NEBULA AWARD WINNER • HUGO AWARD FINALIST • “If you want a fantasy with strong characters and brilliantly original variations on ancient stories, try Uprooted!”—Rick Riordan “Breathtaking . . . a tale that is both elegantly grand and earthily humble, familiar as a Grimm fairy tale yet fresh, original, and totally irresistible.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review) NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF … review)
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY NPR • BuzzFeed • Tordotcom • BookPage • Library Journal • Publishers Weekly
Agnieszka loves her valley home, her quiet village, the forests and the bright shining river. But the corrupted Wood stands on the border, full of malevolent power, and its shadow lies over her life.
Her people rely on the cold, driven wizard known only as the Dragon to keep its powers at bay. But he demands a terrible price for his help: one young woman handed over to serve him for ten years, a fate almost as terrible as falling to the Wood.
The next choosing is fast approaching, and Agnieszka is afraid. She knows—everyone knows—that the Dragon will take Kasia: beautiful, graceful, brave Kasia, all the things Agnieszka isn’t, and her dearest friend in the world. And there is no way to save her.
But Agnieszka fears the wrong things. For when the Dragon comes, it is not Kasia he will choose.
Praise for Uprooted
“Uprooted has leapt forward to claim the title of Best Book I’ve Read Yet This Year. . . . Moving, heartbreaking, and thoroughly satisfying, Uprooted is the fantasy novel I feel I’ve been waiting a lifetime for. Clear your schedule before picking it up, because you won’t want to put it down.”—NPR
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I loved it, and I’m not easy to please. Novik has created a world and a story based on Eastern European fairy tales, yet far richer and more complex than any fairy tale I’ve ever read.
I am in my 7th decade and consider this one of the top 5 books I have ever read. Original, engaging, hard to put down, satisfying throughout. The ending was perfect.
“Our Dragon doesn’t eat the girls he takes…”
Alright, a confession–I think this line was an instant hook for me. It’s not a log-line, no. But it worked as a hook, and I realized my old days’ YA-loving-brain started imagining ‘things’. This means, after the hook, this line also delivered the perfect reader map of what might be happening later. Whatever my brain imagined while blushing a bit here and there, and whether it happens in the book later or not, as a writer, I’d consider this book a success. I read the sample pages in Google at one sitting. I got annoyed when 2 or 3 pages were cut from the sample. And then, when I finally got the book and read it, I realized what happened. Not in the story, no. But in the writing. (One disclaimer: I read all books from a writer’s pov. Much of my reviews will be about writing). So, I realized what makes readers keep reading, and most importantly what makes readers ‘understand’ things even when they are reading fast.
Now, if you are a professional reviewer/ readers/ advanced readers, you know how important that is–making the prose easily understandable because the books go through the advanced readers first who reads dozens of books in a month. I read dozens of early drafts and dozens of published books per month. I know what it means. In that sort of life, I must say, reading Uprooted was a serenity to my brain.
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This book made me go through this wild adventure with magic, monsters, and absolute page twisting plot turns! It was wonderful and one I love to recommend to fantasy lovers. The love story sneaks up on you when you least expect it, just like the true villain in the story. Check it out!!
This book was so good. The writing was so magical and engrossing. I loved The Dragon and Agnieszka. This was such a beautiful book. The only thing I wanted was more of an HEA at the end. But that’s my romance reader’s heart wanting that. This book was so wonderful as a standalone. It was nice to read a full story but at the same time I wanted more. I wanted more of the characters.
Great story
A lovely fantasy that reminded me of the works of Robin McKinley
I’d enjoyed the start of the Tememaire series by this author but started to lose interest several books in, so I was initially a little hesitant to try this unrelated fantasy, but I’m really glad I gave it a shot.
The characters, story, and world-building all reminded me a lot of stories by one of my all time favorite authors, Robin McKinley; stores like The Blue Sword, The Hero and the Crown, or Chalice, all stories I’ve read many times. There was a beautiful ethnic flavor (possibly based on a Polish folk story?) which added a lot to the storyline for me, and I can tell this story will be going on my rereads list.
If you enjoy fairy/folk tale type stories, or are a McKinley fan, I highly recommend you give this a try.
I feel very mean giving this book three stars. Uprooted is not Naomi Novik’s debut novel, but it was her debut into the wider fantasy sphere and her first full-length standalone. Filled with gorgeous prose and wonderful characters, this book did an amazing job capturing the fairy-tale spirit adult fantasy novels often lose, but perhaps didn’t do so well in creating a clear plot or character motivations. It reads beautifully and I still definitely enjoyed the book, but one really has to go into it with the mindset that some things will be not be as clear as they could be.
Agnieszka lives in a small village by the Wood, a forest of unimaginable terrors that regular infects or kidnaps people from the surrounding towns. The Wood itself is ever-expanding but is held back by the magic of the Dragon, a wizard that lives nearby in a tower, and in return for him keeping back the Wood he demands one teenage girl come live with him for ten years. While the girls are free after the decade is up, they are irrevocably changed, presumably abused, and leave their villages permanently to be rarely seen again. The Dragon only takes the most beautiful and talented girl of the crop, and everyone this year agrees that’s Agnieszka’s dearest friend Kaisa. But when Agnieszka realizes she has magic ability in front of the Dragon, it’s her he takes away from her family. While adapting to her new life, trying (unsuccessfully) to learn magic, attempting to discern the Dragon’s true motives, the Wood continues to creep ever onward. When magicians and royalty from the kingdom become involved in the Wood and the Dragon’s attempt to hold it back, Agnieszka is sucked into a world of politics, magicians, and the history of her land, which is drenched in so many sins it might be impossible to save.
