I was thrilled to be approved for this ARC from T Kingfisher. I absolutely love her writing. This is the fifth book that I read/listened to. by her. I love it when she writes the opposite of "fairy tales.". In "Nettle & Bone", she writes about the princess killing the prince. In this story, she writes about the person watching over the princess in the tower. I enjoy the characters in the book Jennifer Blom did a great job bring all the characters to life.

I think I might’ve enjoyed this more had it been longer. And it took me almost a month to get past the 2nd chapter (I kept falling asleep at the same point in the audiobook). But once I (finally) got past that - i really liked this weird little reverse fairytale. I think at this point I’ve read enough of T. Kingfisher work to know that she is a phenomenal writer and storyteller, but not all of her releases are for me. Thornhedge worked for me and I’m looking forward to continuing with her backlist and her future releases.

This was such a fantastic read! It very much was a fairytale, but like the synopsis says, it's subversive, and I loved this story! That Toadling was the rightful daughter of the king and queen, but was stolen and replaced by faeries, and then had to give a blessing on the one that replaced her? Yeah, it was really fantastic to read!

The fact that the blessing didn't go as intended, and she had to watch her replacement live the life that she was supposed to? When all Toadling really wanted to was to go back to the fae that became her family. Yeah. That was rough.

We knew that something went wrong, that Toadling is watching over this tower, which gave it a Sleeping Beauty feel to it. But to find out what happened and why, well, that was such a great story to watch unfold!

And oh, that ending? With how it was resolved, yeah, that fit with everything that happened before it. But what she decides for her future, what choices she was given, yeah, I'm so glad, she deserves it after all that she went though!

I loved reading this book, and I can't wait to read more by T. Kingfisher!

A retelling of Sleeping Beauty in which the hero is Toadling, the human raised in/altered by Faerie, who’s sent to protect the human world from the changeling princess but ends up just putting her to sleep for hundreds of years. When another human finds her, Toadling has to confront her fears that her small powers won’t be enough. It’s a fine retelling with a refusal of the myth of beauty meaning goodness.

“Thornhedge” is a cozy retelling of the classic sleeping beauty story. It spins the same take of a maiden stuck in a perpetual sleep and hidden away by an enchantress however, it subverts our understanding of the story; instead of a beautiful, innocent maiden asleep in the tower it’s beautiful yet wicked changeling. Her beauty and maidenhood combined with her evil nature challenges our idea of the role beauty plays in our perception of good versus evil. Our hero, Toadling, is a human woman. She is ugly and homely, yet it is in her that we find quiet compassion and a gentle strength.

I loved this read. I loved Toadling and I loved seeing the world through her eyes. The ways she described her family was so lovely. In general, I thought the entire novella was so well written and it left me with the nicest, warm feeling in my belly.

Anyone who is a fan of fantasy would enjoy this book, but I especially recommend it to fans of “the Cruel Prince” and the “Green Rider” series.

I received this audiobook as an ARC. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher.

This was my first book by this author and I’m happy to say it definitely will not be my last. What a magical ride.

I will never get enough of how T. Kingfisher turns stories around. Loved every second of this! Gorgeous writing, awesome narration! Thank you so much to Macmillan Audio for the ALC.

I’ve previously read T Kingfisher’s books and I loved them, so this was an automatic must read for me. This book is definitely different from her most recent work, A House with Good Bones(which I am obsessed with. Thornhedge has less humor but more magical world building and mythical qualities.
This was a quick read (116 pages) and full of magic and whimsy which was such a nice palette cleanser for me after the dark thrillers I’ve been reading. I love this original take on classic fairy tales, with a gentle (swoon worthy) knight and a kind toad-shaped heroine, and a princess trapped in a tower. The descriptions of faerie land were beautiful and dreamy, and I listened to the audiobook for this one so it felt like childhood story time🥰 and like most original fairy tales this one takes some dark turns.
The audiobook narrator was not my favorite but I’m very picky with voices, I just thought she sounded a bit too wide eyed and breathy. But she definitely gave the vibe that this was an ancient tale of old magic handed down for centuries.
Toadling is such a lovely and fresh take on a fairytale heroine and I enjoyed her adventure so much 💕
Thank you to @macmillan.audio and @netgalley for the ARC. All opinions are my own.

"Thornhedge is the tale of a kind-hearted, toad-shaped heroine, a gentle knight, and a mission gone completely sideways."

I love a good fairytale retelling.

This was a GREAT fairytale retelling.

I loved Toadling's origin story. I loved her Greenteeth family, and the explanation of Changelings.

I loved the dreamlike quality of her life in the water, her inner monologue, and that the ending was left wide open.

The main male character, the world's worst night, was a bit milquetoast for me, but I liked his interactions with her - that he listened and trusted Toadling. 

I LOVED that creepy little girl, and would read the heck out of a story with her inner thoughts.

T Kingfisher is quickly becoming a Season's Pass for me.

7.5/10

Thanks to NetGalley, Macmillan Audio, Tor Publishing, and Titan Books for this ARC.

This is a wonderful, cozy little fairy tale, perfect for a fall evening snuggled up with some tea and a blanket. Of course, in T. Kingfisher fashion, this cozy tale also has abuse, death, and other dark topics in it. But that is what I love about it, that we have a story about a child being loved by monsters and a monster who looks like a child, not shying away from any of the gruesomeness that it entails, and we still end up thinking "What a nice little story." by the end of it.

I've always been a fan of fairy tales, "fractured," retold, or original, and Thornhedge manages to completely reinvent a classic while still staying true to the darker origins of fairy stories. 5/5, would recommend.

