This is the first 5 star book I’ve read in about a year. I’ve been frustrated with the state of Trad pub these last few years. Without getting into details, I’ll just say that I feel like more and more my tastes and the tastes of what’s getting publish/popular are two widely separate things, and getting wider.
But every now and then, our tastes converge.
Like everyone else, I first discovered Amal El-Mohtar through ‘This is How you Lose the Time War.’ That book has two authors; I’ve been a fan of Gladstone since his first book’s debut over a decade ago. After ‘Time War’ was my book of the year, I decided to read whatever El-Mohtar put out next.
If I were to describe ‘The River Has Roots,’ it’s Patricia McKillip meets ‘Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell’ in ‘Mythago Wood.’ If you’re young you have no idea what I just said, so I’ll describe it like this instead: British-inspired fairytales (without any of that morally dubious Britishness), with riddles and music and poetic language. It’s a tale of witches triumphing over evil, with kindness and love instead of violence.
This novel is in fact two novelletes stapled together and published. The first is a parable about true love triumphing over death and greed; the second is about how it is difficult to forgive, and how abusers sometimes self-justify their abuse/remember things wrong/misunderstand the nature of their relationships with their loved ones. Both are unapologetically feminist in tone; the narrative holds strong to it’s convictions.
I’ve always loved McKillip’s prose. In recent years, I’ve not been able to find a new author to scratch that peculiar poetic, fairy-tale itch that McKillip so excelled at. El-Mohtar is the first author to come close to that mythic vibe.
WHAT IS THE TARGET AUDIENCE? WHAT GENRES? WHAT MAJOR TROPES?
- Poetic language
- Music, riddles
- British Countryside
- Cottagecore witches
- Anyone 15+
- Feminist
- No fight scenes
PACING AND STRUCTURE
I listened to the audiobook, and it was 4 hours long. It was a good length, but I would have liked more. I suggest you read the audiobook, it was good.
Both novelettes in this collection were well paced and structured. Due to the short length of the overall volume, there was no room for fat. The author successfully wrote a trim and efficient story. On a mechanical level, everything which wasn’t necessary for the message/vibe was left on the cutting room floor. The author’s a master. I respect this author more than most authors because most books published these days contain at least a little bloat; not here. Maximum respect to El-Mohtar from a jaded reviewer like myself. This is the best mechanical book I’ve read in probably a half decade. You literally don’t see this sort of thing published anymore.
CHARACTERIZATION
I personally feel mixed about the book’s characters.
In book 1, the good are the women.
The Hawthorn sisters are as well characterized as is necessary for the novelette they star in. One wants to settle down, get married, start a human family; the other wants to run off to the land of Faerie and marry a gender-neutral elf. Nothing exceptional, but they served the story.
The other two main characters were the gender-neutral elf and the rich murderer man. I never got a good handle of the elf’s personality. The rich murderer man had a cardboard personality with two things painted on it: greed, and ‘if I can’t have you no one can.’
Let’s take a step back to look at the entire genre for a moment. When these authors write villains, they’re usually flat as cardboard. Unapologetic rapists, evil capitalists, bloodthirsty colonialists. I get what the authors are trying to do when they write flat villains: their political message is best served with clear and obvious themes. Cardboard motivations help point out the theme.
I’ve read a lot of books; cardboard doesn’t impress me anymore. I personally enjoy when the author puts in elbow grease. But objectively I can’t say that ‘cardboard’ never works. In this case, it works.
In book 2, the strongest character is the villain.
The main character for the second story in ‘The River Has Roots’ is actually a villain. He’s been cursed by a witch, stripped of his memories. As he gradually regains his memories, the reader slowly learns that this ‘innocent man’ is not innocent. I personally wanted him to be redeemed, but I think some readers will disagree and want him to stay punished.
The magical memory loss is an allegory for the fickleness of perception, and how two different people can perceive the same thing in different ways. This is a tale of the unreliability of memory, and how an abuser can think he’s being loving when he’s truly being oppressive. The author was deliberately tricking us into empathizing with the villain. That ain’t cardboard.
While this ‘innocent man’ is clearly a villain, he’s not portrayed as irredeemably evil. I enjoyed this. I can’t remember the last book of fantasy fiction which actually had a redeemable villain featured in this way. A+ work by the author, she did something to set herself apart.
PLOT
I enjoyed the plot of the two novelettes. The first is the story of a murder, and how the dead victim solves her own murder. The second is the story of a slowly unwound curse, and how a man who views himself as kind must come to terms with his own cruelty. Both plots are good. If you like a character-focused story, the second story was better than the first. If you like intricate plotting, the first story was the better of the two.
AUTHORIAL VOICE
As stated previously, the author had lovely prose. Reminded me of McKillip. ‘nuf said.
The author had restrained worldbuilding. Reminded me of ‘Mythago Wood,’ where if you walk into the wrong forest you will vanish into Faerieland and never come out again. It also reminded me of ‘Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell,’ where the British Empire is trying to weaponize and profit from the discovery of magic; meanwhile Faerieland has it’s own ideas.
If I am going to compare a novelist to McKillip, Holdstock and Clarke, you can bet I’m going to tell you to go read this book.
AUDIOBOOK NOTES
The audiobook added to the experience. The singing sections were actually sung, and the audio team added sound effects at moments. Worth it.
LESSONS LEARNED
As an author, I want to improve my own writing/editing skills. To that end, I like to learn lessons from every story I read. Here’s what I learned from this story:
- Cardboard characters are not necessarily bad.
- While I personally prefer to read books without cardboard characters, I must admit that a skilled author can actively choose to write a cardboard character for a specific purpose. In this case, this novel’s first villain was cardboard. That character’s simple villainy served to enhance the book’s theme, while not bogging down the tight story with unneeded length.
- I feel as though a major reason why cardboard characters worked here is because the book is so short. (Two novelettes covering a 4 hour audiobook. Effectively this is two 2 hour stories.) Trying to write a compelling cardboard character for a whole novel seems like a risky endeavor.
Here’s a link to all the lessons I’ve previously learned.
SUMMARY
While reading this book, I enjoyed it in a ‘brain off, happy vibes’ sort of way. But after I put this book under the microscope and I stopped being enchanted by the lovely prose, the book held up under inspection thematically. I can’t really ask much more than that.
This is the first 5 star book I’ve had in about a year. While I don’t think it was perfectly targeted at me as a reader, if you like books with embellished prose please check this out.
John Mendez- Book Reviews and More 