I have given up thinking about reviewing the other two books in the Bishop series, because I think they might end up increasingly hysterical rants and no-one seems to agree with me, and I am moving on the the excellent and reliable Holly Black again.
Hazel and Ben live in Fairfold, a small tourist-trap town with a bunch of fairies living in the forest nearby. Once, they were as close as two siblings could be, but their relationship has fractured over the years as the weight of secrets and misunderstandings lies heavily on it. In a glade in the forest, a horned prince lies sleeping in a glass box, as he has done for generations. One day, the box is shattered, and he is gone. As the pair begin to resume their old roles, they quickly find out that they are running out of time, because the monster at the heart of the forest is on the move, and is hungry for the town.
Ben is a great main character – desperately romantic, cursed/blessed with fairy magic which he struggles with on a daily basis, and deeply in love with the idea of the horned prince. His journey is lovely to watch unfold, and it’s easy to read as both an analogy for the trials of any gifted child, and as an analogy for coming to terms with one’s sexuality.
Hazel, though, is inspired. She is complicated, makes bad decisions for bad reasons, and occasionally bad decisions for good reasons, and is a true Knight Errant in the old Romantic style. The gender reversal of the pair is mentioned briefly in the book, but it never feels strained or pushed. Hazel is jealous, and angry at herself for that jealousy, and lives her life with the terrible intensity of a person who tries to feel something, anything to make her forget the weight of the truths she is hiding from everyone. Her journey is hard to watch. It is painful and spiky and everything that I remember late adolescence being. It is beautiful.
There are many themes investigated in the book, and I suspect that everyone who reads it will take different things away. For me, it was family, the sacrifices we make for our siblings, the obliviousness of our parents, the intense bond that develops and sometimes sours. It was the weight of expectation versus the weight of one’s own heart. There’s a lot more in there that I could English Lit about, but I’m not going to, because I want another cup of tea and I didn’t make any notes, and because you should read this and find them out for yourself. Also, I want to play more Pillars of Eternity there I said it I hope you are happy now.
5 stars: will play with the fairies in the wood again. (When I’ve stopped playing PoE.)
Cross-posted to my blog here.
Have you read Holly Black’s other faerie books, Tithe, Valiant and Ironside? Because they are also excellent.
No, because you are my library. I buy new books very rarely. I mean, I am totally happy to borrow your copies, but the list of books I want is enormous and as much as I love Black she is not high on it.
Oh please oh please write hysterical rants about the Bishop books! I’m quite confident I would adore reading them :)
I meant the unfunny kind of hysterical I’m afraid. But I did some thinking yesterday and I will write about them, it’ll just be a … not be a review. More of a thinky thing. With content warnings. Several of them.
Yes, yes, yes. I adored the crap out of this book. I’m trying to write a review of it, but it keeps ending up really personal and I’m not sure I want to publish it. We’ll see.
Welp, I’m all set for deeply personal and profoundly over-share-y myself, so you’ll have my unconditional support regardless. It’s not a small thing to do.