4.5/5

A perfect book to read about a fierce FMC who ventures into a deadly forest that seems to come right out of a Grimm's Fairy Tale. Though she seems to be more experienced then most...

I'll be frank, I was in a reading slump for a minute and I thought the best course of action would be to get a few ARCs. I was incredibly lucky to stumble on a book that not only kept my interest, but I could also read in one sitting (one sitting being a few hours). Now I want to start off and say why this isn't a full 5 stars. It may be a bit of nitpicky reasons, but I always hold myself to post honest reviews. The only complaints were that I felt there should have been an extra added scene. Despite feeling that I knew the FMC, and I began to understand her morals, I just felt there should have been just <i>something</i> added. I can't say for certain what, but I thought I would mention it. The last thing is that I felt that I could have used a bit more detail about the world we find ourselves in. We are told about a pretty significant war for the FMC, but it seems that she doesn't or doesn't want to let the reader know just what it was about. Although the author doesn't reveal the outcome of the war involving Veris for plot reasons, I still desired a clear understanding of the war's purpose.

Other than that, I can say that I fully enjoyed myself. I found myself loving the personality of Veris and seeing myself in her. I especially enjoyed the feature of pagan and witchcraft practices that weren't deemed as evil or as a foil of some kind of Christian ideology. Veris herself is strong and confident, but isn't one to shamelessly boast or stubbornly refuse to admit when she was wrong in something. I enjoyed the journey overall, regardless of its length. I felt that the plot didn't overstay its welcome, and it was summed up rather nicely at the end with a minor cliffhanger. I finished this book satisfied and I am looking forward to what else Premee Mohamed comes out with.

I would like to thank Tor and Netgalley for giving me a chance to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

Veris is charged by the tyrant to find his two children, who have disappeared into a magical dark forest. She only has a short time to do so, or the tyrant will destroy her village and her family. The tyrant tells her to find his children, as Veris is the only person so far to make it in and out of the forest alive.

The book starts off on a strong note, as the action picks up right away. It has non-stop action and intrigue, and it had me at the edge of my seat the whole time that I was reading it. There are morally gray characters and fantasical creatures alike, and there is some magic used in the form of magical trinkets that Veris uses to help find her way. There are no chapters in this book, but I don't feel like it needs chapters, as it is a novella. It also doesn't feel repetitive or filled with running sentences, as some people might imagine chapterless books to be.

If I have one critique about the book though, it's that the ending felt a little rushed. It's a spoiler, so I won't reveal it. I do, however, love the open ending, which has me thinking about what could be next, in a good way.

Do I recommend this book? If you love dark, fairytale fantasies that are condensed into one short book, I'm saying a big yes!

This dark and atmospheric book definitely keeps things tense for the reader. I ended up wanting to like it more than I actually did though. I wanted to know more about the main character, the tyrant, and what was going on in this world when the book ended.

Veris Thorn is the only person to have returned from Elmever alive, so when the Tyrant’s children go missing, she’s tasked with entering the cursed woods once more and returning them. However, along the way, she must face the woods’ devious denizens while confronting her own traumatic past.

The Butcher of the Forest by Premee Mohamed weaves a masterfully told, twisted fairy tale. It’s a darkly whimsical read that leans into horror territory. Here the woods are sentient and its trees shift and disorient travelers. There are creepy deer (and a unicorn), and the pages ooze with body horror and uncanny dread.

All in all, if you loved the mind-bending trippiness of the forest in The Ritual or the messed up bear from Annihilation, you'll probably love this novella as well.

Immersing myself in the eerie fantasy world of Premee Mohamed's novella, "The Butcher of the Forest," I found myself entranced by the chilling tale of a woman compelled to navigate a dark and magical forest to rescue the children of the man responsible for the devastation of her village and life during a brutal war. This novella proved to be adept at weaving vivid imagery and darker-than-expected themes into a haunting narrative that left a lasting impression.

