Dylan FarrowBesprekingen

If you didn't read the blurb, in 'Hush" we follow seventeen-year-old Shae who wholeheartedly believes she's cursed after the death of her younger brother five years prior. Tragedy strikes again when her mother is found murdered with a golden dagger—a weapon used only by the Bards. She ventures out to seek the truth and after locating the Bards whereabouts, she later discovers the truth behind the murder was a lot closer to home then what she initially thought.

Overall, this was an impressive debut from a celebrity that I have seen in a long time. Their track record ahem hasn't been great *side-eyeing Evelyn Lozada and KUWTK trash crew 'works of art'* and this was surprisingly well written and more so up my alley. It almost had me shook.

The plot was satisfactory. It was predictable at times but it still kept me mildly entertained. The romance portion. Meh. It could've been better but then again my heart was set on Mads because I mean… Mads was the book boyfriend of all book boyfriends and I will fight anyone that says otherwise! He was so sweet, endearing and swoonworthy! Why oh why didn't Shea fall for him?! Why did she have to go fuck up a good thing?! I understand he doesn't have the typical leading hero looks but c'mon, Ravod was alright but he didn't stand a chance against Mads. Ugh. So disappointing. Anyway I digress…

Moving along to the MC—Shae, the lead heroine, wasn't very likable. Side characters were great but something about her just rubbed me the wrong way. Maybe it was her rash behavior that led to the disruption of her friendships with Mads and Fiona. It's understandable that her mother's death was absolutely gut-wrenching especially after losing her father and brother years prior but her approach, behavior and actions were abrupt and too rash for my liking. Her problem was that she never thought things through (not the brightest as you can see) and nearly put her loved ones and their families lives at risk. And in all honestly I would have probably reacted the same way her childhood friends did and distance myself from her and her mother's murder.

So to sum it all up, Dylan Farrow's 'Hush' has promise and I can't wait to follow this story with the upcoming installment. And if you still unsure if this is right for you, keep in mind that this is ideal for readers who enjoy young adult fantasy, adventure, magic, and a bit of mystery all bundled into one. So if you're a fan of all of that, jump aboard, you won't regret it.

I wanted to love this sequel, but I only ended up liking it. I did really enjoy the ending but I was left wanting something slightly different in the first part of the book. If you've read the first one, definitely pick this up.

Thanks to NetGalley for the arc in exchange for my honest review.

Veil the second and final book in the Hush series by Dylan Farrow begins where the first ended. Shea, along with friends Fiona and Mags and Shea’s once Bard trainer, Kennan are heading to Gondal in pursuit of Ravod after he stole the Book of Days.What they find there will completely upend everything they have been taught to believe about magic, the Blot and the origins of the Book of Days.

Veil is an enjoyable and fast-paced YA fantasy. The world-building is interesting and the story kept my interest throughout. My one quibble with the story - I did get annoyed with Shea’s constant infatuation with Ravod despite every betrayal. Still, I’m not a fan of romance novels in general so you can take this criticism with a grain of salt. it should also be noted that this is definitely not a standalone as much of the action is dependent on the events of the first book. Overall, a fun read and I give it a high recommendation for fans of YA fantasy.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review½

An interesting start that plays on familiar tropes without being too trite in the end.

The Bards come to collect the tithes for Shae's village. Their poor village does the best it can but it is not enough. The Bards decide to do a Telling. Shae wants to ask the Bards for a favor, but they do not look on her with respect. After they leave, she finds her mother dead. Shae will not rest until she finds the answer. To do that she must go High House. Will she find the answers she wants? Will she get involved with the Bards at High House?

I enjoyed this story. I liked Shae's questioning of everything even as the powers that be try to gaslight her. She thinks she has no gift and that she is weak, but she is much stronger than she or any of the Bards think she is. While Shae and her villagers have been taught the Bards are worthy of respect, she discovers they are not what she has been taught. They are as flawed as the villagers. There is also evil among them. Shae is my favorite character. The other characters do not draw the same feelings from me. There are many questions I have about them.

The world building is good. The story as a whole is good but there were times in the late middle where I got confused as to what was real and what was illusion or dream. I look forward to reading the next book of the series.

This book takes place right where Hush left off (spoilers for Hush):

The Book of Days has been stolen by Ravod. Cathal has his remaining Bards chasing after Shae and her traveling companions (childhood friends Fiona and Mads and reluctant acquaintance Kennan), as they make their way to Gondal, which until recently everyone believed to be a fairytale.

