Thursday, January 1, 2015

The Darkest Part of the Forest by Holly Black

When you were younger, did you ever wish you lived in a land of fairy tales? Well Hazel and her brother Ben actually do, and it is not all it's cracked up to be. Filled with delightfully developed characters, Darkest Part of the Forest features POC, homosexuality, and some more topics sometimes tiptoed around in YA literature. Great for any fantasy or romance lover, Holly Black's latest novel has plenty to offer a large audience looking for a voice in popular YA books.

The town of Fairfold is known far and wide for having humans and fae exist side by side. People travel from all over to visit, but many learn that tourist behavior can lead to a deadly fate. Hazel and her brother Ben have dubbed themselves heroes to protect the land, Ben with his musical magic and Hazel with mighty sword. As they grow into adolescence, they learn being knights may not be as easy as the once believed. With more and more people vanishing and dying they discover their early acts of heroism were child's play and the forest has gotten darker and scarier. An elven prince has lain asleep in a glass coffin for many years with all tourist and townsfolk alike, dreaming of what it would be like for him to awaken. Over the years Hazel and Ben have crafted tales of how mighty their beautiful prince was before put into his slumber, but when he really does wake they learn there is more evil lurking about than they ever dared imagine. Finding hidden truths, deeply deeply buried secrets and personal strengths locked away, these siblings face many battles in the forest they thought they knew.

Holly Black possesses a unique way of writing that is not always popular, however with Darkest Part of the Forest, I think even the most steadfast will buckle to its greatness. Sucked in immediately by the twisted take on fairy tale and fae lore this book will be a force to reckon with in 2015. Holly has really paved the way for this year with fairy tale based YA books and I'll be surprised to see anything keep up. What a shame it isn't out during the holiday's to send off as a great gift. (I have completed the novel and written this review on December 10th 2014 but have complied with a request to withhold my review until January)

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