Mohamed's skillful storytelling conjures a world that is both enchanting and foreboding. The dark and magical forest, depicted with vivid and atmospheric prose, serves as a compelling backdrop for the protagonist's harrowing journey. The author's ability to evoke a sense of unease and wonder simultaneously heightens the immersive experience, making every step into the unknown feel palpable.

The central theme of revenge and redemption, coupled with the exploration of trauma and the aftermath of war, adds a layer of depth to the narrative. The protagonist's quest to rescue the children of her tormentor is fraught with emotional turmoil, and Mohamed does not shy away from the darker aspects of the human psyche. The novella deftly balances the fantastical elements with these weighty themes, creating a story that resonates on both an emotional and intellectual level.

The unexpected ending is a masterstroke, defying conventional expectations and leaving a lingering sense of contemplation. Mohamed skillfully subverts the anticipated resolutions, adding a layer of complexity to the story and prompting reflection on the nature of closure.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book.

The was a creepy, dark, fairy-tale-esque little handful of a book. I loved the concept of this dark *forbidden* woods and wasn't sure quite what to expect, as this idea isn't really a new idea. But the CREATURES in these woods are so deliciously creepy, eerie, unnatural, disturbing, that I can't help but just be enamored by the creativity. While I'm not sure the characters themselves felt quite complete to me, I honestly didn't care because I really liked the world we were walking through. It gave me a sense of Seanan McGuire's "Wayward Children" series, the dark and twisty worlds that have no connection to the world as we know it, but the people just come to accept it as the way of things. More dark fairy tale worlds!

I read Premee Mohamed’s The Butcher of the Forest yesterday, and I’m pretty sure I’m not okay. It’s a fantastic novella, and that’s the problem. It’s too good, and now it’s done.

Veris lives in the valley that is ruled over by the Tyrant. She spends her days raising rabbits and helping her aunt and her grandfather with gardening and other tasks around the house. Most days, that would be more than enough, but today is not like most days.

Today, Veris was shaken out of bed by the Tyrant’s soldiers attempting to tear down her front door. Today, she was put into a carriage and taken to the Tyrant’s castle. Today might be the last day of her life. Last night, the Tyrant’s two children, Eleonor and Aram, vanished into the woods that lie north of the castle. Where the southern woods are often traveled by foragers and hunters, the northern woods are understood by the locals to be dangerous. No one who goes into the northern woods comes out again. Except, that is, for Veris.

Years ago, Veris ventured into those woods to rescue a child, and they both returned. Somehow, that information made its way to the ears of the Tyrant, and now he has had his soldiers drag her to the castle. Today, he has ordered her to find his children and bring them back home, or her life and those of her aunt and grandfather are forfeit. So it is with rapidly dwindling hope that Veris returns to her house to prepare. The northern woods are more dangerous than anyone other than her knows, and all she can do is try. Today, she will gather up her totems and supplies, and she will go to the woods. Today, she will risk everything she has in order to save it from the Tyrant’s whims. Today, she will try to save the children of a monster.

The Butcher of the Forest is quick and beautiful and painful as a knife through the ribs. Premee Mohamed has created a fairy tale to rival legends, with fae creatures and monsters and all the rules one must follow in order to survive. My utmost thanks to Netgalley and Tor Publishing Group for an eARC in exchange for a fair review. It’s available for purchase on February 27th, but if you can, preorder it through your favorite bookstore today. You’ll thank yourself.

This review originally appeared here: https://swordsoftheancients.com/2024/02/14/the-butcher-of-the-forest-a-review/

HIGHLIGHTS
~don’t trust the apples
~homey magics bring you home again (maybe)
~don’t lie to yourself or you’ll lie to the monsters

I will be honest: I didn’t actually enjoy The Butcher of the Forest. But I still think it’s objectively pretty decent, and I found a fair bit to appreciate in it.

