"But unless Atrix could name what he fought, he would never defeat it, for he thought he fought only himself."
It's surprising that I've never read anything by Patricia McKillip because I devoured everything by Robin McKinley as an adolescent--and they're right next to each other on the shelf. I chose The Book of Atrix Wolfe based on the Author Read-Alikes section of my library's NoveList.
Before reading further, I want to say that I'm not not recommending this book--it might be just your thing. It just wasn't really my thing.
I enjoy what I call light fantasy--the stuff you can read without having to learn an entire new world and new language to understand. This book fell somewhere in the middle. It took me about fifty pages to connect all the different threads of the story, and I got lost on and off throughout the entire book.
One element of the writing was just straight up annoying. I'm an advocate of the simplest dialogue tags possible--"said" and "asked" are the only ones you really need. Anything more flowery is just a sign that the dialogue isn't strong enough on its own. And completely unforgivable: tagging dialogue in a way that interrupts the dialogue.
"What," Burne barked, "happened."
or
"Tell me," he said harshly, "what he recognized."
Even an untrained ear can hear how awkward that is. And those two examples came from the same page.
The book did have some redeeming qualities. It was entertaining enough for me to keep reading to the end. And it had some very beautiful imagery. It's a good book for lovers of fantasy.
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