Unraveller

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Once again Frances Hardinge has delivered a story that's a little bit different and creepily atmospheric. Set in a world full of disagreeable magic and malicious curses, the plot is complex, multilayered and full of rich imaginings. It introduces us to a whole host of questionable characters. Those who curse, those who are cursed and anything and everything in between - think inventive supernatural creatures. I loooved this world where hatred could make certain people develop a form of magic that could curse other people. The way the magic worked, what was done to them (or not), the firm the curses usually took ... it was rather wonderful (in a very dark and twisted way). Especially since it gave a unique perspective on greed, desire, revenge and the twisted forms love can take.

Even if you didn’t dwell on the past, however, sometimes the past dwelt on you. Sometimes it remembered you and came after you for revenge.” After being imprisoned for mouthing off to some pompous idiot merchant, Kellen is rescued by a marsh horse and her rider on behest of their female patron - she has a job for the unraveller. Perhaps you will decide that all the stories of the Wilds and the Raddith cursers were invented to entertain tourists. And at night, when you see a many-legged shape scuttle across the ceiling of your bedchamber, you will tell yourself that it is a spider, and only a spider . . .

I think anger’s alright, actually. Lots of you have been treated badly, and most of you never asked for any of this. But… hate’s different. It eats you up and makes everything worse. You’ve all suffered enough already, haven’t you?” It’s wonderful that in a story about unravelling - curses, yes, but also the tangled webs of resentment and hate and pain - Frances Hardinge instead weaves a very complex and deeply nuanced tale with a whole onion-worth of layers. Discovering the flaws in one’s society (large or small, country or village) is a huge and important part of growing up, and one that Hardinge explores and pokes at with questions and ideas. If anyone can do something wrong, or feel something wrong, and wind up an outcast, then what? What grace can the world learn to offer to the rejected and outcast and othered? What can be learned from anger, and what are its limitations? How do you know when anger is righteous and useful, and when it’s merely cruel? Can power that comes from anger and pain be used for good?

Unraveller feels like a true fairytale, there may be wondrous creatures and mysterious forest settings, but there's also a Marsh Horse that may eat you and definitely a solid chance of being turned into a harp, a bat or a ship if you get on someone's bad side. It's very funny throughout, but balances that out with themes of grief, fear and rage.It sounds very critical and don’t get me wrong, there’s so much creativity and enjoyment here. But it just never came together and I never cared about any of the characters. And then that overcomplicated ending just happened and I was already losing patience by that point. I doubt I’ll remember much of this story in a few months. Regrettably, this one joins the other forgettable books, like Skinful of Shadows, Verdigris deep and Deeplight. But I also loved the more visual parts of the worldbuilding. From bogs to marshes, from rivers to the metropolis; whether we were in lonely places or ones bursting from the seams with inhabitants - this world was beautiful in every way.