Saturday 9 April 2016

The Darkest Part of the Forrest by Holly Black

20958632Book Blurb (from goodreads)
Children can have a cruel, absolute sense of justice. Children can kill a monster and feel quite proud of themselves. A girl can look at her brother and believe they’re destined to be a knight and a bard who battle evil. She can believe she’s found the thing she’s been made for

Hazel lives with her brother, Ben, in the strange town of Fairfold where humans and fae exist side by side. The faeries’ seemingly harmless magic attracts tourists, but Hazel knows how dangerous they can be, and she knows how to stop them. Or she did, once.

At the center of it all, there is a glass coffin in the woods. It rests right on the ground and in it sleeps a boy with horns on his head and ears as pointed as knives. Hazel and Ben were both in love with him as children. The boy has slept there for generations, never waking.

Until one day, he does…

As the world turns upside down, Hazel tries to remember her years pretending to be a knight. But swept up in new love, shifting loyalties, and the fresh sting of betrayal, will it be enough?
 

My review:
I would like to just start this off by saying how great the book trailer for this book is, if you haven't seen it yet you should defiantly check it out. It's so creepy and the song gets stuck in your head for days. It's the main reason that I read this book.
This book follows Hazel, a young girl that lives in Fairfold, a magical place with monsters in the forest. Hazel has a brother who was cursed/blessed by a Fae, which gave him extraordinary musical powers. Following a desperate need to hunt the monsters that snatch tourists when they stray too far from the path they go out to be 'knights', using her brothers musical abilities to lure the monsters out so she can slay them, until there was an accident which stops them going out all together. This links to the coffin in the woods where a horned prince sleeps (kind of like sleeping beauty). One day he wakes up, and becomes the forests most wanted. Hazel and her brother have to find him before the monster does and he dies in order to get answers about what is going on.
Hazel is a character that knows what she wants, but not how to get it. A string of events in her life leaves her unable to think clearly and caused her to make irrational, impulsive decisions which can often hurt herself and those around her. She so desperately wants to play knight, but by no means has the skills to do so and doesn't have enough smarts to realize that she is going to get herself hurt.
Ben is insecure and doesn't know what to do with his musical gift, so he begins to neglect it, vowing to never play his music again. However, if he could of just taken a deep breath and attempted to get over this fear of making a mistake he could of been a greater help in this book. The thing that I loved the most about this character was that he was gay, and Holly Black just mentioned it and moved on. There was no conflict around it, he had normal romantic relationships just like anyone else. It was really refreshing to see, and I hope that more authors take note of this.
All in all I give this book three out of five stars:

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