A review by morag
Among the Beasts & Briars by Ashley Poston
Did not finish book. Stopped at 28%.
I asked for this for Christmas because it sounded interesting. A cursed forest? An ancient kingdom? A cursed female protagonist with a fox sidekick? It sounded cool, classic, and engaging.
I was so wrong. First, lackluster world-building and characters. I know nothing about this world or it's culture. I know there's a spooky forest and a classical vaguely-European kingdom, but that's it. You could get the same amount of information from a postcard illustration. The same goes for the characters. They have no personality or unique traits. The protagonist is a blank slate, and we barely get to know her best friend before she gets cursed. This curse sweeping the kingdom is supposed to be the inciting incident, the emotional launching pad for the story, but it all happened to people as well-rounded as a piece of paper.
All of this makes it impossible to get invested in the story. Why should I care that this kingdom is in trouble? That these people are cursed? I know barely anything about either of them. How much I care about these things is proportional to how much effort the author put into fleshing them out, so we're at a zero. On that note, this novel does nothing new or original with the fantasy genre, either. I've read a dozen other books with these same tropes, settings, and romances. It bores me to tears.
The final nail in the coffin for me was the love interest. In order to have romance in this book, they turned the protagonist's fox sidekick into a human man. A giant, hunky, naked man. It's so stupid it hurts. Why does there always have to be a love interest? I mean, I know why. Romance sells. It wouldn't be a commercial fantasy without a romance. But like this? Did no one sit down and think for two seconds about how creepy it would be to have a romance between a human girl and A LITERAL ANIMAL?
Once I saw where this was going, I couldn't stand to finish it. What a massive disappointment.
I was so wrong. First, lackluster world-building and characters. I know nothing about this world or it's culture. I know there's a spooky forest and a classical vaguely-European kingdom, but that's it. You could get the same amount of information from a postcard illustration. The same goes for the characters. They have no personality or unique traits. The protagonist is a blank slate, and we barely get to know her best friend before she gets cursed. This curse sweeping the kingdom is supposed to be the inciting incident, the emotional launching pad for the story, but it all happened to people as well-rounded as a piece of paper.
All of this makes it impossible to get invested in the story. Why should I care that this kingdom is in trouble? That these people are cursed? I know barely anything about either of them. How much I care about these things is proportional to how much effort the author put into fleshing them out, so we're at a zero. On that note, this novel does nothing new or original with the fantasy genre, either. I've read a dozen other books with these same tropes, settings, and romances. It bores me to tears.
The final nail in the coffin for me was the love interest. In order to have romance in this book, they turned the protagonist's fox sidekick into a human man. A giant, hunky, naked man. It's so stupid it hurts. Why does there always have to be a love interest? I mean, I know why. Romance sells. It wouldn't be a commercial fantasy without a romance. But like this? Did no one sit down and think for two seconds about how creepy it would be to have a romance between a human girl and A LITERAL ANIMAL?
Once I saw where this was going, I couldn't stand to finish it. What a massive disappointment.