The Wolf and the Woodsman

In this world based on Hungarian history and Jewish mythology, we follow Évike, a wolf girl from a small village, who hasn't been blessed with magic like everyone else in the village. When the woodsmen come to take one of them, the village easily agrees to send Évike along with them as their sacrifice, making the woodsmen believe she is a Seer. What follows is a dark, sad story full of love, acceptance, and violence.

The premise of this story is a good one. It is full of rich lore, with magical creatures, dark forests, and political intrigue. However, I think this story fell short in a few ways. There was so much lore that had to be told to the reader, that there would be an intense scene that was interrupted by a story. It would pull me out of the story and ruin suspense. There was also so much lore that there was no way I would've been able to keep track of all of it. I also feel like besides Évike, most of the characters felt relatively 2 dimensional. The love interest, while having some character development, didn't seem to have much personality. The romance reminded me a lot of a darker telling of Nina and Matthias, but I didn't like these characters as much. The plot was fine, but because it kept getting interrupted by the stories, it felt disjointed. The ending was exciting and suspenseful, but because I didn't feel much attachment to the characters, it didn't feel like the stakes were that high.

I will definitely try out more by this author. There is definitely potential in this story, there were just some short comings. I am still excited to see more from this author.

TW: ableism, amputation, animal death, antisemitism, blood, body horror, bullying, cannibalism, child death, death, death of a parent, dismemberment, domestic abuse, emesis, emotional abuse, genocide, gore, homophobia, immolation, murder, physical abuse, racism, religious bigotry, self-harm, sex, torture