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librarianryan 's review for:
Finding Baba Yaga
by Jane Yolen
I love Jane Yolen. I have since childhood. With over 350 works to her name she is prolific writer that is a must for almost all adolescents. When she is not writing “rip your heart out” historicals like the Devil’s Arithmetic, or cute as a button picture books, she is a master reteller of fairy tales.
Her newest take on retelling is the story of Baba Yaga, the Russian witch that lives in a house with chicken feet, that moves at her will. But this isn’t any retelling, in fact, I don’t think of it as a retelling, more as a companion story.
Natasha, Tash as she prefers, has run away from home. She has run to the woods and into the house of Baba Yaga. There she will experience heartbreak, security, adventure, and hope. But much of this is said between the lines.
This book is entirely in prose, each chapter a few poems long. It has an timeline that feels part of Back to the Future. Tash is modern, lives in the modern world, but once she is with Baba Yaga, it is almost as if time flows backward. When another young woman comes into the house, and seeks her prince, and horseback and drawbridges come into play. The best word I can think to describe this work is interesting. Being in prose leaves so many purposeful holes. Since I was reading a galley, I didn’t have the readers guide at the back, but I almost wanted that, to see if I was getting from the story what the author and publisher were intending.
For all intents and purposes this is a fairy tale, even when the book itself is telling you this is not a fairy tale. It does not have the prince kissing his girl at the end as they ride off into the sunset. It is both that you think and what you don’t think of a fairy tale. Love is not love, but something that can rot both people and stories. The villains are not the over dramatized stereotypical men of these types of tales, but the real people from who you need to escape.
Overall, I liked this book, but am not sure I understand it all. It does not read like Pay the Piper, or Beauty, but like it’s own space alien thing...like a dream where you only remember bits and pieces.
Will this be the book mentioned on Yolen’s tombstone at her death, not even close, but for those of us die hards, it is another tale to spend an afternoon dwelling within.
#MountTBR
#ReadHarder
#Booked2019
#LittenLoveBingo
#NancyDrewChallenge
#BNFantasyChallenge
#KillYourTBR
#SFFTBRChallenge
Her newest take on retelling is the story of Baba Yaga, the Russian witch that lives in a house with chicken feet, that moves at her will. But this isn’t any retelling, in fact, I don’t think of it as a retelling, more as a companion story.
Natasha, Tash as she prefers, has run away from home. She has run to the woods and into the house of Baba Yaga. There she will experience heartbreak, security, adventure, and hope. But much of this is said between the lines.
This book is entirely in prose, each chapter a few poems long. It has an timeline that feels part of Back to the Future. Tash is modern, lives in the modern world, but once she is with Baba Yaga, it is almost as if time flows backward. When another young woman comes into the house, and seeks her prince, and horseback and drawbridges come into play. The best word I can think to describe this work is interesting. Being in prose leaves so many purposeful holes. Since I was reading a galley, I didn’t have the readers guide at the back, but I almost wanted that, to see if I was getting from the story what the author and publisher were intending.
For all intents and purposes this is a fairy tale, even when the book itself is telling you this is not a fairy tale. It does not have the prince kissing his girl at the end as they ride off into the sunset. It is both that you think and what you don’t think of a fairy tale. Love is not love, but something that can rot both people and stories. The villains are not the over dramatized stereotypical men of these types of tales, but the real people from who you need to escape.
Overall, I liked this book, but am not sure I understand it all. It does not read like Pay the Piper, or Beauty, but like it’s own space alien thing...like a dream where you only remember bits and pieces.
Will this be the book mentioned on Yolen’s tombstone at her death, not even close, but for those of us die hards, it is another tale to spend an afternoon dwelling within.
#MountTBR
#ReadHarder
#Booked2019
#LittenLoveBingo
#NancyDrewChallenge
#BNFantasyChallenge
#KillYourTBR
#SFFTBRChallenge