Reviews

Osmo Unknown and the Eightpenny Woods by Catherynne M. Valente

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mimiecherry's review

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adventurous emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted mysterious reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

lizmarkus's review against another edition

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adventurous medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

anna_hepworth's review

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adventurous emotional hopeful slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

A pdf copy of this was made available to me through the Hugo Voter's pack, which I greatly appreciate, as I was unlikely to have been able to get a copy through my library (libby knows the name, but can't find it, not even for 'notify me').

I have loved all of Valente's quirky fairy tale inspired works that I have managed to get my hands on. True to form, this story invests heavily in 'that which is important for the story' narrative logic, burbling ever onwards and taking the reader on a turbulent and fascinating ride. I suspect it would do incredibly well as a readaloud story, with a chapter per evening, as the chapters are both wonderfully self contained and narratively dependent on the previous (this is a good thing! I'm failing to describe it properly, but I did like this).

Fabulous world building, wonderful writing/narrative voice, a large cast of varied and fascinating characters.

stephaniepoli's review

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Read this with my 10-year-old. At 43% we still didn't understand what the heck was going on in the story. Lots of overly wordy dialogue. Lots of sticky sentences I might add. The characters are not likable, Bonk is just plain rude but doesn't seem to change. Stories are all about change and nothing really happens here. It's more like an exploration in a very strange fantasy world. And I like strange but this was over my head.

rwalker101's review

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adventurous hopeful inspiring lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This was so cute. So so so cute. The kind of magical story I would have loved as a kid. I'm deducting one star, however, because there are a few instances of head-hopping between Osmo and Never that we just SO distracting. That's definitely the kind of thing that should have been caught in editing.