The Wolf Wilder | Review

The Wolf Wilder by Katherine Rundell - Middle Grade

Feodora lives in the snowy Russian woods with her mother and they are Wolf Wilders. They untame domesticated wolves that are no longer useful to the rich that had them tamed in the first place. They teach them how to run, sleep outside and how to relearn their wolf instincts so that they can survive in the wild again. This is how Feo has been brought up, around wolves, but the evil General Rakov has threatened to shoot any wolves and take her mother away if they continue wilding. With the help of an unlikely friend and her wolfpack, Feo must find a way stop Rakov and his men.

Re-reading Roald Dahl | The Witches.

I mentioned in my last post that I am doing a sort of series where I re-read a Roald Dahl book from my youth and discuss how I feel about it now as an adult. I read the BFG a couple of months ago (The next one of these will probably be the BFG now that I've seen the new film) and I very much still loved the story so I wondered if any other stories could stand the test of time too.

I chose to audiobook this book due to the fact that it's how I consumed it as a child. Every night we would listen to recorded stories at bedtime. I remember popping my cassette tape of The Witches into the player and listening as I fell asleep. I think I managed to find the same recording as even though it is in tracks, halfway through the story it randomly said 'Side two' like it would on the tape and the voice was very familiar.

I thoroughly enjoyed it and I still find the idea of the witches creepy, even though I'm now an adult and they can't smell me! I think it's actually a lot scarier than I remember it being, but perhaps I was just a braver child haha.

So I did a little research to find out a bit more about this book and it turns out that it was banned from a lot of schools and libraries due to misogyny. Dahl responded to this claim saying that that was not his intent at all and he knew many nice women, but witches could only be women and not men. This is an interesting article about what women today can learn from The Witches and the portrayal of women in it.

I didn't manage to find any other opinions on this next observation, but to me characteristics displayed by some of the witches are those that are usually associated with a Nazi stereotype. The accent given to the grand high witch is described similarly to a German accent. The way that she commands her captivated, adoring yet fearful audience is reminiscent of Nazi leader, Adolf Hitler. You have to take into consideration the time of publication, 1983, less than forty years after WWII. Animosity towards Germany was still high in Britain and so this stereotypical germanic villain would not have been considered so problematic.

Also the Jenkins family, chubby Bruno, his uptight mother and entitled businessman father, sounded so familiar to me. And then it clicked, they are basically the Dursleys. I find it interesting because JK is more than likely a fan of Dahl since, well, who isn't? But I'm going to say she probably didn't notice that the Jenkins were stuck in the back of her mind from reading The Witches when creating her own characters.

I remember watching the film a lot when I was younger too and so of course I had to re-watch it. There are some significant changes in the film, one of these being an alternate ending that's not on every edition, but *spoiler alert!* in this other ending the main protagonist is transformed back into a little boy by a good witch. This happens due to an added character, the grand high witch's assistant, played by Jane Horrocks.

Dahl himself is known to have hated the film and he described it as 'utterly appalling', apparently. I can't say that I completely agree with him on that, although the 'special effects' are a little feeble compared to today's technological advances, but hey that's 90's films for you!

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Book Review | Bodies of Water by V.H. Leslie

I've been lusting after so many books by Salt Publishing for so long! I finally caved the other month and ordered a couple, one of them being Bodies Of Water by V.H. Leslie which I'd heard really good things about.

Bodies of Water is a gothic novella written in a dual narrative. One being from the point of view of Evelyn, a woman who is currently staying at a hydropathy treatment resort, Wakewater House in the victorian era. The doctors there claim to be able to help upper class women with their 'women's problems' by using water. The other, in present day, is Kirsten who has just moved into the newly renovated apartments in the very same building and things don't seem quite right. The narrative switches from one to the other every new chapter. I really liked this aspect, I've read dual narratives before and it hasn't quite worked for me, but with this story it was perfect. The chapters are quite short and the pacing was on point, making this a very quick read. I found the plot was really creepy with slight elements of fairytale in the mix. Leslie also uses great description, without over doing it in a way that can make some books a bit long winded and this really kept me reading on.

I ordered this book having a pretty good idea of the story. I can't write this review without being honest about the fact that I was slightly disappointed that there wasn't more about the treatments that were administered at the resort included in this. I think that would have set the tone and atmosphere much more on that side of the story, although the book would have probably had to be a little longer. 

