Name: Sophia
Grade: 11th
Title: The Language of Thorns: Midnight Tales and Dangerous Magic
Author: Leigh Bardugo
Published in: 2017
Pages: 288
Rating: 5 stars
Review: The Language of Thorns: Midnight Tales and Dangerous Magic is a series of the fairy tales that we have all come to know and love, but recreated. Beauty and the Beast, The Nutcracker, The Little Mermaid, and three other stories have been reinvented to take the characters known by many and fit them in stories that take completely different paths. Leigh Bardugo is up to this challenge. She understands that people know many of these narratives and, using incredible imagery and imagination, she makes them her own. While this is a standalone book, these tales come from the world that many of her other books are set in.
I found this book incredibly enchanting. After reading the first story I found it very difficult to put it down. On top of the incredible writing, each page is beautifully illustrated. The borders of the pages are slowly filled as the story progresses and by the end, the whole story is depicted in the margins. Another thing I love about this book is that I don’t have a favorite story. They are all so fantastic and different that it is hard for me to compare them with one another. I also feel somewhat of a connection with many of the characters. This book tends to draw you in and it makes me feel like I am in the story and I am the one who is going on the journey.
I highly recommend this book to anyone who is looking for new myths, folklore, or fairy tales. In this modern age, it is hard to come across new fairy tales that take on an air of the past but this book exceeded my expectations by far. And because these tales are part of the author’s other works, they may interest you into her other books: The Shadow Bone Trilogy, and The Six of Crows Duology
AFL Teen Book Reviews 