I was really intrigued by the premise and I honestly really liked the prose, but I had some trouble getting through this one. I didn't manage to finish it before the release date, mostly because I kept hitting violent bits that mad eye need to take a break and then forgetting to pick it back up. I do think I'll try to go back to it later, once I've forgotten enough to start it over.

Evike is a young woman with a backbone. She has grown up mistreated and tormented yet she always fights back. She is the only wolf girl in her village with no powers. The Holy Order of Woodsmen arrive in her village looking for a wolf girl seer to take to their Partitian king as a blood sacrifice. Her guardian Virag disguises Evike as a seer and sends her with them. When the party of Woodsmen and Evike are attacked by monsters, only Evike and the one eyed Woodsman Gaspar survive. That is just the beginning.

The detailed setting. The finely drawn characters. The growth and inner turmoil of the characters. The tension between the characters. The moral dilemmas. And the setting. Yes. The setting. There is just so much to enthuse about. I read this book for hours in the middle of the night. It was an immersion into another world. Read it and find out.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the chance to read this arc in exchange for an honest review.

Évike lives in a small pagan village surrounded by walking trees. Like all of the villagers, she lives in constant fear of the Woodsmen of King János Bárány. Every two or three years, the Woodsmen have come and taken one of the wolf-girls of the village so that her gift of pagan magic might be put to use by the king. The women never return. When Évike was a young girl, her own mother was taken, leaving her to be raised by the village seer, Vírag. Now 25, Évike remains the relative outcast of the village, as she never developed any of the four magic talents possessed by the women of her home. She can’t spark a fire with a word, she can’t forge a blade with a song, she can’t heal the injured, and she has no gift of foresight. Blame falls on her father, an outsider who left the village again before her mother was taken.

When Vírag receives a vision that the Woodsmen will soon return to the village, a drastic decision must be made. She knows that the king has sent them to retrieve Katalin, one of Évike’s peers, and a burgeoning seer herself. Fearing the fate of their village left with only one, elderly seer, Vírag calls Évike to her hut. Quickly disguising Évike and Katalin as one another, Vírag tricks the Woodsmen into taking the one wolf-girl without a hint of magic. Évike is understandably bitter, as Katalin was one of those who bullied her the most in their youth. Now she must pretend to be her as she’s taken away to the capital.

The wild forest around Évike’s village isn’t the only threat along the path to the capital, however, and monsters are very real. Soon all but the captain of the Woodsmen group sent for her are killed. Her deception is revealed, but instead of killing her for the lie, the Woodsman reveals one of his own. He isn’t a mere Woodsman. He is Gáspár Bárány, firstborn son of the king.

Évike and Gáspár forge an uneasy truce. If she helps him find the turul, a powerful source of magic that could save the king from the manipulations of his second son, he will help her search the capital for her own father and protect her people. Time is short, and the journey will be perilous, but it may be that their growing tolerance for each other hides something more…

Ava Reid has provided us with a masterful debut novel, a blend of Eastern European and Jewish history and folktale that is sure to delight older fans of Leigh Bardugo’s Grishaverse. Magic, monsters, and romance fill the pages, and the characters resonate with real-world people and events fantastically.

The Wolf and the Woodsman is available today.

My utmost thanks to NetGalley and Avon & Harper Voyager for an eARC in exchange for a fair review.

Gorgeous, one of my new favorite fantasies. I hope Ava Reid continues to write stories like this, definitely excited for her next work.

Will update this review with a link to my full blog review when it is posted!

The Wolf and the Woodsman is a darkly romantic tale of forests and fates, myths and monsters, kingdoms and killers. It’s a story that is by turns brutal and tender, a story of both the building of trust between two individuals and the building of nations - of the body, and the body politic. It’s a gorgeous, rich, haunting book, sharp as an icicle and fierce as a hawk, with a heroine I can't not fall for and a romance that will make you swoon.

