Staked

I greatly enjoyed the first 7 books (plus however many novellas) in this series when I read them all in a row pretty much. And I enjoyed this book for the most part.

However, and I know this will sound a little silly when talking about a book about Druids, I feel like I'm witnessing Mr. Hearne's coming out as a Social Justice Warrior with this book. Yes, get out the pitchforks, I'm sure I have immediately become a horrible person to a bunch of you.

Yeah, it makes sense that a book with a good third of its narrative from a female's perspective would at times deal with feminist problems, and the aforementioned Druids would worry about nature and man's destruction of it. But there are ways to do it that aren't practically beating me over the head with it. I could list off many strong female characters by other authors that (I'm assuming, since I'm male, boo hiss!) should inspire female readers simply through their actions and don't need to pontificate on why they did them. Similarly, Atticus worries about the fate of the earth (and to a lesser extent the people on it) regularly throughout the series, but only in this book did I feel that I was being forced to sit up and take notice, or else. I greatly enjoyed Granuile's character up to this point, but with this iteration it is as if nothing matters except getting the author's message across in her voice. I'm quickly growing to despise her character because of this.

I could be completely misreading things or attributing intent that isn't there, but that's the way it read to me, so at least something made me start thinking it. I felt it was pretty blatant too, but perhaps I'm just more sensitive to it now than before.

But here's a perfect example: you know who (to me) were the best female role-models in this book? The Polish witches. Not once did they talk about oppression or misogyny or any other buzzwords. They just were, and they were cool, and I respected them as characters. Not as women or men, not as activists or abusers, but as people. That's the way you show that women are strong. You don't tell me that they are and force me to comply.

I'll read the next one because 8 books is a lot of investment and I greatly enjoyed most of them, as evidenced by my ratings, but I fear that the next book will only get worse. I hope I'm wrong.

Oh, and I do want to say that the Owen chapters were absolutely wonderful. He's a breath of fresh air every time he appears.