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monsterqueers) wrote2020-08-06 04:03 pm
monsterqueers) wrote2020-08-06 04:03 pm
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[BOOK REVIEW] The Cats of Tanglewood Forest
Bit different than the usual, but while we were getting hit with the remains of that tropical storm I had to turn all the electronics off and so I had the time to read a physical book so I did.
This one has been sitting on my shelf since 2014 and I only just got around to reading it RIP.
It is The Cats of Tanglewood Forest by Charles De Lint and illustrated by Charles Vess.
So first off: The book is *gorgeous*!
It has a watercolor kinda look to it and its illustrated in color throughout the whole book.
The art is well-composed and has a lovely fairy-tale vibe to it.
Here is some of it, pls excuse shoddy picture quality:
100% beautiful and I was genuinely surprised at it. When I read the blurb I didn't go peeking so I didn't see it was illustrated that wonderfully(or maybe I did and it was just 6 years and I forgot lol). The art is the best part of the book imo.
It does have the problem of drawing characters looking different every time you turn around, however.
The story is that in order to save her life, the cats in the forest used magic to change a young girls shape and she now has to go on a quest to cure herself.
Beyond this section is spoilers!
Alright so I was very much a fan of some of the things in this book- some of the prose choice, T.H. Reynolds the fox was so sweet and wonderful, The Apple Tree Man is a very comforting figure that I like, and the cat TF is good, but the one thing you can't really get around with this book is that its written by a white dude and the protag is a light-skinned red-haired girl and she runs through a bunch of Native American-flavored mythos- like a portion of the adventure is stated to be on a Reservation. He makes up a fake tribe and is terrible at sourcing where his folklore comes from. Its. A glaring fault. Just... Really uncomfortable.
This reviewer puts it better than I could over on goodreads: [LINK]
Also this reviewer has a nice bit to add about how the only people who can help are gendered male, and all the women arent quite enough on their own: [LINK]
The shapeshifting bear-people that are unfriendly to the MC are also white so im not sure where on the scale of 'annoying but adequate symbolism that most of the antagonists and psuedo-antagonists are white humans I guess' to 'deeply offensive that a native thing is given to white people and done with zero research' that lies but it sure is a thing.
Beyond that, the plot certainly works, and is plenty comfortable.
The prose is also nice, with gems like "…it might seem like a terrible thing to be trapped in a kitten's body, but there are worse fates" and "...cats would come to dream and be dreamed."
However I find myself incapable of really enjoying it because of the appropriation.
In addition, for a book called The Cats of Tanglewood Forest... it REALLY doesn't have enough of the cats in it.
Like they barely exist in the the plot. I picked up this book for the cat folktale, I found appropriation and way too much wishing to not be a cat.
Im sure it would be a lovely story if I was ten and had no idea of how bad the native rep in this is, but im not ten and I do know how terrible the rep is.
TLDR:
Rating the artwork as its own thing- 4/5
Rating the text- 2/5
Average- 3/5
I wont be reading it again, thats for sure, but im glad I finally got around to it.
Its glaring issues overshadow the lovely prose and the little morsels of good storytelling to the point were a potentially amazing tale has been reduced to 'meh its native appropriating and doesn't have enough cats, read something else'.
If anyone has recs for books by Native Americans/First Nation people about NDN-flavored fantasy/folktale stuff I will gladly put it on my to-read list.
This one has been sitting on my shelf since 2014 and I only just got around to reading it RIP.
It is The Cats of Tanglewood Forest by Charles De Lint and illustrated by Charles Vess.
So first off: The book is *gorgeous*!
It has a watercolor kinda look to it and its illustrated in color throughout the whole book.
The art is well-composed and has a lovely fairy-tale vibe to it.
Here is some of it, pls excuse shoddy picture quality:
100% beautiful and I was genuinely surprised at it. When I read the blurb I didn't go peeking so I didn't see it was illustrated that wonderfully(or maybe I did and it was just 6 years and I forgot lol). The art is the best part of the book imo.
It does have the problem of drawing characters looking different every time you turn around, however.
The story is that in order to save her life, the cats in the forest used magic to change a young girls shape and she now has to go on a quest to cure herself.
Beyond this section is spoilers!
Alright so I was very much a fan of some of the things in this book- some of the prose choice, T.H. Reynolds the fox was so sweet and wonderful, The Apple Tree Man is a very comforting figure that I like, and the cat TF is good, but the one thing you can't really get around with this book is that its written by a white dude and the protag is a light-skinned red-haired girl and she runs through a bunch of Native American-flavored mythos- like a portion of the adventure is stated to be on a Reservation. He makes up a fake tribe and is terrible at sourcing where his folklore comes from. Its. A glaring fault. Just... Really uncomfortable.
This reviewer puts it better than I could over on goodreads: [LINK]
Also this reviewer has a nice bit to add about how the only people who can help are gendered male, and all the women arent quite enough on their own: [LINK]
The shapeshifting bear-people that are unfriendly to the MC are also white so im not sure where on the scale of 'annoying but adequate symbolism that most of the antagonists and psuedo-antagonists are white humans I guess' to 'deeply offensive that a native thing is given to white people and done with zero research' that lies but it sure is a thing.
Beyond that, the plot certainly works, and is plenty comfortable.
The prose is also nice, with gems like "…it might seem like a terrible thing to be trapped in a kitten's body, but there are worse fates" and "...cats would come to dream and be dreamed."
However I find myself incapable of really enjoying it because of the appropriation.
In addition, for a book called The Cats of Tanglewood Forest... it REALLY doesn't have enough of the cats in it.
Like they barely exist in the the plot. I picked up this book for the cat folktale, I found appropriation and way too much wishing to not be a cat.
Im sure it would be a lovely story if I was ten and had no idea of how bad the native rep in this is, but im not ten and I do know how terrible the rep is.
TLDR:
Rating the artwork as its own thing- 4/5
Rating the text- 2/5
Average- 3/5
I wont be reading it again, thats for sure, but im glad I finally got around to it.
Its glaring issues overshadow the lovely prose and the little morsels of good storytelling to the point were a potentially amazing tale has been reduced to 'meh its native appropriating and doesn't have enough cats, read something else'.
If anyone has recs for books by Native Americans/First Nation people about NDN-flavored fantasy/folktale stuff I will gladly put it on my to-read list.