Book Thoughts: Ash

Title: Ash
Author: Malinda Lo

I really wanted to love this book. I didn't.

I love the idea of this book. I adore fairytale retellings (and, okay, I'm a bit of a sucker for the Cinderella story), and this one put a really cool twist on it -- Ash (the Cinderella character), rather than falling in love with the prince, falls for the king's huntress, aided not by a fairy godmother but by a fairy (think faerie) who's in love with her. It was such a cool story and I absolutely adored Malinda Lo's twist on this classic tale.

What I didn't love was the writing style. It read, to me, like an antiquated fairy tale -- which fits for the kind of story this is, I guess, but it feels very forced and one-dimensional as a narrative style for an entire novel. I had no emotional connection to Ash or her relationships with Sidhean or Kaisa. Ash at one point describes fairy tales as stories with a lesson to be learned; I kind of felt this way about the novel ASH. It's less of a novel that you get emotionally invested in and more one that's like oh, okay, Cinderella but she loves a girl and also love is important. You don't feel the love, you just sort of read about it.

I don't know. I did enjoy ASH because as I said, such a cool twist on the story, but I kind of had to drag myself through the style and I don't feel attached to the characters at all. But as this is Malinda Lo's first novel, I love her blog, and her newer books aren't fairytales, I'll definitely try something else of hers.

Book Thoughts: Wicked

Title: Wicked
Author: Gregory Maguire

My favorite movie as a kid was The Wizard of Oz and I loved the book, and I recently developed a deep love for the musical Wicked -- so of course the next natural step was to read the book on which the musical was based.

When I first wanted to read Wicked, my dad told me I should wait because it was too "grown-up" for me. I finally got back around to it and at first didn't understand what it was that he thought was so awful about it; there were some allusions to sex, one unpleasant murder towards the end, they said the word "nipple" once, but nothing that seemed to justify having me wait to read it.

Having finished the book, I think I understand. It's not that the content would have been horribly inappropriate (although I probably would have asked some uncomfortable questions about sex, true), it's that the themes -- religion, politics, the nature of evil, whether there is a soul -- would have confused little-me and gone right over my head.

I have to say I prefer Baum's original and the musical version because I'm a sucker for happy endings and the writing style of Wicked wasn't as engaging as I would have liked, but I did really enjoy reading this one. It's given me a lot to think about, and it was really awesome revisiting an old favorite from a completely different perspective. I'm glad that I waited to read it, because I got so much more out of it now than I would have several years ago. There's a LOT in this book that's food for thought. I would definitely advise trying it!

Book Thoughts: Hood

Title: Hood
Author: Stephen R. Lawhead
Series: King Raven #1

I just finished reading this one, and it was not what I expected, nor did I expect to enjoy it as much as I did.

Hood is the first in a trilogy that is a retelling of Robin Hood -- but rather than in Sherwood Forest, it's set in the dark forest of medieval Wales and chock full of British political intrigue. I've always been a fan of the Robin Hood story (come on, who didn't love the singing-animals Disney movie of it?), but I wasn't sure what to make of the Welsh names and mythology.

But any wariness I had was swept away in the story. I enjoyed recognizing the various reincarnations of the traditional Robin Hood characters (Bran as Robin, Iwan as the Welsh form of John, so Little John, and of course Merian), but I also got sucked into this as a story all its own. There are parallels to Robin Hood, definitely, but it isn't a direct retelling. It's more a "reimagining."

There were places where the writing felt a little forced, but the story makes up for it. It's a decidedly dense novel (took me several days to read it), but that's because it is packed with Welsh lore and adventure.

Hood probably isn't for just anyone, but if you're a fan of the Robin Hood story and/or medieval stories and/or adventure, you should give this one a try.