Review: Nettle & Bone

Nettle & Bone by T. Kingfisher
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

If I feel that a book isn't working, I try my best to pin down why it isn't working. Not to justify my uneasiness, but rather to sharpen my skills at becoming a better reader. Sure, there's the whole escapism aspect, but, if you don't analyze a book, did you even read it?

With N&B, I feel its biggest sin is that it starts in the wrong place. To be fair, most of the world-building should be in the first act, but this book is so overly weighed down by set up it could tip even the scales of justice. While the first act remains engaging enough to keep with it, not much happens in terms of plot. A good one-third of the book has passed before it truly gets started. Not that I'm recommending you skip ahead or anything.

Once it gets started, everything else does fall into place nicely. Pacing beyond that point is strong. So are prose and characters. If it wasn't for this book's original sin, I probably would have rated it higher. Though, I will say nothing in here really knocks my socks off. While maintaining its own imprints of originality, much of it just feels like I've read it somewhere before. It's good in many ways, but limbos under being great in every way I can think of.

At the end of the day, there isn't much to say about N&B. If someone asked me to recommend this book, I would say they can do a lot worse. Though, maybe I'm too overbearing on the books I read. That I can't see the forest for trees and all that nonsense. Then again, it might all just come down to personality. After all, you can't spell analyze without (being uptight).

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