I loved the pacing and structure of the stories within the story, the way the origin stories and myths behind the various magics and faiths are revealed over time, providing an echo and frame for protagonist Évike's own story, the way story is shown as propaganda, as a tool of nation-building, of mythologizing. Of making people into *a* people. There are so many stories, and I’m glad to have read this one.

Thank you to NetGalley and Harper Voyager for the advance review copy!

I'm not quite finished with this book yet, but I'm LOVING IT. Enemies to lovers, Jewish rep, actually interesting characters....this book really does have it all. The only reason I'm not done with it yet is because I'm trying to enjoy every last moment of the book. Would absolutely recommend.

Brilliantly done! I thought this would be the beginning of a trilogy, but it was tied off nicely. The writing was beautiful!

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the complimentary ARC. All opinions provided are my own.

I’ve read some powerful fantasy this year & Ava Reid’s The Wolf & the Woodsman is one of them, telling a story that hits like a bag of bricks. This book wrestles with questions of magic & faith & left me with a hopeful feeling, even if it is slightly tempered by what this romance reader would call a somewhat precarious HFN.

Unlike others in her village Évike can’t do magic. Every year her community must sacrifice one of their own to the Woodsmen on Woodsman Day & this year, it’s Évike, who’s sent in someone else’s place & against her will.

Despite the fact that she doesn’t quite fit in with the people in her community, like them she’s considered pagan & referred to as wolf-girl by the woodsmen.

But on their journey Évike wonders if there’s more to the enemy Captain who’s taken her & who leads their group than the sternness & eyepatch that first drew her attention. He blushes; he’s not a warrior despite his position as leader; he shows his feelings of guilt when his actions conflict with his religious beliefs.

But that’s the thing—no matter how drawn Évike & the Captain are to the other, he & his people believe that “faith”—in actuality, magic—is accessed most through bodily sacrifice. Thus his missing eye. & he holds himself to a set of impossible faith-based standards, which he himself struggles with because they don’t always match what seems morally best.

& she’s trying to determine her own path forward, as someone who doesn’t share his beliefs or his preoccupation with “perfection” & as someone who’s both tied to her village & ostracized within it. As someone who, as she says earlier in the book, wasn’t gifted with what everyone else around her was.

As the blurb says, TWATW is “inspired by Hungarian history and Jewish mythology” & it’s full of stunning similes that make me see the world in a fresh way; it’s gory & often dark; it’s emotional; it’s colorful. Not to mention, it walks that line between hopeful & unsettling that makes books memorable.

4.5 ⭐️. Out today!

A deeply immersive, lyrical fantasy that encompasses Jewish folklore, pagan folklore, and the fallout from empires built around religion. Evike is half-pagan, half-Yehuli and faces ostracism from both communities; however, no one ostracises her more than the ruling power, of the Prinkepatrian faith. After she's disguised as a seer and sacrificed to the Woodsmen by her own community, Evike is forced to exist with the Woodsman that she has feared her whole life. But she finds divides even within the Woodsmen, and that no community is completely united. This book explores a lot of complex topics and I would love to see a sequel to explore some of these topics further!

Thank you to NetGalley, Avon, and Harper Voyager for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

TW: violence (on-page), self-mutilation, racism, grief, death of a parent, parental abandonment, societal ostracism, bullying (physical and emotional), antisemitism, torture (I utilized StoryGraph to help me and I recommend checking out the CW/TW there as well in case any of these are triggering for you)

This was such a beautifully written book. I love fairytales and this throws you right in. It reminded me of The Witch's Heart in terms of the storytelling. While I wasn't familiar with the background of the stories, I truly enjoyed reading this. It really spoke to how important history and stories are to a people's culture and this book represents Judaism, the struggles, the hope, and is such a beautiful book. I wish I could do it better justice in this review.