There were also couple of character's that appeared to be a bit two dimensional and sometimes a bit convenient to keep the plot moving. There's a side character in this called Manon who I would've loved to find out a bit more about, she seemed like a very interesting woman. (I don't want to say any more in case of spoilers).

However, aside from those couple of things, I did really enjoy this little book and I'll probably read it again. I read it in one sitting on a rainy day when I wasn't feeling too great. It's a pretty slim novella, but still, I couldn't put it down until it was over. I gave Bodies of Water three out of five stars. You can purchase a copy here. If you like a creepy quick read I'd highly recommend it, but perhaps not one to read in the bath!

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Book Review | The Girl Of Ink And Stars by Kiran Millwood Hargrave

I picked up 'The Girl Of Ink And Stars' in the bookshop without even knowing what it was. I was instantly drawn to it as the physical book itself is just absolutely beautiful from the cover to mapped end-pages to the illustrated borders of every page inside. Side-note – I'm so glad to have a British copy of this book, the American name is different for some reason and 'The Cartographer's Daughter' sounds nowhere near as magical. Also the book design is completely different too and way less pretty IMO.

Book Review | The Lie Tree by Frances Hardinge

I actually picked up my copy of 'The Lie Tree' in a supermarket when I was home in February. I'd heard the title a few times and had seen it around quite a bit, but I had no idea what it was about. 

Set in the Victorian era, fourteen year old Faith has grown up admiring the world of science through watching her father, Reverend Erasmus' work. More than anything Faith wants to follow in his footsteps, but of course it is not right for a young lady to be a scientist. However, the family have been forced to move out of the country due to a huge scandal surrounding her father and one night he decides to share with her with his biggest secret, the Lie Tree. Soon after, he dies under extremely suspicious circumstances. Faith, convinced that the reverend has in fact been murdered, finds herself on a path of both discovery and deceit in order to bring justice to the person who caused her fathers demise.

Book Review | The Girls by Emma Cline

*I was given a free ARC of The Girls provided by Netgalley and Vintage Publishing in exchange for my honest review.*

If you haven't already heard about this book, well where the hell have you been? Although was only just published on 14th June, Emma Cline's debut novel 'The Girls' has already had huge praise and a lot of hype around it in the book community. 

Set in 1960's California, fourteen year old Evie Boyd finds herself drifting away from her best friend and drawn to another group of girls. These girls are older, free-spirited and happen to be part of a cult.

Book Review | A Stolen Kiss

*I was given a free ARC of A Stolen Kiss provided by Netgalley and Swanifide Publishing in exchange for my honest review.*

This book is a retelling of the classic fairy-tale, the Swan Princess. We follow the quest of four teenagers, a stable boy, a ladies maid and two royals, as they travel through kingdoms, forest and swamp in search for an evil sorceress. One of them has been cursed and only the one who cast it can lift it. 

Happy Thoughts

A little round up of what's been putting a smile on my face recently

The Duck Pond. -I will never tire of this park. 

• It was Easter last Sunday and although we had no actual Easter eggs, Noah and I made Easter nests together. Then this weekend my dad came down to visit for the day and surprised us with late eggs from my mum (she never forgets) so lots of chocolate has been consumed!
• Lettuce has literally come out as a boy!... This sounds like nonsense, but seriously, there's no denying it now!
• After what feels like a year long slump, I've finally gotten back into reading for fun again! I've read 10 books in March (including graphic novels) and I'm quite happy with that!
• Following on from my last point, I will be regularly posting book reviews on here. There will be a mixture of fiction, non-fiction, graphic novel and short story collections. (You can check out my review of The Beauty here) This is one of the thing I've wanted to do on this blog since the beginning. 
• We've been marathoning doctor who from the beginning because I haven't seen any since Peter Capaldi started an Noah hasn't seen any since before then! But we've been getting so into it. Last night we watched the Van Gogh episode and there were tears all round. 
• Spring is here and the April showers have also arrived. This might not seen like something to be happy about, but I really enjoy listening to the sound of rain when I'm studying or reading or falling asleep. 
• I've been blogging for just over a year now and I hadn't even realised until yesterday, oops!
  

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