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lisashelves 's review for:
The Drowned Woods
by Emily Lloyd-Jones
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ / 4 stars
The Drowned Woods is a Welsh inspired fantasy story with a heist. It is a story about Mererid, a water diviner, who joins in to steal from the prince she ran from years ago.
“Things are only immortal until you kill them.”
I had sort of forgetting this book was inspired by Welsh mythology hehe. I started the book as part of Owlcrate’s read along that they organize every month for their monthly books.
The introduction for the book was very long. I afterwards learned that the story takes place in the same world as The Bone Houses, but seeing as I haven’t read that I didn’t see the connection. I would expect the introduction to not be as long as it was, when it isn’t the first book in that world. While the world-building wasn’t necessarily the things that took so long to introduce, the characters did. It felt like the introduction was “done” around 35% in, which seems long to me. it did give me ample time to get to know the characters.
Learning it is inspired by Welsh mythology, it didn’t stop me from stumbling over the names. While I don’t want to bash on the Welsh names, not knowing how to read the names made the reading a bit slower for me. Of course, it didn’t take away from the story and its plot!
I am a big fan of the plot and the world! I really enjoyed the magic system that was in place, the “other-people” and the heist. I really want more books with heists hahaha, as I really enjoy the planning, execution and everything that comes with it.
The characters were nice and I liked them. Mer was an awesome girl who was really strong. I liked how she didn’t apologize for who she was and knew what she wanted. She was really stoic, but not in an annoying was. Fane as well was someone who had his goal in mind and worked towards it. The character I enjoyed most was Ifanna. I enjoyed her a lot, especially because she was so different from how serious Mer and Fane were! I also really liked that all characters were morally grey!
The chemistry between Mer and Fane was really well done! I liked how they connected over their pasts and their grief. The fact that Fane was only comfortable around Mer, because she could kill him, was a bit funny. At the same time their growing relationship is very subtle, and thus the coming together felt a bit sudden. Almost as if some passages were the growth was better shown were removed.
The part at the well, towards the end, was very confusing to me. I read the pages multiple times, but still don’t really grasp what had gone on. I did really like the plot twist though! It was written really well and I hadn’t seen it coming! The epilogue was also super sweet!
Overall, I really enjoyed the story which had an amazing plot and worldbuilding. It took some time to get the story going, and some confusing events happened, but I really liked how the story ended.
The Drowned Woods is a Welsh inspired fantasy story with a heist. It is a story about Mererid, a water diviner, who joins in to steal from the prince she ran from years ago.
“Things are only immortal until you kill them.”
I had sort of forgetting this book was inspired by Welsh mythology hehe. I started the book as part of Owlcrate’s read along that they organize every month for their monthly books.
The introduction for the book was very long. I afterwards learned that the story takes place in the same world as The Bone Houses, but seeing as I haven’t read that I didn’t see the connection. I would expect the introduction to not be as long as it was, when it isn’t the first book in that world. While the world-building wasn’t necessarily the things that took so long to introduce, the characters did. It felt like the introduction was “done” around 35% in, which seems long to me. it did give me ample time to get to know the characters.
Learning it is inspired by Welsh mythology, it didn’t stop me from stumbling over the names. While I don’t want to bash on the Welsh names, not knowing how to read the names made the reading a bit slower for me. Of course, it didn’t take away from the story and its plot!
I am a big fan of the plot and the world! I really enjoyed the magic system that was in place, the “other-people” and the heist. I really want more books with heists hahaha, as I really enjoy the planning, execution and everything that comes with it.
The characters were nice and I liked them. Mer was an awesome girl who was really strong. I liked how she didn’t apologize for who she was and knew what she wanted. She was really stoic, but not in an annoying was. Fane as well was someone who had his goal in mind and worked towards it. The character I enjoyed most was Ifanna. I enjoyed her a lot, especially because she was so different from how serious Mer and Fane were! I also really liked that all characters were morally grey!
The chemistry between Mer and Fane was really well done! I liked how they connected over their pasts and their grief. The fact that Fane was only comfortable around Mer, because she could kill him, was a bit funny. At the same time their growing relationship is very subtle, and thus the coming together felt a bit sudden. Almost as if some passages were the growth was better shown were removed.
The part at the well, towards the end, was very confusing to me. I read the pages multiple times, but still don’t really grasp what had gone on.
Spoiler
Like why Mer didn’t just kill Renfrew and stopped the whole well from exploding, as was their whole point after finding out that he betrayed themOverall, I really enjoyed the story which had an amazing plot and worldbuilding. It took some time to get the story going, and some confusing events happened, but I really liked how the story ended.