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cookiecat73's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Gore, Violence, Blood, War, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Confinement, Physical abuse, Torture, and Murder
Minor: Cursing, Emotional abuse, Grief, and Religious bigotry
queenmackenzie's review against another edition
adventurous
hopeful
lighthearted
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
‘They say that in the Realm, the sea is in the sky…’
So starts The Wood Be Queen, a story spanning the Earth and the Realm, where the sea really is in the sky! I was delighted by this, and by the description of rolling waves high above, the sun shining through them. I love the idea of there being a town called Strange Ground by the Skea on earth and one called Strange Ground Beneath the Skea in the Realm. And I absolutely love the fact that in the Realm the messenger birds of choice are seagulls. It’s such a cool detail, and it made me smile each time it was mentioned.
The first character we meet is Mai, a homeless woman in Strange Ground by the Skea, and on the night events begin she receives a message from a gull, with the words We have failed. Come home. written on it. It is immediately intriguing and shows there might be more to this woman that appearance dictates. This first chapter with Mai is such a strong beginning, and if you want a feel for the book I’d highly recommend you listen to Edward Cox himself reading the opening pages during Gollancz Fest@Home (his section begins at 10:35, which you can skip to by clicking the time in the description).
Mai, with her mysteries, is the one that pulls Ebbie Wren, our hero, into the story. Ebbie has been friends with Mai for a few years, believing her only to be a strange yet wise woman who lives on the streets, but on the last day of his job at the closing Library of Strange Ground, he finds himself in the possession of a strange satchel containing a letter from his missing friend, a ring that sounds like the crashing of waves, and an unusual lantern in need of a candle. From there, he is catapulted into the Realm, and is pulled toward Bek Rana, a thief in Strange Ground Beneath the Skea, who wants nothing to do with Ebbie’s appointed mission: find the missing Heir to the Wood Bee Throne and save the Realm from Yandira Wood Bee, the Queen’s sister who has made a dark deal with Lady Persephone of the Underworld, and has seized power as Empress of the Realm.
There are a lot of threads in this story, many characters scattered throughout the Realm and our world, all being pulled slowly together like woven threads, and I won’t mention all of them, because Bek and Ebbie are, for me, the two principal characters. They are the ones on the quest, the others all pieces in a game being played by the Uldonfolk, the gods of the Realm. Now, the Uldonfolk are fascinating; I mentioned Persephone, and the other principal one is Lady Juno, the High Queen, and the events that unfold are being moved along by the game they are playing against one another. I really enjoyed the way their names are pulled from Roman mythology, but their behaviour and traits have been reshaped by the author to create something new. They have retained that element of unpredictability though, and sometimes reading The Wood Bee Queen felt a bit like reading the Iliad, in which our heroes are at the mercy of the whims of the gods.
‘What difference would ridding the Realm of Yandira make ultimately, when the Oldunfolk could be so perversely ambivalent about who to save and who to damn in this sickening game of Theirs?’
It can feel a bit like deus ex machina, because everything has been lined up for the characters by forces beyond their control, so a lot of their journey is reactionary instead of pro-active. In this sense, it does have the feel of an older story, an old folk tale told around the fire. This threw me off a few times, especially at the start when some of the characters hadn’t been fleshed out as much and seemed to be solely archetypal, but as I went along I did see that at the heart of this story are still the choices of the little folks. In some way this reminded me of The Lord of the Rings, in which the hobbits are up against such huge forces, but in the end it is the small choices they make that determine the course of the future. It’s something very different to the current trends of fantasy, and it certainly won’t appeal to everyone, but I really enjoyed this story full of hope, magic, and wonder. I think it’s something the world needs right now, the idea that ‘When darkness comes, lighteness must follow, but never to shine upon a clear and easy road…’ There is light and there is dark, and there are the choices we make to change the world around us. This story is a beautiful reminder of that, and I hope others will enjoy it as much as I have.
I received an eARC of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death, Torture, and Murder