The novella starts out strong, quickly introducing the reader to Veris and the Tyrant she and her people live under. I liked Veris immediately, and the Tyrant turned my stomach; the nightmare he’s put the people he’s conquered through is gotten across very efficiently and effectively. The quick glimpse we get of him when he orders Veris dragged into his presence was more than enough to make me thoroughly despise the man – and absolutely believe he’d carry out his threats if Veris didn’t go into the woods, or failed to come out of them.

The woods – the Elmever – is really where my problems with this novella began. Although Mohamed really nails the sense of urgency powering Veris’ mission – she has from dawn to dusk to get in and out, or she’ll never get out at all – the woods themselves never felt that eerie, frightening, or otherworldly to me. I’m not sure if I was expecting something more dramatic, but birds that occasionally talk and trees that move when you’re not looking? I want a lot more out of my otherworlds; I want the plants and earth and air to be strange and unique, whether creepy or beautiful or both. The fact that you can slip from our world to the world-inside-the-Elmever without noticing is supposed to be one of the things that makes it terrifying, which I don’t object to – but once you’re there, I’d have liked it to be a lot more obvious that this is not our world, you know? Give me bleeding trees and silver bees, squirrels with bat wings hanging upside-down from branches, grass that bruises when you step on it. Streams of blood and honey. Etc.

I had the same issue with the various beings Veris encounters in the woods: they didn’t strike me as alien enough, strange enough. Mohamed disdained to rehash the elven-esque Fae for her Elmever, and she gets points from me for that, but I didn’t really feel anything for or about the creatures she created instead. The house, the guardians, the game she has to play to get the kids back – for me, it was all very meh.

Mohamed did a lot more with Veris wondering if the Tyrant’s children even deserve to be rescued, especially with pointed little details like how the older one, the Tyrant’s heir, just takes Veris’ care and sacrifices for granted, because to her that’s what other people/servants are for.

A lot of the smaller details really did charm me; the way Veris’ aunt does everything in threes to try and give her, Veris, good luck for her quest; the small, humble objects Veris has as talismans to help her. There was this really lovely sense of domestic magic, un-fancy magic, along with a very clear awareness of how outclassed those small magics are by the power of the woods. That gives the whole story a bit of an underdog feel; as with the best fairytales, Veris has to be small and careful and quiet, because if she tries going head-to-head with the monsters, she’d be squashed like a bug. She’s not a hero in the usual sense, because everything depends on her being meek and going as unnoticed as possible, rather than going in big and loud and swinging a sword. I really liked that!

The horror, for me, wasn’t in the monsters and all – though hey, the story did deliver on the cover’s promises; we do get a unicorn! – it was in the moments when the Rules tighten like a noose around Veris’ throat, when the tension is wound to the breaking point and someone missteps, or doesn’t think. There’s a very intense dread in those moments, and a reflexive anger, when you really want to shake whichever character’s fucked up for being so gods’ damned stupid.

And the actual semi-ending, View Spoiler » is appropriately horrifying and wrenching and no no no!!!

But then that ending is undercut by the actual ending of the novella, which retroactively takes a lot of power out of those final moments in the forest. Which lost Butcher of the Forest quite a few stars from me.

I honestly don’t know who I’d recommend this to; it’s not scary enough for horror fans, not fantastical enough for fantasy, and I didn’t find the story itself a very satisfying one. Veris survives by being small and quiet (and clever), but Butcher of the Forest is too small, too quiet, and not clever enough for me.

A swing and (mostly) a miss, imo.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for sending me an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review!

I REALLY enjoyed this. REALLY REALLY enjoyed this novella! It's dark and gritty, and honestly... I wanted more. I loved that the main character isn't "young", she's stubborn as heck, but also smart in her dealings with the beings of the forest. It's the dark side of fae, and I want more Veris. Or Eleonor. I'd love to see a follow up with what happens after the ending of this honestly.

For me, it definitely reads like a dark fairytale with lots of character. I couldn't put it down!

The Butcher of the Forest follows a woman who is forced into a harrowing journey into dangerously magical woods to rescue the children of a ruler. While inside (for the second time in her life) she encounters strange and disturbing creatures, tricksters, and things that want to kill her and the children or keep them there forever. It's evocative and a really effective, contained story that will never let you think about unicorns the same way.

