A review by rainysakura
The Tricking of Freya by Christina Sunley

5.0

I participated in a book swap event on Facebook, and this is one of the books I received. It sat on my shelf for months, my excuses ranging from "I'm too busy" to "I need to finish Harry Potter first" and even "I prefer reading on my Kindle". Eventually I sat down to read the first chapter. Good thing I didn't have anything going on that day because I had read about half of it before I finally put it down. This story is a combination of so many things I love to see in a book: the innocence of childhood, excellent character development, SENSATIONAL writing (like, seriously, sensational) and even a little language learning. I have studied language and linguistics for years, and reading this book made me want to study Icelandic. In my opinion, this isn't a book that will have you on the edge of your seat waiting to find out what the "family secret" is (I predicted to my husband by the end of chapter four how the book would end). What you will get out of it, as I did, is an adoration for Freya the child and for her sweet imagination and innocence. You'll have a love-hate relationship with her aunt, and you'll have an urge to google recipes for pönnukökur. If you're anything like me, you'll stop reading the book only to watch a documentary on Iceland. You'll see a little of yourself in Freya and maybe even in her relatives. You'll try to pronounce the name Ingibjorg aloud and laugh at how utterly ridiculous you sound. You'll look up flights to Reykjavik (and find one for $550 round trip from NYC!), then proceed to resist the urge to buy said ticket.

tl;dr: this book made me feel a lot of things, and I'm so glad I read it. I recommend it wholeheartedly to you, fair review reader.