This book review was part of a podcast discussion.
Listen to the episode here.
I really enjoyed this book and recommend it to those who are looking for a strong heroine, regardless of reader age.
*potential spoilers ahead*
The book has two main protagonists: Makenna the Hedge Witch and Tobin the Knight, each on opposite sides of a war. I expected them to meet in battle, grow attached, and probably fall in love, a typical teen fantasy aimed at girls. The knight saves the heroine. She draws out his sensitive side. They join to fight the forces of evil and win, living happily ever after. I was wrong.
We meet Makenna as an 11-year-old just after her mother was murdered for being a witch. She sabotages the town she knew and loved for the injustice and wanders the wilderness. Targeted by trickster goblins, Makenna captures and indebts one named Cogswhallop, who tells her of balances. For every favor, such as freeing him from a trap and saving his life, a debt is owed. Cogswhallop is indebted even more when Makenna saves his fellow goblins from being killed just for being goblins. She swears to fight against the humans for the goblins and Cogswhallop calls her general, and I wanted more. By the end of chapter three, I didn’t care that Makenna was a preteen, I was invested in their plight: goblins and witches (both helpful to villagers, I might add) killed for being who they are. They’re fighting against a theocracy who uses their power to target those who they claim are the Dark One’s minions.
A five year time jump and we meet Tobin, a disgraced knight who fought the Southern Barbarians until he took the fall for his younger brother’s involvement in a treasonous plot. He receives a chance to redeem himself by removing the powerful sorceress who has enslaved the goblins in the north. The priest who charges him tells him about the goblins and the sorceress: she is evil and has put a spell on the goblins, cowardly creatures with no loyalty who do not feel love. During his skirmishes with Makenna and her goblins, which end with his capture, Tobin comes to realize the deception. The sorceress has relatively little magic, the goblins follow her by choice, and above all, the goblins are loyal to those they love, and have the courage to fight for them. Tobin even says in chapter 14, “It’s just… I guess we’re not as different as I though.”
The Goblin Wood‘s theme is balance. It’s how the goblins do favors, and for everything Makenna does for the goblins, they do for Tobin. Big picture, you could say that the humans and goblins are keeping a balance. Makenna saves them, indebting goblins to humans, and they save Tobin, ending the debt and keeping the scales balanced. In the book, Makenna says how she lost six goblins in battles over the years. She also says later that she’s killed six people. Another balance. Besides balance, there are also reverse parallels between Makenna and Tobin. Makenna lost her mother and left humans. Tobin saved his brother and was exiled. She pushed them away and he was trying to earn them back.
Minnesota
Caty Willis works a boring day job, but in downtime fancies herself an artist and writer. She loves reading, especially fantasy, and dreams of opening a bookstore one day. Follow her on Twitter @shimmybook.