Honestly, this is a book I know I'm going to go back and reread and get more from each and every time. The romance was a subplot, but the sexual tension, the forbideness was building throughout. Both Évike and Gáspár are outsiders, tied to their religious beliefs, but can also relate to the other through shared experiences. A gruff, prince who also blushes and gets on his knees for the woman he loves. I loved how the physical intimacy and close-proximity of the journey forced them together. The book was a bit more graphic than I was expecting, but the writing was excellent, my reactions visceral.

I really recommend this for someone who appreciates fairytales, mythology, history, or is just looking for something different, with of course a beautiful romance.

Rating: 4
Steam: 2 (brief descriptions but ultimately fade to black)

I really enjoyed the first 40% of this for the sharpness, the body horror-based magic system, the angry impetuousness of the lead, and the potential of the romance. I'm DNFing at 60%, though, because I've spent the last 20% hardcore scowling in frustration over inconsistencies and lack of development. I've ceased to care about the characters, too, so that's usually a good reason to stop.

I really don't know how to start this review since I have many thoughts about it. So my understanding is that this book is about antisemitism and I can sort of see that. It seems like every religion and culture is treated like trash in this story except for the Regyar. The main heroine Evike is part wolf girl and Yehuli. Which is just bad all around apparently. Even the other wolf people treat her like shit because she can't use magic (but she actually can later in the story).

So the King of Regyar and his adopted second son Nandor just pretty much want to wipe out the wolf people and the Yehuli. Gaspar, who is the King's legitimate son is hated because his mother was Merzani. The Merzani are another hated race of people. There is so much hate in this book. The King has soldiers that are called The Woodsmen and they have to commit to their faith by losing body parts and they have to remain celibate. Most Woodsmen are trained from childhood but Gaspar was basically forced into it when he hit the age of twenty and his father took one of his eyes. Evike and Gaspar are attracted to each other but Gaspar fights against it because he is a Woodsman. They eventually do end up together though.

This tale was hard to get through just because of all the hate in it. If you can get past that it's a good book. I'm not even going to lie I almost didn't read this book just of all the Twitter drama that she engaged in with several other authors when a certain's author's book was released. That wasn't cool and if they had beef with that author they shouldn't have waited two years to say anything. The fact they did it on her book's release day was really shitty.

Rating: 3½ stars

*I received an eARC from NetGalley and a finished early copy of the book from the publisher. All opinions are my own.

"The trees have to be tied down by sunset. When the Woodsmen come, they always try to run."

🐺

My goodness, Reid's prose is a delight. Her metaphors are original & evocative, her descriptions fresh & true. She uses strong verbs & creates a forest that is ALIVE--the setting becoming another character. 5☆ prose & world.

I really really really wanted to love this story. There's an absolutely magical land, a strong mc, a grumpy love interest... But, I just wasn't invested in their story, their mission or their stakes.

I read for relationships more than character, and I wasn't engaged with their relationship. I think it roots to not deeply caring about Gáspár's struggle or him as a character. But--there was nothing *wrong* with this story. I just didn't fall in love with it. I still recommend THE WOLF & THE WOODSMAN as the language is unbelievable, the world unique, and the characters could be ones YOU fall in love with.

I will buy her next book--this one just didn't shine for me.

🐺

WRITING CRAFT NOTES

1. In my opinion, character is primary. If I don't care about your character or their relationships (platonic or romantic), I'm out. Doesn't matter how unbelievable your world, plot, prose--I read for character. So, make sure they're layered & interesting. And--secondary characters need strong arcs too.

2. Reid has such graceful & evocative prose. I'll definitely study how she makes such interesting observations work so well. They sound as if they come from the character & are very beautiful.

🐺

I received this book from @Netgalley in exchange for an honest review

First, HUUUUUUUGE shoutout to Harper Collins, Ava Reid, and their team for proving me with my FIRST PHYSICAL ARC! I'll be yelling about this (and this book) for ages!

Now let's get into it.

Y'all, this book was a certified banger for me.

