Similarly to when your favorite TV show ends, or when you finished the last Harry Potter book, or after you graduate, I sat back and sighed when I turned the last page of "Uprooted" because the moment was over.

Naomi Novik has written a well-crafted novel that manages to have both excellent writing expertise and passionate style. Its been a long time since I read for three hours straight, but that's the kind of novel "Uprooted" is. Novik's words flow, as if she wrote the whole novel in one setting. I loved Agnieszka (pronounced ag-NYESH-kah), the main character, with her dirty hems and tangled hair, and even her name itself was so jarring and messy when I tried to pronounce it. I loved the Wood and Novik's telling that a non-corporeal body can be the greatest enemy. Just like hatred and spite and malice and complacency, the Wood represents all our greatest fears turned wrong. The conflict between Agnieszka and the Wood is a timeless one, interpreted by Novik in a unique and wonderful way. With its vivid descriptions and almost cinematic visuals, its not like any other book that I've read this year.

... it seemed exactly the twisted sort of thing the Wood would do, turning love into a weapon. (page 173)

I could see light shining through my own skin, making a blazing lantern of my body, and when I held up my hands, I saw to my horror faint shadows moving there beneath the service... I was shining like a sun, the thin shadows moving through me like fish swimming beneath the ice in winter. (page 110)

I should have been spent. But magic was still alive and shivering in my belly, too much of it with nowhere to go, as if I were an over-ripe tomato that wanted to burst its skin for relief, and there was an army outside our doors. (page 350)

A magical, shining adventure full of heart. Recommended if you enjoyed The Lord of the Rings, folk tale fantasy, and books that you just can't put down.