Wintersong by S. Jae-Jones
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This book had the greatest beginning of all time: I am CHALLENGING everyone who reads this review to find a better one than this!!
“Winter turned to spring, spring to summer, summer into autumn, autumn back into winter, but each turning of the year grew harder and harder as the little girl grew up while the Goblin King remained the same. She washed the dishes, cleaned the floors, brushed her sister’s hair, soothed her brother’s fears, hid her father’s purse, counted the coins, and no longer went into the woods to see her old friend.”
A FREAKING PERFECT BEGINNING of introducing a world where magic is hidden/not the norm but exists, a girl who use to be part of that world but eventually left for “reality” but the Goblin king never forgets a bargain..muahha
“Käthe made a face. “It’s always about Josef with you. Don’t you have any dreams of your own?”
I did. They were locked up in a box, safe and sound beneath the bed we shared, never to be seen, never to be heard.”
The burden of being Lisel, the responsible older sister and dutiful eldest daughter who must always put her needs above others. At times it was scary how much I related to this character and the sibling relationships were done sooo well. You know characters are well developed when you want to physically punch their face. So good job!
“Tsk, tsk.” The Goblin King waved one long, slender finger at me. “I had thought you a worthy opponent. We were playing a game, Fräulein, but you don’t seem much inclined to engage me.”
Its the best game in the world: one where he takes what you love and hides it. And if you don’t come find it then its his forever. A game that forces you to make selfish and selfless decisions. I’ll be perfectly honest guys I am wayyyy to emotionally invested in this plot.
AND THAT PLOT TWIST !
“Liesl,” Josef said again. “I’m so very glad you’re safe. But I must ask you: who have you been searching for?
Spoiler
None of us understand what you’ve been talking about. Who, my dear, is Käthe?”
Oh SNAP WHAT THE FUCK FUCK OH THAT GOLBIN FUCKING TRICKERY KING
In this treacherous game, the Goblin king has his tricks but Liesls has her stubborness….we shall see who prevails in the end *Stubborness all the way i believe in you Liesl!!*
“And what had I done with the Goblin King’s gift? I had taken it and hidden it away, like it was something secret, something shameful. Perhaps my lack of faith had cost me everything after all.”
This is where true writing shows: the classic -show don’t just tell- was so prominent and well done in this book I wanted to cry. The author DID NOT just simply tell us over and over again about the wisdom of Liesl and how smart she is and what a good sister, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH!!! The author showed her love of her family through her sacrifices and her thought
“So I tried my best to stifle hope. Because hope’s twin was despair, and despair was infinitely worse. If hope hurt, then despair was the absence of hurt. It was the absence of feeling. It was the absence of caring.
I wanted very much to care.”
This is one of the most beautiful and powerful descriptions i have ever read that really showed the struggle of a character to just enrapture us reader. The only thing worse than caring, is not caring at all and I feel like a lot of people would relate to struggles Liesl went through. Being in the goblin world, she slowly looses her spark/energy and I know we can all think of places that drain our own spark.
“I am Elisabeth,” I said. “But Elisabeth is only a name. An empty word I fill with myself. But you had a word once; I see the echoes of it within you.”
This part of the book had me on the edge of my seats. This silly girl with music in her heasrts turned out to be so much more. Short-tempered yet disciplined. Self-indulgent, selfish, yet selfless. She is compassion, hatred, and contradiction all in one. I love Liesl as a character with a deeper understanding than most. I related to her like no other and she helped me with my own shit and this description really soothed me.
And the Golbin king? I would actually kill to find out his name.
Now for my complaints:
1. While the goblin kingdom was meant to be mysterious at times it seemed incomplete
2. While i did love the emphasis on character development, the actual actions were less than satisfied with the most chaotic thing being a simple ball at the beginning
3. Brief skim over the siren creatures that are part of their world but not…?
4. I have others but right now i’m on a book high and i just loved this novel
The wait and agony for book two is slowly killing me, so obviously you all need to read this to share my pain 😉
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