A review by thereadingbanshee
After the Forest by Kell Woods

dark emotional mysterious medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? N/A
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.75

2.5, i obviously have mixed feelings.   

 I really love the first part of this book. 
It focused on characters, our MC mostly, took its time in a very pleasant way. The writing itself is lovely, and really set the scene and the atmosphere of the story. And i loved every part of these first 150-200 or so pages, the atmosphere was immeculate to me. 

 Then, the middle part was confusing me a bit, and I slowly (and much to my dismay) started to slowly lose interest. 
The plot was moving along, but the pacing was a bit off, and i didn't enjoy some parts of the developments.
The romance scenes were interwoven in an awkward way with the other scenes? and some of the language used in the dialogues lost its kind of old time sense, and was getting derigatory.

(Also, the issues that bothered me so much in the last part of the book that i mention below were starting to appear.)

 And the last part... well the last 100 pages or so i skimmed so that is telling. 
But even before then, the pacing just was completely off. We went from having all the detail of the MC's feelings and thoughts, to not having them when they were crucial for the developments to make sense. 
One example that really made me mad were the conviently ignored facts that would have got the MC out of the trials and also out of the carriage to Hornberg. Before she goes to her house to bake gingerbread (and so uses tattermagic and gets caught), the very last scene mind you, is Mira telling her to use her magic through the forest! And she goes and does the total opposite. And we don't get a sliver of explanation for that course of action. Greta also doesn't use here forest magic during the carriage ride, because i guess it wouldn't be convinient for the plot? Made me mad.


 The biggest issue for me was the "big" twist. I saw it coming miles away, and this could have not bothered me if the elements letting you know of this weren't so obvious but completely ignored by the MC. 
AND i hate the kind of trope that twist was based on, and hoped it would at least be done in a original way and was sorely disappointed. 
"Bad woman who seduces poor innocent men who clearly don't deserve it" trope? Really ? Your villain is a woman out of nowhere? Oh yes, no, it's actually even worse and unoriginal and done without any depth : it's because of SA. I'm tired.


In short, i think the premise and a ton of element of this book were very interesting, but sadly didn't get the execution they deserved. 
Expand filter menu Content Warnings