Everything Shae thought she knew to be true is now put into question and she must face the fact that if you want something done, you might just have to do it yourself (along with a ragtag bunch of misfits wanting to change the world).

As someone who was (is still…?) obsessed with 2012-era YA dystopian books, I enjoyed this book (more than the first one!). I personally think that if this series was spread into 3 books, certain parts of this book could have been expanded upon or more fleshed out. Particularly the time Shae & team spent in Gondal, between getting there and being betrayed by General Ravod. The Battle of High House. And then obviously I want to know what happens between the ending of the book and the epilogue, cause I need to know how adorkable Erik (and let's be real, Shae) would be on their first date. (But that's more of a me-thing with not wanting to let go of a series when it's done).

Overall, I enjoyed this series & this book.

~ARC received through GoodReads Giveaways~½

"Perhaps I made a mistake by trusting him, but his mistake is underestimating me."

This book can be summed up in three words: Gaslight. Gatekeep. Girlboss.

Shae is a headstrong, albeit stubborn, young woman who isn't afraid to ask questions and push the envelope when things aren't adding up. What starts out as an unfortunate tale of a poor town plagued by illness turns into a world where nothing is at it seems.

I thought the premise for this story was interesting and the magic system 'tellings' was unique.

I'm interested to see how Dylan Farrow wraps this story up next the next book.

Hush is the first novel in the Hush series by Dylan Farrow.

Plot:
Shae lives at the edge of a small village with her mother. They are just about tolerated in town since Shae’s brother died of the Blot, a highly contagious illness transmitted by ink which is why reading and writing are outlawed. The only people who don’t seem to fear that Shae might still be carrying the Blot are her best friend Fiona and Mads, the neighbor boy who may be more. But not even with them Shae has shared the fact that something is wrong with her, that her dreams and her embroidery are bleeding into reality. When the Bards come to town, Shae hopes to receive their blessing and healing, just like the entire town. While the town receives rain from them, Shae isn’t so lucky. And after they are gone, Shae’s mother is murdered, leaving her without hope and with very few options. So she risks it all and travels to the High House, where the Bards live, hoping to get help from them.

Hush is a pretty good read, albeit not deviating far from young adult fantasy standards. As it is being touted as a feminist book, I was expecting a little more from it in that regard, but I did like reading it overall.

Read more on my blog: https://kalafudra.com/2021/07/14/hush-dylan-farrow/½

Literary Merit: Good
Characterization: Good
Recommended: Yes
Level: High School

I honestly didn’t know much about this book before starting it, only that it had a cool cover and looked intriguing. Hush is Dylan Farrow’s debut fantasy novel, and has a surprising amount of real-world context. In her Author’s Note, Farrow describes a time in which her family was being blackmailed and made to look terrible, and that this book is her way of showcasing what gaslighting and manipulation looks like. While I didn’t necessarily see this at first, after reading about the author’s experience, I suddenly realized just how much manipulation I had missed. The writing is by no means perfect, but this was a highly engaging and suspenseful fantasy story that I’d love to read more of in the future.

Hush follows the story of 17-year-old Shae, who has spent her entire life being ostracized by the other inhabitants of the small town of Aster. When Shae was young, a vicious plague known as the Blot wiped out countless numbers of people, including her younger brother. Because of this, Shae’s mother has taken a vow of silence, and the rest of the town avoids the two as if they might be infected simply through association. Her only solace is her mother; her childhood friend Fiona; and Mads, a boy desperately seeking her affection. Everything changes for Shae when the Bards - powerful sorcerers with the ability to help those in need - come to her town, and her mother winds up dead. Devastated, Shae desperately seeks the truth, but is dismissed as crazy by everyone she turns to. Undeterred, Shae travels to the High House (the legendary home of the Bards) to seek the truth that nobody else dares question.

This book felt particularly poignant in today’s climate simply because it is centered around a deadly plague. Unlike our own plague, however, this one centers around ink, paper, and forbidden words, which immediately gives it a really cool premise. It feels a lot like Fahrenheit 451 or other such dystopian works, as the people of this world are forbidden from speaking certain words and learning how to read and write. In a world filled with fake news available to us at the touch of a button, this story has the potential to really resonate with young audiences, especially when we learn that the Blot may not come from paper and ink at all, but from the very ruler entrusted to protect everyone.