Anyone who’s read anything by Novik knows that her prose is lush and gorgeous, absolutely dripping with imagery and wordplay, and Uprooted is no exception. Oddly enough, I found a lot of criticism online for this, calling her prose too wordy or flowery, along with a sizable amount of critiques regarding her characterization. All of this was so bizarre to me; Uprooted excels in the beauty of its writing. Novik admittedly doesn’t do characterization with grandiose displays of emotion, no wordy inner monologues or dramatic displays of affection, but all her characters were distinct, all their personality told through their actions and dialogue rather than their narration. This style reads very maturely and ensures that the writer has to make clear through actions what a character is thinking and feeling. So often I feel like the inner thoughts and outward actions of characters are antithetical to one another, but this style of writing ensured that Novik had no choice but to keep her actions in line with the character. I think this largely has to do with the type of audience leaving these critiques and for a specific reason, so let me be clear: Uprooted is not YA. You’re not going to find the traditional YA romance arc or emotions here, nor the straightforward prose. (There’s also sex in it. I promise it’s not YA.) This isn’t a dig against YA, I obviously read a lot of it, but I think the book community at large has some misinterpretations of Uprooted and the age range its for.
For someone who doesn’t usually get too invested in romance plots, Agnieszka has a good one. She’s lived her life in the thankful shadow of her best friend, Kaisa, forever overlooked in favor of her talents and beauty, doomed to be second best but in return knowing Kaisa will be the one taken away while she lives a safe life. Agnieszka’s outlook on life is greatly shaped by this upbringing, both in loyalty to Kaisa, whom she believed was never going to get a full and happy life, and in her own self-image as a messy and overshadowed young woman. Her character arc is about self-confidence and it’s incredible to see how her romance with the Dragon develops as she grows as a human being, both into her magic and into her own independent self, separate from the Dragon’s magic and from Kaisa’s shadow.
Ultimately, I think the plot was more complex than it really needed to be. There’s a striking juxtaposition between the fairy tale style and understated characterization and the often needlessly labyrinthine plot. The plot did come together eventually during the last fourth of the book, but the middle of the novel was rife with circular political intrigue, magical artifacts that served no purpose, and confusing build-up regarding the origin of the Woods. Had the plot actually been dense or the magic involved truly complicated, I wouldn’t have minded the complexity of the novel, but when the novel came to a close and plot threads began to be revealed, I was left with a sense of bewilderment. That was it? The twisting, unnecessary middle amounted to a perfectly straightforward ending. To be clear, I liked the ending. I just had an immense amount of confusion as to why the narrative’s middle was so ridiculously complex without any ultimate payoff. I really feel like I could’ve chopped off a hundred pages from this book and made something clearer out of it; no matter how beautiful the prose, it just wasn’t necessary.
Uprooted is a beautiful book that’s weighed down by the force of its own plot. A simple fairy tale this could’ve been, but when a hundred pages are shoehorned in with little relevance to the ultimate plot, it loses its way a bit. If you’re willing to take a detour into some less important subplots for the sake of reading some gorgeous writing and getting some fun character moments, you might enjoy it more than I did. If we had cut out a decent hunk out of this book, I probably would’ve given it five stars, but don’t let the three star rating deter you: if you’re looking for a more mature fairy tale, Naomi Novik is the way to go.
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It was amazing!
This book kept me up all night and had me at the edge of my seat.
it was unpredictable and made me see things at a whole new level and experience.
I really love this book!
This was so magical and enchanting and was right up my alley. The world was built out so well and the wood was alluring yet dangerous and it made for a captivating read. And I loved the touch of romance thrown in with the story. I loved the characters and this was a great read.
Another great Naomi Novik book. You don’t know what’s going to happen, the characters draw you in, and the world is scarilicious with characters who seem to have good intent, but perhaps not as pure as they themselves think.
Great take on classic eastern European folk tale.
The audible version has a good reader with a wonderful accent for the story. Think fantastical adult fairy story.
Loved it!
An appealing, unlikely young woman as hero in a strangely twisted world…great reading.
This is a book with a very original take on probably old myths and fairy tales. Full of interesting characters, fairly quick read, and enjoyable.
This book is difficult. It’s uncomfortable and unexpected and hard to love at first, but then hard to get out of your mind after reading. Complicated and sticks with you. Ultimately a love story, but not overly romantic. It’s about doing what’s right no matter the personal sacrifice, but with magic and curses and kind-of Beauty and the Beast but only very loosely.
Okay, so, I don’t think my burnout did this book any favours. It wasn’t bad, just not what I needed or wanted. I *might* re-read it one day when I’m in a better mental space.
I liked the story and loved the idea of the forest and the nature magic working throughout – especially when I got some answers at the end – but for the most part, I was bored. I never really felt like coming back to it and didn’t care about the characters, but I blame my burnout at least in parts for that. I don’t think Novik’s voice is quite right for me (though it is beautifully descriptive!) so both of those things together have muddled my enjoyment.
Having said all that, I do recommend Uprooted if you love epic fantasy!
I enjoyed this book so much. It was interesting, a bit scary, sad in places, but always well written. I also was very happy it was a full book and not a series. It was a fairy tale that was almost familiar.
Goes to show that what you expect is not always true.