West Book Review
4.5/5 stars Recommended for people who like: Norse mythology, fantasy, multiple POVs, female leads
I've waited so long for this book to come out. I first read East in either 2010 or 2011 and fell in love with it immediately. I really loved Rose and Neddy and the White Bear, as well as the world that Pattou had created. Naturally, when I saw West at the store I had to buy it.
The intro to West is an interesting one; it starts off in what I believe is modern-day, with one of Rose's descendants finding the story in a box. From there, Pattou dives right into the story, which blends a nice mix of Rose's adventure with the events that are occurring at home, much like the first story. It also, once again, centers around a journey to find someone while magic does it's best to divert Rose (and co.) from her road. Pattou does do a very nice job of switching between POVs and making each voice unique, though I do wish she made some of the POV chapters longer, as more often than not, the chapters were only one or two pages. There was also a decent amount of excitement going on at home in the story and it keeps you engaged, even though the events there are, to an extent, less action packed than what Rose is doing.
The world building is excellent, and we get to see some parts of Pattou's world here that we didn't get to see in East. A lot of the terms are familiar, such as Fransk and echecs and the like. There are also some returning characters, aside from the obvious ones of Rose's family, and it was interesting to see how Pattou brought them back and the roles each of them played in this second part of Rose's story. One such character was Sib, who was in the first story, but played such a minor role that it almost felt like she was a new character in this one. Sib had a strong voice, even though she didn't actually narrate one whit of the story. I'd actually be really interested in a whole book about Sib and her past, if Pattou ever wanted to go deeper into that. Estelle was another returning character who got a fresh voice in West. Estelle does have narrative chapters throughout the book, and it was nice to get those spurts of childlike optimism and bravery in between all the adult narrators. She's another one I'd maybe like a book about, but perhaps on an adventure of her own in a few years from when this one is set.
Pattou is working a formula and it works. This rehashing of a previous journey is seen throughout a lot of media--sometimes it bothers me, sometimes it doesn't--and Pattou keeps it similar enough to be recognizable and likable as a journey, but also changes enough aspects and makes it new enough to keep the story fresh and exciting. I especially like the new folktale aspects she brought into this new journey. While I really liked the twist on the 'find x person' journey we saw Rose go on in the first book, I also felt like it was a bit of a rehash of it as well. We still have Rose journeying desperately to find someone, we still have her at risk, we still have magic deterring her at every step and creating puzzles for her, and it just felt a bit...repetitive. Though, for the repetition factor, I would've liked to see more of Rose weaving, it was one of my favorite parts of the first book and I missed seeing it as much in this one, so in that case, more repetition would've been good.
However, a lot of the book was also about characters remembering things that had happened in the past book, which, fine, it's been a while since the last book, readers need a rehash, but it shouldn't happen throughout the entire book, and I felt like that's exactly what happened. Rose, especially, thought a lot about her time traveling before, about her time in the mountain castle, about being in the Troll ice palace, etc. I would've liked to see more of a focus on what was occurring during the book, on the details of the places and characters. I also would've liked more of a focus on some of the character endings, as I was writing this review I actually had to go back and double check because I couldn't remember what happened to one character, and another just kind of...disappeared from the story with little to no explanation.
A point connected the the ones just above, a lot of the book also felt like it was telling rather than showing. I can't remember if East does this as well, it's been a year or two since I last read it, but throughout a lot of the story, I felt like Pattou was telling me how the characters/I felt and what was occurring instead of showing/making me feel what they felt and what was occurring.
Overall, I enjoyed this book immensely and finished it in about 3-4 hours. The world is colorful, the obstacles, while similar to the last book in style, are new and create a longer journey for Rose overall. I really liked the new characters Pattou brought to the table, as well as the returning ones, and would definitely like to see books about some of them in the future.
