Thursday, April 14, 2016

The Forest and the Tower

Naomi NovikI started Naomi Novik's Temeraire series with a bang but then lost steam somewhere around the third book and never got back into it.  So I admit I was not all that excited about about her new stand-alone novel, Uprooted.  But the book got rave reviews from people I trust, so I thought I should give it a go.

Of course, the large hardcover edition came into the library just before I was off on a trip to the other side of the world.  It also came in at the exact same time as another large hardcover fantasy novel I wanted to read.  After some serious agonizing, I chose to take Uprooted with me on my trip and leave the other book behind.  And, pretty much as soon as I read the first page, I was sure I had made the right decision.

To digress for a moment, one of the reasons I get a little bit annoyed by all the love and adulation that Game of Thrones has inspired from the HBO series is that I think of Game of Thrones as a fantasy throwback.  Maybe it was of the moment when the series first started being written about 20 years ago, but now, it just feels a bit dated and outmoded to me.  The fantasy genre has evolved past the massive doorstoppers, series of 10 books each, swords and sorcery and all the rest.  I'm sure those types of books are still being written and enjoyed, but I love that the genre has expanded to include so much else, too.  And so while I really enjoyed Game of Thrones when I first started the series, I have no real desire to continue with it.  I prefer the way fantasy is now.

And that's why I think Uprooted really works for me.  While Uprooted is very firmly rooted in traditional fantasy and folk tales, it is also very much a modern novel.  The book stands on its own without two more books to follow, features a gloriously strong heroine, focuses on friendship and caring for others, and there is no objectification of women (or men).  Hooray!

My favorite thing about Uprooted is one of its key themes, the push and pull between caring for individuals and caring for populations.  How important is it to save one person when an entire group of people is at risk?  Alternatively, how easy is it to lose empathy for others if you never consider them as individuals?  I loved the way Novik explored this with Agnieska and the wizards.  Agnieska is deeply rooted to her home, her family, and the people she grew up with.  She loves them all and knows them.  In contrast, the wizards, all of whom have lived far longer than her and seen everyone they care about come and go, seem to care very little for individuals.  They care more for symbols and countries and larger beliefs.  Both beliefs make sense, and I really appreciated the way both sides played out throughout the novel.

My other favorite thing about this book was the friendship between Agnieska and her friend, Kasia.  Some readers are apparently disappointed that Agnieska and Kasia's relationship did not become a romance.  I was not disappointed by that at all; I love when authors give equal footing to friendship as they do to romance.  Friendship can be so hard to write well because it develops deeply over time.  Novik took a friendship that had existed for both girls' entire lives, and she brought so much honesty and trust and forgiveness to it.  I loved everything about how this friendship was brought to life.  It was wonderful.

There is a romance in this book, but it does not take center stage.  While I found it believable in some ways, I also don't think the male character was developed well enough for it to capture my heart or imagination.  That said, I loved the way Agnieska acted in the romance.  She never considered herself unworthy, she never considered them unequal, and even when it seemed like maybe things wouldn't work out, she went on with her life doing good things for many people.  It was excellent.

This book got me through several nights of jet lag (or perhaps exacerbated the jet lag since I was totally open to reading it at all hours of night).  I think it was a little long at the end, but other than that, it was lovely.  Exactly the sort of fantasy novel that I love; I can't wait to purchase a copy of the book for myself.  And while I know I said I'm so thrilled that this is a stand-alone novel, I also would love to jump back into this world and spend more time there.

15 comments:

  1. I also really liked it. Like you I wasn't especially attached to the male lead but that didn't prevent me from being invested in their relationship, and I missed *them* during the second half of the book. Did you considered it an adult of YA book? I'm for YA. Also: I liked the sex scenes (A YA book with sex scenes! Almost as if, you know, sex was part of young adult's lives! But maybe it's not YA at all...).

    Another question: saw a lot of reviews that felt their relationship was abusive, but until reading them I didn't feel it at all, and I'm pretty sensitive to that. He was a rude jerk, but not really abusive. She could hold her own!

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    1. Yes, I agree - I wish she and Sarkan had more time together, too. I like how she managed to randomly contact him, but those were brief moments. It was clear she trusted him and depended on him, but his reliance on her was less obvious (except with the magic), and I think I wanted that to click more.

      I did not think the relationship was abusive, either. The one part that gave me pause was when he did the whole illusion with the prince and their time together. I don't think that was abusive, really, but it definitely made a point about gender and power dynamics. I agree, he was pretty rude. But I assumed a lot of that was due to his inability to really connect with people any more vs him being a bully. I think he just had trouble understanding how other people viewed him.

      As for YA vs adult - eh, I don't really care. I guess it could be YA because it features 17-year-old girls? But it has some pretty deep themes about trust and honesty and empathy for others. Not that teenagers don't understand those, but I think those aspects of the novel makes me put it more in the adult camp.

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  2. Great to see this review! I kept meaning to read the Temeraire books, but never started them. Maybe I'll just go with this one instead!

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  3. I don't read a lot of fantasy but I read this book last year and really enjoyed it. The thing I remember most about it is the Wood - it has such an evil presence in the story!

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  4. I'm in the middle of this audiobook now. I'm enjoying too. I think that is an adult book more than a YA.

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  5. It was good, but I never felt it was amazing..something was missing, I can not remember what

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  6. What a beautiful cover! And I'm all about books giving importance to friendships. I do enjoy romantic storylines, but the tyranny of romantic relationships in stories can get old.

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  7. I am really looking forward to this. I have heard good things about it! Glad you mostly liked it!

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  8. I enjoyed this recently also. I like what you had to say about friendship. I thought that the scene revealing how complicated Agnieska and Kasia's friendship was, with both resentments and love, was very well done and very realistic.

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  9. I agree the Temeraire series lost steam, but I loved Uprooted

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  10. Oh, I loved this book and I'm so glad you love it, too! I really love your point about caring for individuals vs. populations--that's a theme that I find very interesting, because I think that this issue comes up so often, but so many books brush it away with convenient plotting to remove the conflict. It's a really interesting part of our moral makeup, and I don't think I had thought about how big a theme it is here till now. Great stuff!

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  11. This one sounds so good and especially caters to my desire to read more fantasy. Hopefully my library has a copy of this one.

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  12. I was sorry that the friendship with Kasia didn't stay center stage as the book went on, but yeah, that was lovely to see as a crucial part of the story. Since reading this book, I've read a few critiques of Agniezka's relationship with the magician (ack, I can't remember his name!), which I think are probably fair. But it was okay to me as I was reading. It reminded me a bit of Sophie and Howl so I got very soft-hearted about it.

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  13. I've seen Novik's books about and been intrigued, but those were the series books and so I haven't gone further than that - a standalone sounds good. I like series but I'm still on #7 of a 10 book series, one every couple of years - I know what you mean. This sounds good and I like the population theme you talk of, it can come up in films but in a different way; surely more detailed in a book.

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  14. I really liked this one too ... but I started out listening to the audio, which was a mistake. I didn't like the narration and couldn't erased the voices from my head, even after I switched to print. :(

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