Reid already had me with the premise. Outcasted characters coming into their destiny? Hidden magic? A tortured prince forced to reckon with the burden of his birthright? AND enemies to lovers? Sign me up!! There were some moments in the plot that felt a bit repetitive to me but because I found Ava Reid's writing style so delightful it didn't bother me as much as it could've. While the formula was similar, the execution was never boring. Their turmoil with their treatment at the hands of the communities they're a part of, their longing for acceptance, the loss they'd suffered, and their conflicting feelings were all very well depicted.

Also, this was ACTUALLY enemies to lovers. Not mild dislike or misunderstandings easily solved and paving the way to insta-love. No, Évike and Gáspár despise each other and even when things improve, there are years of hatred running through their history that makes their back and forth relationship believable. We watch them work through it, which was refreshing. And as frustrating as they were at times, to the point where I actually yelled at my book, they came alive from the page and I messed with that heavy. Also, the villains made you LOATHE them. Nice!

The book is marketed as a fairytale inspired by Hungarian history and Jewish mythology and, yes! Brilliant! The themes, politics, and beliefs fueling the decades long hatred between cultures were well depicted and did wonders to keep the plot and character motivations in motion. Reid's bio mentions that they majored in political science with a focus on religion and ethnonationalism and I think that's why the intersection between religion, history, and their magic is so amazingly explored.

Basically, I need y'all to get on this. I'll definitely be keeping an eye out for Ava Reid's future works.

Once again, thanks a bunch to Harper Collins/team for my copy, and Ava Reid for a fantastic read ;). THIS BOOK DROPS T O M O R R O W JUNE 8TH!!!! Go support this thrilling debut!!!!!! <3

...

CW: gore, body horror, graphic death, anti-semitism, child death mention, heavy child abuse, spousal abuse, deeply explored religious fanaticism, ethnic cleansing, genocide, racism, sexual content

I thoroughly enjoyed the Wolf and the Woodsman as a story of magic and learning your own self worth but also for the way author Ava Reid blended the myths and legends of her Jewish and Hungarian heritage into the overarching story.

This story featured a great atmospheric setting, as Evike and Gaspar navigated their way through mysterious woods and eventually arrived at their final destination. And although they have a tense, fraught relationship, they also have something in common. They are both outcasts in their separate and distinct cultures. Evike is the orphaned pagan girl who seemingly has no magic, and Gaspar is captain of the holy order of the Woodsman and the rightful heir to the throne, but his mother was reviled for being an outsider. Together, they must find a way to prevent complete destruction of Evike's home as well as the Yehuli, of whom Evike’s estranged father belongs.

I adored Evike's relationship with her father and the Yehuli community. The more she learned from him the better she was able to see herself for her true worth. And she learns she must stand up for the Yehuli as much as her pagan family that once turned its back on her. I also loved the unflinching look at nationalism and the role of religion in building - and destroying - nations and cultures that are different.

There is a bit of romance here and if you love the enemies to lovers trope, you will definitely enjoy it. Personally, I could have done with a little less angst but this may just be me. I still highly recommend this one to fantasy and action fans looking for a unique twist based on history and heritage.

Romantic and lush and just so damn lovely, THE WOLF AND THE WOODSMAN was everything I thought it would be and so much more. When I saw it being touted as “in the same vein” as THE BEAR AND THE NIGHTINGALE, I knew immediately that I had to read it. The Winternight trilogy is, hands down, my favorite in existence and a book has to be incredibly special to be “in the same vein” as that one. Well, let me just tell you. This beautiful book earned that comparison and will proudly sit next to Winternight as my favorite books in existence.

Reid’s gorgeous and evocative prose transports readers to the frozen landscape of the tundra to the bustling overcrowded capital as two unlikely allies embark on a quest to stop a madman from seizing the throne in the capital’s kingdom. THE WOLF AND THE WOODSMAN is a fairytale, with nods to Jewish and Hungarian folk tales thrown in along the way. But, at it’s core, it’s a story of outcasts, of persecution, of two lonely souls searching for the history and the culture and the sameness that can define who they are and where they fit in this harsh, cruel world. What started out as a Woodsman leading a Wolf to her certain death slowly blossomed into a journey of understanding, acceptance and, ultimately, love.

