Let's Talk Books

Is there such a thing as cosy adventure? If there is, then The Crimson Road is the perfect example.

Violet Zennor is more than a girl. Tragedy divides her life, there was before, when she was a daughter, and there is after, when she is a tool of her father’s penance. Driven to the brink of madness by his guilt, and far too cowardly and self-important to do his own dirty work, Hedrek Zennor transform his child into a weapon. His death frees Violet for the first time in her life. She is her own person. That is, until her father’s friends reveal the conditions of his will, and the prophecy he was working to forestall. Now Violet must travel to the far North, beyond the barrier held by the Briar witches, well into the Darklands, where Leeches rule, to find The Anchorhold and put an end to what dwells there… even if its her own brother.

The Crimson Road is a very unusual novel. It is relatively high stakes, packed with magic and danger, brimming with strong, badass women, and yet very cosy, equally brimming with found family, kindly people, affection, and family drama. Violet is in danger almost the entire novel, but we spend idyllic passages in hidden worlds, meeting lovely people, and nicknaming animals. This is the first book I have read in A.G. Slatter’s Sourdough Universe, and whilst I worry knowing the end may impact my eventual reading of the others, I did not feel as though I had missed too much. This works as a stand-alone novel because of the strength of Slatter’s world building, and the fullness of her characters.

I found the preoccupation with fertility in this novel to be interesting. I think there is an argument to be made that the focus was meant to be on motherhood, which I don’t disagree with, but in places I think it leaned a little more towards pregnancy than motherhood. In a narrative that is so much about a woman overcoming what was made of her, I found this a really unique, and important element, but I do worry it played into the “tough women can’t have babies, wombs are the price of your badassery” schtick so many rejected when it was foisted onto Marvel’s Black Widow. It is not Slatter’s problem that this is so trope-ified, but I do wonder how well these narrative elements will play with other readers! I would be super interested to hear what others felt about this plot-point.

An exceptionally well-penned adventure novel, which will also satisfy a hunger for emotive, whimsical, and fantastical fantasy. 4 stars.