Thistlefoot

by GennaRose Nethercott

Overall: I went into this book hoping for an offbeat fairytale retelling with Night Circus vibes, compelling characters, and strange magic, and this book delivered in spades.  Thistlefoot takes the Baba Yaga folk tales as its jumping-off point: Isaac and Bellatine Yaga, estranged adult siblings with strange abilities, receive a cryptic note from a Ukrainian attorney that they’ve inherited a very large box kept in storage for decades.  I don’t want to give too much away, but the story manages to combine a puppet show, a strange band of musicians, magic powers, a very unique house, and a mysterious, deadly stranger in a meditation on generational trauma and the importance of storytelling.  If you like the work of Erin Morgenstern (The Night Circus), V.E. Schwab (The Secret Life of Addie LaRue), Naomi Novik (A Deadly Education), Leigh Bardugo (Ninth House), or you’re a fan of Stranger Things, you should pick up this book!

Likes: I loved all the different characters.  Two of the narrators, Bellatine and Isaac, are both deeply flawed and yet sympathetic.  The third narrator, whose identity I won’t reveal, weaves in elements of folk tale that are crucial to the book’s conclusion.  There’s a small but very diverse cast of supporting characters, including my favorite, Hubcap, a small black cat with a big heart.  Nethercott combines historical fiction, fantasy, folktales, and romance into an original and refreshing brew.  And her prose (did I mention that she’s a poet?) is beautiful and unique.  This book packs an additional punch given the current war in Ukraine.

Dislikes: really nothing. 

FYI: murder, attempted murder, pogroms, massacres, suicidal ideation, accidental death, difficult parent-child and sibling relationships.