The hardest books to review are the ones that capture your whole entire heart, and this spectacular book didn’t just capture my heart, it embedded itself in there. I can’t find the words to properly and coherently convey how much I absolutely adored this book, so I’ll just simply say read it. It’s lyrical and romantic and heartbreaking and hopeful, and it’s certainly a book that I’ll reread again and again until I’ve memorized the entire thing. I’m already calling this one my favorite of 2021 and I doubt that anything else I read this year will come close to besting this beauty.

The Wolf and the Woodsman is an enrapturing tale of mythology, culture and romance. It tells the story of a girl named Évike, a woman of the Wolf Tribe - who fear the coming of the Woodsmen. When the Woodsmen arrive, the Matriarch of the Wolf Tribe decide to sacrifice Évike, the village outcast, who ends up experiencing the terrors of the woods and the blood-thirsty city that awaits her beyond it.

I think fans of Katherine Arden's the Winternight Trilogy would thoroughly enjoy this novel. Though unique on her own Ava Reid writes in such a similarly thrillingly atmospheric way that I felt as if I was living through the pages to the point that whenever the wind blew, I swear I felt it rise right up my skin.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It was beautifully romantic, properly grim and yet even in the darkest bits of the story - where violence rears its ugly head highest - Reid's execution of the story is so evocative and steeped with nuance and emotion that you could tell how personal it was for her. My heartstrings hurt right alongside the story and its characters to a level where I think I'll be thinking about this book for a while.

Fantastic debut. Would recommend!!

Actual rating: 2.5 stars

I was so excited for this book and can somewhat see the comparisons to Spinning Silver and the Winternight trilogy, but this book did not live up to the hype for me. The beginning was very nice, and it did feel like the same sort of magical quality. However, it really slowed down after that and became less interesting, especially once they reach the city and meet the king. At this point, it's more like medieval Christians vs Jews vs pagans which isn't uninteresting as an idea, but I had just lost interest by then.

In general, the pacing is very slow with action scenes that do not last very long. I felt disappointed and confused with some of them because they're over in about a paragraph. I could have used much longer scenes, especially with some of the cool creatures that they meet! While this seems to be based on Hungarian mythology and history (I think), it also seems to be influenced by Norse and Greek mythology. I'm surprised that this didn't work better for me because I usually love these types of elements. I just generally found myself pretty ambivalent, perhaps because the pacing was off for me.

I liked Evike initially, but then I grew to be somewhat apathetic towards her. She's fierce and will fight for herself. She's an outcast in her village and treated pretty horribly, so it does feel like she's a survivor. Despite feeling like her journey was great at first, I'm not sure that she has the most character growth. She's a bit "woe is me" towards the end, though she does have some moments of self awareness at least. Gaspar was alright, but he's somewhat bland and forgettable. I really did not feel the romance at all which I think is a major reason why I didn't love this book since it is a focus for most of the book. I kept wondering why they even liked each other, so unfortunately, this was a miss for me.

There are some really great ideas in this book though! I thought that the concept of the Wolf girls and magic that comes with sacrifice were really interesting. I could have used more of these aspects as I didn't entirely get the best sense of the magic and creatures in the world.

I'm definitely bummed that I didn't love this more! I really thought I would adore it, but I just felt somewhat relieved to finish it unfortunately. However, it does seem like others really like it, so perhaps it's just not the book for me.