*Special thanks to NetGalley and Tor.com for this e-arc.*

From the moment I saw the cover and read the synopsis, I knew that this book would be exactly my vibe. I love all things deep and dark (think: space, ocean, polar winters), and I was very excited to read about a deep and unknowable forest filled with eldritch horrors. This was a quick read as it is a novella, and I think that an expansion of this dark forest would make for a great full-length story. I've seen comparisons to Annihilation, which I can totally see: human character ventures into a not-quite-normal wilderness and encounters everything from the uncanny valley to the outright horrors. There is commentary on what it means to be innocent or guilty when it comes to the Tyrant and his children, but the highlight of the book was definitely the setting and the different challenges, riddles, and games the main character has to face in her journey into the woods.

A huge thank you to B2Weird Tours, the publisher, and the author for the tour opportunity! Keep an eye out for my tour post closer to publication!

This was such an intriguing novella. It read like a very dark fairytale, with beautiful prose and truly horrifying elements. It tells the story of a woman, tasked by the tyrant conqueror of her country with rescuing his two children from the enchanted forest next to her village - a forest that many people have entered but only one has ever left alive again. That one being our protagonist Veris.

The world building surrounding the tyrant and his conquered nations is flimsy at best, but it's also not what this novella focuses on. This is about the horrors in these strange dark woods, the creatures lurking within and the consequences of humans going where they really should not go. The atmosphere captured by Premee Mohamed's (cleverly metaphorical) writing is phenomenal, the whole vibe is eerie and frightening and I was constantly on my toes. Add to that the high stakes of this mission (the tyrant will kill Veris's family if she doesn't succeed) and the strict time limit (if they stay in the forest for more than a day, they will be trapped forever), and this turned into a book you just have to devour in one sitting. I was stressed, I was fascinated, I was emotionally involved on each page, and the ending really packed a punch.

I did feel like the writing sometimes veered into very flowery territory which didn't quite fit the story it was telling, and I think I would have enjoyed this more as a slightly longer novel that fleshed out Veris and the world she lives in a little more. Also there is one reveal later on about our protagonist that I felt wasn't handled well at all. Without getting into spoilers, the way some things that happened to Veris in the past were revealed felt like they were added purely for shock value, and while I hope this isn't the case, it read like it and made me feel really uncomfortable. This book should come with trigger warnings.

All in all, this would have been a 4 star read if not for that aforementioned reveal, for now it's a 3,5 for me - still rounding up because I liked almost everything else.

⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4/5 stars

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for kindly approving this ARC.

A moment of silence for the gorgeous cover art because I cannot for the life of me get over it.

Do you like dark and grotesque fairytales with enchanted but eerie forests plagued with cunning creatures that would trick you into spending an eternity to their mercy? If so, this one is for you.

The people who lurk into the entrails of the Elmever are never seen again… Well, except for Veris, the first person to come in and out of the forest safe and sound (sort of). But that’s in the past, or is it? One day, Veris is summoned to the castle to an audience with the bloodthirsty Tyrant that rules in her country. He knows about her exploit and wants her to go back into the Elmever a second time. The instructions are clear: go and retrieve my children or I’ll murder you and your family, and then I’ll raze your village to the ground.

The Butcher of the Forest makes for an intriguing and tension-filled tale, full of dangers lurking in the shadows, sinister glamour and questions that raise discussions about themes such as inherited sins and hope. Are we the sins of our parents? Does someone raised into cruelty become cruel themselves? Can we escape that cycle of violence?

A haunting tale written with an exquisite and mesmerizing prose that highly contrast with the grotesqueness and decay of the Elmever forest.

It was too slow for me. I like some slow books, but everything was taking a long time to happen until I lost interest. I couldn't feel anything for the protagonists and didn't understand the urgency and fear towards the tyrant.

