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A review by hurricanetortillah
Wakenhyrst by Michelle Paver
3.0
I was really excited to read this book because I read Paver’s Chronicles of Ancient Darkness series (or the ‘wolf books’ as I refer to them) as a kid and knew from the first page of the first book that I would love them, and they have been my favourite books ever since. I tried reading another of her adult books, Dark Matter, a while ago and while the premise was really good I just could’t handle reading about all the dead animals that she seemed to be constantly throwing in (I’m a real big animal lover, I always have to check doesthedogdie.com when I wanna watch a new film). **SPOILER**,
this one still had dead animals, though thankfully less. Her writing as always, in my opinion, was amazing; I just love her style. The main protagonist, Maud, was interesting and likeable. But I just found the actual plot lacking - it left me feeling like nothing had really happened (I guess that could be a gothic thing). I didn’t really find it creepy at all, in fact the setting seemed like a lovely place to me, and I didn’t enjoy the journal entries from Maud’s father - I thought the first couple were cool but then there were way too many and they just weren’t that interesting. I thoroughly disliked his character so I always just wanted to hear more from Maud instead. I think we are supposed to dislike him because of his arrogance and misogyny, and while this is typical for the time period I’m just really fed up of misogynistic characters in books (and everywhere) right now. Because of her writing style I got through this book quickly, and it was fun but I probably won’t ever pick it up again. I was leaning towards a 2.5 star but I'm bumping it up to 3 because I love the writing so much.
this one still had dead animals, though thankfully less. Her writing as always, in my opinion, was amazing; I just love her style. The main protagonist, Maud, was interesting and likeable. But I just found the actual plot lacking - it left me feeling like nothing had really happened (I guess that could be a gothic thing). I didn’t really find it creepy at all, in fact the setting seemed like a lovely place to me, and I didn’t enjoy the journal entries from Maud’s father - I thought the first couple were cool but then there were way too many and they just weren’t that interesting. I thoroughly disliked his character so I always just wanted to hear more from Maud instead. I think we are supposed to dislike him because of his arrogance and misogyny, and while this is typical for the time period I’m just really fed up of misogynistic characters in books (and everywhere) right now. Because of her writing style I got through this book quickly, and it was fun but I probably won’t ever pick it up again. I was leaning towards a 2.5 star but I'm bumping it up to 3 because I love the writing so much.