Very much enjoyed it, easy read with great historical ties to ground the fairytale retellings the book is prevalent with. It's been quite some time since I've gone back to the brothers grimm tales, which are so much more gruesome then the retellings that came after them, but seeing as my mother read one fairytale out of the grimm book to me each night, I realize that's exactly the type of fairytale i enjoy.

It was interesting to see each chapter start with a small part of another fairytale before diving into the main story, running parallel to eachother the further you read. Trying to piece together the connection the two sisters of the fable had with Greta and her magic was fun, and seeing everything fall into place near the end was very satisfying. 

I wasn't sure what to expect from a book that explored the life of Hansel and Gretel after they've grown up, thinking it would be more of a life lesson story then anything else, but when they dived into witch burnings, skin walking and different magic systems i was hooked. The impact of the time accurate wars passing through europe and the famine and hardship the town faced because of it was a great way to ground the story. Greta herself wasn't too complicated of a character, but I appreciated how the author mostly relied on physical descriptions of how the characters conveyed their feelings and opinions, instead of perhaps staying in Greta's head and having her describe everything beat by beat. It lead to a very dynamic telling of the chemistry between her and Mathias. 

While the story did kind of lose itself in the third bit, wanting to wrap up too many threads causing a bit of a shift in the pacing, I did still quite enjoy the read, and I'll be checking out before the forest, the prequel about the origins of the witch as well.