts to save what few personal relationships he has left (alongside his freedom and life, of course). He must decide how selfish he wants to be, and how selfless he needs to be in order to turn the tide around. These are existentialist choices in their own right, albeit of a smaller scale, but they make you care about the book as a whole.

I’ve talked a lot about politics and plot so far, but this is a very character-driven story at its core.

Being character-driven, the pacing is also on the slower side. Especially for a whodunit plot. It’s less “piecing different plot elements together” and more “personal revelations that alter the plot and thus the mystery”. Basically, we care about this world because we care about Jamie. Not the other way around. And Manibo expertly unveils Jamie’s backstory at just the right pace for a character-driven narrative, weaving it seamlessly together with his relatable sci-fi worldbuilding.

And this, of course, reinforces the point I made earlier, namely that politics are made up by individuals, and Jamie is one such individual.

Even if you don’t like reading about politics, you will like reading about Jamie.

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