This was the first book by T. Kingfisher that I've read, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I think the characters were well-written and the plot was an amazing twist on a classic tale--painting sleeping beauty as the villain instead of the "witch" who cursed her.

Absolutely, 100% yes. This is how fairy tales should be retold. Let's move the focus away from the nice, pretty, blond, rich girl in disguise and look, instead, to the motivations surrounding the so-called "bad guys."

T. Kingfisher is a master storyteller. Every book of hers that I pick up has me absolutely riveted from beginning to end. In fact, my 9 year old niece can't stop raving about her book "A Wizards Guide to Defensive Baking." I listened to Thornhedge on audiobook and loved the narrator -- she brought the story to life and I felt every bit of confusion, loss, pain, and hope that the main character, Toadling, had.

This book is perfect for all sorts of ages. I plan to get it for my niece to read after she finishes another of Kingfisher's titles, "Minor Mage."

Thank you to NetGalley, and Macmillan Audio for the audiobook!

I didn't look closely and didn't realize this was a novella until it was almost over. Nothing wrong with that, I was just curious about where else the story might go.

As it was, I really enjoyed this. It had a clever use of flashbacks and strong characters. The knight would have fit right into Squire's Tales by Gerald Morris. High praise since that is one of my favorite series of all time!

Toadling was stolen from her family on the day of her birth by fairies and left in the swampy lands of the fae world. But she grew up happy, safe, and loved. Until one day, she is forced back to the human world to bestow an important blessing upon a newborn. Centuries later, when a knight encroaches upon the lands where a tower is overgrown with walls of thick brambles, Toadling finds herself frantically trying to protect the tower and the occupant inside. No matter the cost.

I quite enjoyed this retelling of Sleeping Beauty. Some of the previous works have gone into the realm of absurd with their antagonists or the humor that was heavily used, which I’m not always in the mood for. This work was much more somber and had a melancholic atmosphere, which I absolutely loved. It was also more nuanced overall, and I enjoyed the exploration of the idea that “beauty is in the eye of the beholder.”

The fantasy worldbuilding was phenomenal. I loved how many interesting details the author included that were plot relevant, created an immersing setting, and just purely fascinating. As the book went on and some actual true history was included into the primary plot, I started looking up details to see where that situated this story in time, but then decided against it. I don’t prefer it when authors include the real world in works of fantasy, and I think this read would have been stronger without that incorporation.

I did find the characters to be decently written. It was instantly easy to sympathize with Toadling and I enjoyed seeing the story from her perspective. I wanted a more compelling reason for the evil in the antagonist – I imagine the author was relying solely on her being a changeling as the driving force, but it seemed that the author used a rather excessive interpretation. Toadling’s backstory was much more fascinating than the timeline involving the knight, but I did still enjoy both portions of the read.

I noticed this is put in the horror genre, which I think is incorrect despite it having some darker elements. If you enjoy fantasy and unique retellings, then this is worth checking out. Many thanks to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for allowing me to read this work. All thoughts and opinions expressed in this review are my own.

This is a retelling of the Sleeping Beauty. I liked the twist. The main character, Toadling was entertaining, but the ending fell flat for me.

Toadling was taken as a baby and replaced by a changeling. Raised in the fairy-world, she is forced to come back to the humans to make sure the changeling does no harm. Everything goes wrong and centuries later, she's still trying to make it right.

Big thank you to NetGalley for allowing me to read this!

I was really excited to read this short story from T. Kingfisher. The only other book I have read from from this author (in either of her names) was A House With Good Bones. Which was trippy and fantastic. Needless to say, I was excited to read another of her books. This one was quite a bit different.

We follow the story of Toadling. A changeling who grew up in fairy and, though not toad shaped, she could change into a toad. She has learned some minor magic over her years in fairy and now she has to go back to the human world to save it from the fairy that took her place.

This story goes against the grain of the fairy tales you hear as a child and retells the classic story of Sleeping Beauty. With an dose of inspiration from Maleficent, though I have not seen that film. We see what happens when the good guy is the one that traps the beautiful princess in the tower because beneath that childhood beauty is an evil little being. I loved the whole story of Toadling and how she came to be the guardian of the tower. I loved her sense of beauty and family. I really liked our scholarly "prince" who was kind and compassionate. I just really liked the whole overall story of this retelling. I thought the scene with the 3 "main characters" was pretty quick and could have been a bit more interesting, but other than that this was a fun and unique retelling.

This was a warm and quirky retelling of Sleeping Beauty. It was also my first book by this author. I enjoyed the twist, and I especially enjoyed the relationship between Toadling and her faerie foster family.

Thornhedge is a true fairy tale.

A dark melancholy carries the story forward, with a breath of hope resting just beneath.

This is a story of nature and nurture, of our duties and the roles we’re forced to play. It’s a story about family, love, holding on, and letting go.

I listened to this on audio, and Jennifer Blom does a brilliant job of capturing and conveying the mood and atmosphere.

*Thanks to Macmillan Audio for the free audiobook download! I also bought myself a hardcover copy.*

This book left no lasting impression on me. The plot and characters are flat and boring with little depth. I think that this story had so much potential but by writing it as a novella, the story felt severely underdeveloped. The author was able to vividly build this world that’s magical and violent but without building anything else.

What I liked the most about Thornhedge was the narrator! She perfectly captured the melancholy attitude of our main character, Toadling. Despite the lack of depth for the characters, the narrator was still able to distinguish each of them, making this experience bearable.

Kingfisher weaves a fantastical tale giving a compelling backstory to the age old story of Sleeping Beauty. The characters are fresh and more complicated; the story more nuanced; and there are lots of surprising twists to the plot. Let Kingfisher carry you away with this delightful story.