hello chat I may or may not have not updated this for ages bc it was actually causing a reading slump. But I just finished this book and you're going to LISTEN to me YAP and you're gonna LIKE IT.
first and foremost, Willa's role in her people's history is... gorgeous. I'm having a hard time accepting it in a "wait no this isn't how it usually is" way. She was there to spark change. She moved without a sound and set off a new piece of history for her people. She was the last and first of an era. She was a cycle
but also this is such a personal story. It really does live up to its title - this is about Willa. She is not a vessel to tell her clan's story. She is a story of herself, her journey of finding a purpose and a home and finding something that she wanted to pour her whole self into. This is her story, and her family's. Not her clan's.
Then there's the grief. The grief that this book portrays and forces you to feel. Yes, the Padaran was destroyed - but at a cost. Yet there was no other way - and yet the rebuilding will be difficult and foreign and may lose ties with its past. Will the Faeran return to their ancient home? Will any of their past be remembered? Will they even survive?
That's where hope comes in. Hope that the Faeran will rediscover their roots, like a replanted tree. Hope that Gillen will carry on the legacy of her friend, the last woodwitch, in a good light. Hope that their language will return in full use. That the Faeran will rebuild.
We saw the dregs of this hope when the riot started, and now we must continue to hope that once the wounds scab over, the hope continues and smothers old hate.
But we are not there for it. And while that's scary (to me, at least), it's okay. This is Willa's story. She told it for herself.
Identity appears in this book to me as well. Willa may be Faeran in origin, but she is an individual. She is a spirit of the woods, part of it as much as any plant or animal.
This is just me gushing about worldbuilding, but even within the clan you see that everyone has different roles - but not exactly individuality. You have individual roles, sure, but if you're a jaetter then you must be a jaetter. Togetherness in an obsessive way, a cult-like way.
Willa learned that she can be individual as herself, not her role. She found togetherness in a loving and accepting way.
Speaking of love, the way it's treated in this book is so beautiful. Willa learning that it's not finite, that it's not a fragile thing, is so gorgeous. And again, there is establishment of that cult-like obsessiveness not being love. She learns what it truly is.
ough. Robert Beatty you've done it again.
book very good I have many thoughts
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