Content warnings for self harm

My video review can be seen on my channel (around minutes 0:33-4:13 of this video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUixVPhVVb0

***Review posted on The Eater of Books! blog***

The Wolf & The Woodsman by Ava Reid
Publisher: Harper Voyager
Publication Date: June 8, 2021
Rating: 5 stars

Summary (from Goodreads):

In the vein of Naomi Novik’s New York Times bestseller Spinning Silver and Katherine Arden’s national bestseller The Bear and the Nightingale, this unforgettable debut— inspired by Hungarian history and Jewish mythology—follows a young pagan woman with hidden powers and a one-eyed captain of the Woodsmen as they form an unlikely alliance to thwart a tyrant.

In her forest-veiled pagan village, Évike is the only woman without power, making her an outcast clearly abandoned by the gods. The villagers blame her corrupted bloodline—her father was a Yehuli man, one of the much-loathed servants of the fanatical king. When soldiers arrive from the Holy Order of Woodsmen to claim a pagan girl for the king’s blood sacrifice, Évike is betrayed by her fellow villagers and surrendered.

But when monsters attack the Woodsmen and their captive en route, slaughtering everyone but Évike and the cold, one-eyed captain, they have no choice but to rely on each other. Except he’s no ordinary Woodsman—he’s the disgraced prince, Gáspár Bárány, whose father needs pagan magic to consolidate his power. Gáspár fears that his cruelly zealous brother plans to seize the throne and instigate a violent reign that would damn the pagans and the Yehuli alike. As the son of a reviled foreign queen, Gáspár understands what it’s like to be an outcast, and he and Évike make a tenuous pact to stop his brother.

As their mission takes them from the bitter northern tundra to the smog-choked capital, their mutual loathing slowly turns to affection, bound by a shared history of alienation and oppression. However, trust can easily turn to betrayal, and as Évike reconnects with her estranged father and discovers her own hidden magic, she and Gáspár need to decide whose side they’re on, and what they’re willing to give up for a nation that never cared for them at all.

What I Liked:

You know that feeling when you see a book's cover, read the synopsis, and just KNOW that this will be something you'll love? I got that feeling when I heard about this book a year ago, and that feeling did not lead my astray. This story was absolutely exquisite.

The Wolf & The Woodsman is an adult fantasy novel based on Jewish folklore and Hungarian history. There are many major themes in this book that the author explored, including cultural genocide, antisemitism, and ethnic cleansing. I want to note that I do not have Hungarian heritage and I am not Jewish, so I will not have the best perspective on certain aspects of the book. Nevertheless, I know how hard the author worked to put every ounce of herself, her culture, her religion, and her history into this book. As an "outsider", I can appreciate how well-written the story is, how fantastic the world-building is, and how powerful the messages are.

Please note: there is body horror, abuse by elders, mutilation, torture, and other potential triggers in this story.

This is the story of Évike, a woman without power in her small pagan village. She is despised by many in her village, and abused for her powerlessness, as well as her mixed heritage (her father is a Yehuli man). When the Woodsmen arrive to take another pagan girl with seer power, the villagers conspire to send Évike. Évike is taken to the nation's capital, where she must serve the king and his treasonous son. Gáspár, one of the Woodsmen charged with bringing Évike to the king, is the king's other son. He knows what it is like to be despised for who he is. Together, Évike and Gáspár must work together to to stop Gáspár's traitorous brother from overthrowing the king, slaughtering the Yehuli, and changing the landscape and the history of the nation forever.

There is so much more to this story than what I briefly summarized. The magic system, the politics, the scheming, the romance... this standalone novel is filled with just about everything that makes a fantasy novel amazing. But it's even more than a "usual fantasy novel" - Reid makes this novel her own by weaving Jewish history, lore, and life into this book. This book parallels Hungarian history in the Yehuli's imminent expulsion from the capital, the blatant discrimination, the way they are used and discarded by the government. I need to reread this novel to analyze and engulf myself in the political machinations and the Yehuli trials - Reid has written these aspects so, so well, and with such power and purpose.

