Fae Friday – Back to Nature

Happy Fae Friday everyone! I am writing this post as I’m listening to Taylor Swift’s new album Folklore. It’s funny because I like metal and hard rock… But Taylor Swift has always been a “guilty pleasure” artist. Anyhoo, Fae Friday time.

nature

Fae Friday is hosted by Caffeinated Fae, and you can find all future prompts on her blog! All you gotta do is link back to her page and have fun with the prompt! Here is this week’s prompt:

“The sun is shining, the trees are thriving, and the flowers are in full bloom. As we all know, many faeries love to commune with nature, so the prompt this week is: What is a book that takes place in nature that you enjoyed?”

Uprooted by Naomi Novik

Uprooted

By Naomi Novik

“Our Dragon doesn’t eat the girls he takes, no matter what stories they tell outside our valley. We hear them sometimes, from travelers passing through. They talk as though we were doing human sacrifice, and he were a real dragon. Of course that’s not true: he may be a wizard and immortal, but he’s still a man, and our fathers would band together and kill him if he wanted to eat one of us every ten years. He protects us against the Wood, and we’re grateful, but not that grateful.”

Agnieszka loves her valley home, her quiet village, the forests and the bright shining river. But the corrupted Wood stands on the border, full of malevolent power, and its shadow lies over her life.

Her people rely on the cold, driven wizard known only as the Dragon to keep its powers at bay. But he demands a terrible price for his help: one young woman handed over to serve him for ten years, a fate almost as terrible as falling to the Wood.

But Agnieszka fears the wrong things. For when the Dragon comes, it is not Kasia he will choose.

This book doesn’t take place 100% in nature, but the natural environment does play a very important role in this book. Like, without it there wouldn’t be any plot. This story has that Eastern European fairytale vibe to it, which was totally enjoyable. This story was great because it goes against the usual tropes for young female characters. The main character, Agnieszka, is plain, clumsy, and totally forgettable. And she’s comfortable with that.

The Dragon/wizard chooses a girl every ten years to serve him, and in return he protects the valley from the malevolent Wood. The relationship between the Dragon and Agnieszka is very fun to read about. The Dragon is like that super broody character who seems intimidating but is really just super uncomfortable all the time.

I read this book years ago, so forgive me for not remembering much more than this. The nature aspect is really awesome, though. Like I said, the Wood place a central role in this book and it will come up a lot.

That’s it for this Fae Friday! What’s a book that takes place in nature that you really enjoyed?

You can find my past Fae Friday posts here!