Overlong and slow-paced, but compelling despite its flaws.
Griffith picks up Hild's story where her eponymous 2013 novel left off.
When last we saw Hild, she had just been made the Lady of Elmet. She and her new husband (and half brother), Cian Boldcloak, are responsible for holding southern Northumbre for her uncle Edwin, the king. The 7th century was a tumultuous time in Britain. Regional rulers like Edwin clashed as they sought to control the whole island and Christian priests vied with old gods. Hild survived a perilous childhood by making a reputation as a seer and, later, by becoming a fierce warrior. What she wants isn’t power; it’s a safe home for those she loves and those in her care. She knows that war is coming, and leading her people through it will require foresight, cunning, and terrible sacrifice. As she did in Hild, Griffith offers a richly textured vision of life in early-medieval Britain. She takes incredible care in the language she uses, avoiding modern metaphors and generally choosing words of Germanic or Celtic origin over Latinate words. She also dots her text with terms straight from Old English, which has the wonderfully paradoxical effect of pulling the reader into Hild’s universe while reminding us that this place is, for us, strange and ultimately irrecoverable. And there are moments of exquisite poetry throughout the text, particularly in descriptions of the natural world. Where this book falters is in its length, its pace, and a list of characters that will be unmanageable for most readers. For example, the first quarter of the book—almost 200 pages—describes the lead-up to a war between Edwin and rival kings. The political machinations are not easy to follow; nor are they, ultimately, very enlightening. Most of the conversations among Hild, Edwin, and other powerful players are about what they don’t know and, given that the text seldom strays from Hild’s point of view, the reader receives no insights that she doesn’t have. There’s also a tremendous amount of repetition. The word “seax”—a type of knife—occurs 92 times in this novel and, in most instances, Hild is grasping hers or adjusting hers or drawing attention to hers because she feels uneasy or wishes to assert her power. And every time she does it, she becomes more of a figure from pantomime than a real and singular woman.
Overlong and slow-paced, but compelling despite its flaws.Pub Date: Oct. 3, 2023
ISBN: 9780374208080
Page Count: 736
Publisher: MCD/Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: July 15, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2023
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.
A young woman’s experience as a nurse in Vietnam casts a deep shadow over her life.
When we learn that the farewell party in the opening scene is for Frances “Frankie” McGrath’s older brother—“a golden boy, a wild child who could make the hardest heart soften”—who is leaving to serve in Vietnam in 1966, we feel pretty certain that poor Finley McGrath is marked for death. Still, it’s a surprise when the fateful doorbell rings less than 20 pages later. His death inspires his sister to enlist as an Army nurse, and this turn of events is just the beginning of a roller coaster of a plot that’s impressive and engrossing if at times a bit formulaic. Hannah renders the experiences of the young women who served in Vietnam in all-encompassing detail. The first half of the book, set in gore-drenched hospital wards, mildewed dorm rooms, and boozy officers’ clubs, is an exciting read, tracking the transformation of virginal, uptight Frankie into a crack surgical nurse and woman of the world. Her tensely platonic romance with a married surgeon ends when his broken, unbreathing body is airlifted out by helicopter; she throws her pent-up passion into a wild affair with a soldier who happens to be her dead brother’s best friend. In the second part of the book, after the war, Frankie seems to experience every possible bad break. A drawback of the story is that none of the secondary characters in her life are fully three-dimensional: Her dismissive, chauvinistic father and tight-lipped, pill-popping mother, her fellow nurses, and her various love interests are more plot devices than people. You’ll wish you could have gone to Vegas and placed a bet on the ending—while it’s against all the odds, you’ll see it coming from a mile away.
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781250178633
Page Count: 480
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023
PERSPECTIVES
BOOK TO SCREEN
Lush, gorgeous, precise language and propulsive plotting sweep readers into a story as intelligent as it is atmospheric.
In 16th-century Madrid, a crypto-Jew with a talent for casting spells tries to steer clear of the Inquisition.
Luzia Cotado, a scullion and an orphan, has secrets to keep: “It was a game she and her mother had played, saying one thing and thinking another, the bits and pieces of Hebrew handed down like chipped plates.” Also handed down are “refranes”—proverbs—in “not quite Spanish, just as Luzia was not quite Spanish.” When Luzia sings the refranes, they take on power. “Aboltar cazal, aboltar mazal” (“A change of scene, a change of fortune”) can mend a torn gown or turn burnt bread into a perfect loaf; “Quien no risica, no rosica” (“Whoever doesn’t laugh, doesn’t bloom”) can summon a riot of foliage in the depths of winter. The Inquisition hangs over the story like Chekhov’s famous gun on the wall. When Luzia’s employer catches her using magic, the ambitions of both mistress and servant catapult her into fame and danger. A new, even more ambitious patron instructs his supernatural servant, Guillén Santángel, to train Luzia for a magical contest. Santángel, not Luzia, is the familiar of the title; he has been tricked into trading his freedom and luck to his master’s family in exchange for something he no longer craves but can’t give up. The novel comes up against an issue common in fantasy fiction: Why don’t the characters just use their magic to solve all their problems? Bardugo has clearly given it some thought, but her solutions aren’t quite convincing, especially toward the end of the book. These small faults would be harder to forgive if she weren’t such a beautiful writer. Part fairy tale, part political thriller, part romance, the novel unfolds like a winter tree bursting into unnatural bloom in response to one of Luzia’s refranes, as she and Santángel learn about power, trust, betrayal, and love.
Lush, gorgeous, precise language and propulsive plotting sweep readers into a story as intelligent as it is atmospheric.Pub Date: April 9, 2024
ISBN: 9781250884251
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 3, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2024
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