I do want to talk about the romance - I love a good slowburn, hate to love romance. Évike is a feisty, hurt, tough young woman, and Gáspár is a quiet, hurt, tough young man. They should be on opposite sides of the war, with Évike being a pagan "wolf-girl" of mixed heritage, and Gáspár being a royal prince of mixed heritage. But they are like fire and ice or a moth and a flame - they are magnetic, and I love this pairing. I love Évike's headstrong quality and Gáspár's quiet, less assertive nature. Such a sweet, yet volatile romance!

Évike isn't just a strong young woman - she's a fighter and a survivor. She has been abused by her village and her Yehuli family doesn't know she exists. She's tired, hurt, and broken down, but she is a fighter. She takes matters into her own hands - particularly her "powerlessness". Here is where the body horror aspect comes into play - I won't say much more than that. Évike wasn't just on a journey to the capital, or a journey to find this fantastical magical creature - she was on a journey that led to her discovering more about her Yehuli heritage. I really appreciate Reid's commentary on heritage, and the diaspora.

This novel is a standalone, and the story feels very full and complete by the time I reached the end. I would love to read more books in this universe, but I feel as though Évike and Gáspár's "chapter" is over. The ending is one that I enjoyed - no spoilers, of course! The author wraps up all the loose ends but also leaves the future slightly open... I wouldn't mind seeing Évike and Gáspár make cameo appearances in companion novels set within the same universe. If that is something that the author is considering!

I truly enjoyed this wonderful, powerful, thought-provoking novel. The cover is gorgeous and so is the beautiful story!

What I Did Not Like:

I can't think of anything I did not like! Perhaps that the story pacing dragged a little in the middle, but I also read this book over several days, so keep that in mind. The pacing overall is very engaging, but I hit a snag in the middle. But things pick up quickly in the capital! You'll have to read the book to know what I mean.

Would I Recommend It:

I highly recommend this book to anyone who loves fantasy novels. This is NOT a fairy tale retelling - don't be fooled. This IS an adult fiction novel though, so don't confuse this book with Young Adult (YA) novels. The book can be read by YA readers, but the content of the book is certainly meant for adults. (Graphic violence, sexual content, etc.)

Rating:

5 stars. Thank you so much to the publishing team for letting me read this book ahead of the publication. I have been lending my early copy to friends and family and screaming about this book on social media. I have been struggling to read anything in the last year (oh, pandemic), but this book was exactly what I needed - immersive, intriguing, and thought-provoking. I can't wait to read more by Ava Reid!

“I think you are forgetting yourself. You’re a Woodsman and a prince, and I’m a trifling wolf-girl. All my life I’ve been terrified I’d wake to see you at my door.”

Évike is an outcast in her Pagan village, the villagers believe her lack of magic means she is shunned by the gods because of her impure bloodline. When the Woodsman come to claim a pagan girl for the yearly blood sacrifice, the villagers don’t hesitate to offer her up instead. After a series of gruesome attacks, Évike is left with one Woodsman who is—surprise!—the outcast prince, Gáspár Bárány. Gáspár explains to Évike that his father needs pagan magic to defend the kingdom against his radical religious half brother. The already persecuted Yehuli and Pagans would suffer greatly if Nándor succeeded. With just each other to rely on Évike hesitantly agrees to help.

Régország is a dark and unforgiving world with vicious monsters and a darker, more demanding magic. The cultural aspects of the book are richly shaped with detail and you can tell they have a clear relationship to Jewish mythology and Hungarian history—I would read this book again just to soak of more of the cultural elements. Ava Reid explored timeless themes of religious persecution in ways that made me so uncomfortable I know she got it right.

The Wolf and the Woodsman combines religion, politics, and magic in an unforgettable tale about a young woman who, by the strength of her will, survives and finds love in a world that has always cast her aside. A classic enemies to lovers romance, I could not get enough of Évike and Gáspár. Their spats and little arguments added levity and humor and so much natural chemistry. If you enjoyed Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik or love reading fairytales I recommend picking up this fantastic debut by Ava Reid.