My first impression of this book was that it needed more. Perhaps just capturing a brief glimpse of a moment in time is what the author was going for, but I would've preferred it if there were more details about what happened outside of the forest. All the political drama with the Tyrant ended up being pointless, Veris' backstory didn't feel like much of a gut punch since we barely see her relationship to her family, and sadly, the book's name is irrelevant because no character ever does something to deserve a "butcher of the forest" title. 30 extra pages of content or so could've bumped this from "good" to "great" for me.

Fortunately, the parts of the story that did exist were fantastic. I loved the eerie, gothic vibes, and the mysterious feel of this story. Though it had a folkloric, mythic atmosphere, it was also wholly original and contained a lot of very surprising and unusual creatures. The writing was beautiful, and it was so perfectly paced that I meant to just read a few chapters before bed but read the whole thing in one sitting instead.

This was an odd read. Much different than what I would probably pick up off the bookshelf.

The whole description in itself is short:
“At the northern edge of a land ruled by a merciless foreign tyrant lies a wild, forbidden forest ruled by powerful magic.

Veris Thorn—the only one to ever enter the forest and survive—is forced to go back inside to retrieve the tyrant's missing children. Inside await traps and trickery, ancient monsters, and hauntings of the past.

One day is all Veris is afforded. One misstep will cost everything.”

Yup, that’s pretty much it. That’s the entire story in a nut shell. What’s missing is the wild and crazy world of magic that lies within the forest that the children have gone missing in. It definitely has some “final boss” vibes at the end. For some reason, it oddly reminded me of The Warm Hands of Ghosts. If you read it, you might see the connection as well. Because it’s outside of my usual read, it’s personally a 3.5 stars out of 5. Though, I still wouldn’t not recommend this to others who would definitely find this book up their alley.

Thank you to Netgalley and Tor Publishing for allowing me to read this advanced copy.

⭐⭐⭐
.
I have mixed feelings about this one.
The story is very well-developed and interesting but I had trouble getting into it. There were ups and downs in terms of action and I must say the action was more than I expected from a short story which I really liked but the downs were too slow for my liking. I believe if it was a full-grown novel I'd love it.
The Elmever forest is known to be dangerous and no one goes in there ever comes out. Except for Veris who walked in and rescued a child. So when the Tyrants children went missing he summoned Veris for the rescue. She had only a day to get the children while obeying the rules of the forest, no bargains, no bloodshed and not eating anything from the forest.
.
I'm grateful to NetGalley and the author for providing me with an eARC in return for an honest review!

When a tyrant forces a woman to retrieve his children who have gone into the forbidden forest with a deadline that has her entire village's lives on the line, she'll have to outsmart monsters, gods, and pay a price. This is a mixture of a dark fairytale with elements of horror and Alice in Wonderland. The story follows Veris Thorn, the only person to have ever entered the forbidden forest that is ruled by powerful magic, and live. She is now forced to go back in and retrieve the tyrant's missing children and if she fails he'll kill her entire village. Once in the woods she'll be faced by her past demons as well as new gods and monsters who thwart her every attempt to rescue the children and escape. This was definitely an interesting dark fairytale and I appreciate the Alice in Wonderland Horror aspects to it. However, it just felt like it was missing something, I kind of wished it had a better flow and it kind of leaves you with some answered questions and then there was one very triggering moment towards the end that felt so unnecessary and really just threw me off. I kind of wish there was something memorable about this story but it kind of felt bland and I don't think I'll necessarily remember it after reading it. Overall, if you enjoy dark fairytales I think you'll like this and should give it a go.

*Thanks Netgalley and Tor Publishing Group, Tordotcom for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*

The Butcher of the Forest is a wonderful mix of dark fairy tales and horror. It kept me hooked from the first page and I just couldn't stop reading! Just as the Elmever refuses to give up its captives, the rich descriptions capture your imagination. 4.5 stars!

I didn’t realize this was a novella but it was still enjoyable and also quite tense. The forest was terrifying and I loved the main character, she wasn’t the usual “hero” but she was relatable.