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popthebutterfly 's review for:
Beware the Wild
by Natalie C. Parker
Disclaimer: I bought my own copy of this book. Yay me!
Rating: 4.5/5
Publication Date: October 21, 2014
Genre: YA Fantasy
Recommended Age: 14+ (violence, swamp, lies, alligators)
Pages: 327
Amazon Link
Synopsis: It's an oppressively hot and sticky morning in June when Sterling and her brother, Phin, have an argument that compels him to run into the town swamp—the one that strikes fear in all the residents of Sticks, Louisiana. Phin doesn't return. Instead, a girl named Lenora May climbs out, and now Sterling is the only person in Sticks who remembers her brother ever existed.
Sterling needs to figure out what the swamp's done with her beloved brother and how Lenora May is connected to his disappearance—and loner boy Heath Durham might be the only one who can help her.
Review: I like mythological retellings, especially those that I don’t hear about a lot. But there’s something comforting from reading something that you’ve heard about before. Being a Southern girl who’s lived in Tennessee the majority of her life and now living in Georgia, I haven’t been around a lot of swamps. That doesn’t stop the stories and the cautionary tales from coming. I’ve always been taught that those swamps are filled with evil and mystery, forces that I couldn’t combat. Stay clear from them or die, they would say. So when I read this book, I felt like I was getting another cautionary tale from my mamaw about the swamp. This book is really well written and I loved the fact that it presented some American mythology in it. I felt that the writing was well done and the characters were well developed. I also liked that the main character didn’t have to rely on her love interest to help her. The power was within her to do what she wanted all along.
In the end, I thought this book needed to explain the magic a bit more and some things happened that were a bit weird considering that fact. I also felt that we should have had more backstory with the siblings and more of an afterwards with what happened at the end.
Verdict: An amazing book that will revive your fear of the dark swamps.
Rating: 4.5/5
Publication Date: October 21, 2014
Genre: YA Fantasy
Recommended Age: 14+ (violence, swamp, lies, alligators)
Pages: 327
Amazon Link
Synopsis: It's an oppressively hot and sticky morning in June when Sterling and her brother, Phin, have an argument that compels him to run into the town swamp—the one that strikes fear in all the residents of Sticks, Louisiana. Phin doesn't return. Instead, a girl named Lenora May climbs out, and now Sterling is the only person in Sticks who remembers her brother ever existed.
Sterling needs to figure out what the swamp's done with her beloved brother and how Lenora May is connected to his disappearance—and loner boy Heath Durham might be the only one who can help her.
Review: I like mythological retellings, especially those that I don’t hear about a lot. But there’s something comforting from reading something that you’ve heard about before. Being a Southern girl who’s lived in Tennessee the majority of her life and now living in Georgia, I haven’t been around a lot of swamps. That doesn’t stop the stories and the cautionary tales from coming. I’ve always been taught that those swamps are filled with evil and mystery, forces that I couldn’t combat. Stay clear from them or die, they would say. So when I read this book, I felt like I was getting another cautionary tale from my mamaw about the swamp. This book is really well written and I loved the fact that it presented some American mythology in it. I felt that the writing was well done and the characters were well developed. I also liked that the main character didn’t have to rely on her love interest to help her. The power was within her to do what she wanted all along.
In the end, I thought this book needed to explain the magic a bit more and some things happened that were a bit weird considering that fact. I also felt that we should have had more backstory with the siblings and more of an afterwards with what happened at the end.
Verdict: An amazing book that will revive your fear of the dark swamps.