SO RACIST

The writing was clear and lovely. The world building was strong. The story was...ok. A bit heavy on the self-sacrifice as the only form of good, but fine.

The real issue, what bumps it down to one star, is hidden in the back story of one character. This isn't a spoiler because it is really just a throwaway couple of paragraphs, and it's really really troubling. One character has been cast out from her people because of this story: She saw that creatures across the river were being enslaved, and she saved some of them and brought them home. They then turned against her people and killed many before being killed in turn. Her big mistake, the reason for her disgrace, is that she brought refugees in. And that is never not once in the whole book seen as a worthy or wonderful thing she did. Just a big mistake that she made and now she will live in shame forever. SO BAD. SO RACIST. For this reason and this alone, I would not hand this book to a child.