A review by maises
Wildwood Dancing by Juliet Marillier

adventurous mysterious medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? N/A
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? N/A
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

“‘He’s dead.’ He said it as if he couldn’t believe it, even though he’d seen it with his own eyes. ‘Costi’s dead. The witch took him. Drăguţa, the witch of the wood. She pulled him under and drowned him.’”

Book club pick for October. I happened to choose this one because I enjoyed Marillier’s Daughter of the Forest so much earlier this year. I also do love a sibling-centered fairy tale, so I wanted to see what Marillier would do with the iconic Twelve Dancing Princesses (minus seven). I wasn’t sure what her writing YA would be like, but I wasn’t disappointed! This review will contain spoilers overall, but I’ll try to use the hidden text for things really specific. It’s somewhat of a mystery, after all. 

First of all - elephant in the room:
The cousin end game love is definitely a CHOICE. Not a great one. Yes, Jena’s dad and Cezar & Costi’s dad are cousins so technically they are second cousins who have been romantically linked in the narrative.
I am sure they don’t actually care because it’s [insert era that was not specified here], but also they are not real people. Please, Juliet Marillier, have mercy on my soul. I just want to read a romance from you that doesn’t have one singular element that makes me squint because your romance writing is so so good. I’m on my knees. Regardless of my own likely popular opinion on this plot point I will just say separately, I do love these characters. They have so much charm to them that I can just rewrite their relationship by the end as something completely platonic if I have to. Sorry. That’s kinda bad. 

Apart from all that, I think it was a very beautiful book. It’s one that dips into the Fairy Folk a bit more than the Sevenwaters series does, with a relationship much more genial too. Marillier’s strength really is in her world-building. She made the other world so appealing to five different girls’ interests. Even the look into the evil fae world was compelling and dark which I actually loved.

The sisters were the best. My biggest critique there is only just my personal gripe with how easily Tati pushed aside her love for her sisters in place of lovesick-induced complacency. Jena shouldered way too much of that plot on her own. But I think it’s also too easy to dislike Tati for that - I genuinely did enjoy her insane love spiral with Sorrow, the most pathetic (affectionate)
non-vampire
of the story. Sorrow was a character I wasn’t planning on liking at all, especially in the first chapters solely because of the stress it gave Jena and therefore me. But genuinely by the last few chapters I really was on Team Sorrow until the end. Especially loved the parts where
he was undergoing the trials set by the fairy queen except off-screen and you didn’t know exactly what he was up to only that he was suffering whilst doing Indiana Jones-esque feats while Jena and Costi were eating pancakes.
He was a legend for that. There’s just something about reading pathetically in-love characters but from a perspective outside of that duo. It really did exude the same energy as a younger sister viewing her older sister fall in love for the first time, which I would know firsthand. 

Cezar was a great villain. I feel like when people say this they always mean it like they love his character, but no, I hated his little annoying guts. But I think he was an amazing antagonist that really was victim to the whims of Drăguţa and fate. His descent into a pathetic (insult) and desperate version of himself felt rewarding. I did feel pity for him when I think that he
made his wish as a dumb old child and was forced to stick with it.
Even though I hated him and the things he did to Jena and her sisters, I know he was also a victim in a way. Doesn’t excuse anything of course, but I really liked that element of him thinking he’s in the right. There’s nothing scarier than a teenage boy with more authority than he should have on a power trip. That in itself is realistic enough. 

I don’t really know why I’ve rambled on this long, but I still feel like I haven’t even put down all my thoughts yet. I’ll leave it at all the things I enjoyed while reading: Gogu in general, Gogu slamming himself on the wall that one time Cezar made him mad, the supporting fae folk characters, the fairy dancing balls, Stela and Ildephonsus, the scene on the ice when
Gogu turned human
, the flashback when
Costi died and Cezar made his trade because Costi was his most beloved thing
, this Gogu quote - “If a man has to say trust me, Gogu conveyed, it's a sure sign you cannot. Trust him, that is. Trust is a thing you know without words,” the fact that Sorrow and his sister Silence are just named that apparently, pondweed pancakes, Jena and her father, the younger sisters annoying each other but are always ride or die… It was a fun time. 
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