Another poignant subject this book deals with is gaslighting and emotional manipulation. From the very beginning, Shae encounters a number of characters who either refuse to believe her, or downright lie to her to make her question her own reality. This is textbook gaslighting, and I only wish there had been actual mention of this term in the book, as it’s crucially important for young people to recognize when someone is gaslighting them. This theme continues when Shae encounters Cathal, the enigmatic ruler who initially treats her with kindness and later turns out to be a master manipulator. Though I saw this coming a mile away, I imagine a teenager unused to this sort of manipulation might be blind-sided by the twist, and I think that’s an important lesson for young readers.

This book also handles the idea of prevalent sexism. In this universe, women are rarely gifted with the abilities of a Bard, and are seen to succeed less often because they are “simply too emotional” to handle the job and eventually go crazy. I liked that Shae and Kennan flipped this idea onto its head, as both are incredibly powerful and strong-willed, representing strong female characters in different ways. Where Shae is open and vulnerable, Kennan is closed off and cold, and yet both combat the notion that women are fragile and easily broken by their own emotions. I’m really hoping they team up and become friends in later books, as I am a huge fan of female friendships and think they’d make a pretty kick-ass duo.

My only real gripe is that the romance felt very forced to me. While it has not yet been reciprocated (I sense Farrow is trying for a slow burn), Shae seems entirely too infatuated with Ravod from the very beginning. She initially comes to High House demanding answers for her mother’s murder, but keeps getting distracted by Ravod, nearly swooning every time she sees him. For a strong character who initially rejected the proposal of her first love because he wasn’t being supportive enough, this just felt out of place. While I hope this romance develops more in the future, I just wasn’t quite sold on it in this particular book, especially since Ravod seems very much like the stereotypical brooding YA love interest. It’d be much more interesting if Shae had a thing for Kennan, but I won’t hold my breath on that one.

Despite my issues with the romance, I actually genuinely enjoyed this book, especially for a debut fantasy novel. It seems as though almost everything has been done to death at this point, but this concept and world still felt very refreshing to me. I liked the strong female heroine fighting for her mother, and I especially liked the messages about gaslighting and a system designed to keep the lower classes in poverty. There’s a lot of good stuff happening in a relatively short book, and I found myself saying “Just one more chapter,” each time I was left on a cliffhanger. Based on the loose ends left during the Epilogue, I sense that this is going to be a series, and I’m definitely intrigued enough to give the second book a chance whenever it releases. I would recommend this to teen fans of fantasy, as I think it has a lot of potential to be a great series.

RTC

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3 May 2020 - I got an ARC!!! OH MY WORD. I am not worthy.



Thank you so much to the publishers, I am very grateful. Review to come.

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6 Feb 2020

How do you speak up in a world where propaganda is a twisted form of magic?

OH. MY. YES.

COUNT ME IN FOR ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING BY DYLAN FARROW. If her writing is as good as her brother's (the perfection that is Ronan Farrow), this is going to blow my mind. AND IT'S DYSTOPIAN TOO LIKE YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAS GIRL.

Annoyed because I did not know this was the start of a series and I did NOT want to begin yet another series where I wait a year or longer for book two. I’d appreciate if publishers marked BOOK 1 on the jackets so would be readers would know.
Decent fantasy but obviously leaves you hanging to set you up for book 2. I’m not going to bother going into details. I hate that I’ll forget most of the world building by the time book 2 is released. Dang.½

Thank you to Wednesday Books for the free advanced copy, which was won through a Goodreads giveaway.



"Papers...quills... books... ink... Everything I've ever been taught to fear and revile..."

I wanted to love this book. The cover is gorgeous - the shiny golden title against that starry background had me intrigued from the start. The premise, too, gave me such high hopes for the story within - a plague stemming from the ink on pages leads to all written word forbidden, where injustices are felt throughout the villages. Peasants serve up offerings to a revered class of gifted citizens for the chance at a blessing (called a "Telling") on their drought-ridden lands.

Unfortunately, the author's ideas never came across as fully developed. While the intention could've been simply to hold the intrigue strong onto book two, it left me, as a reader, in the dark about what should have been core concepts of the story. The magic that our Bards (gifted citizens) are able to wield is never fully described or understood, even though our main character spends a good deal of time being trained to use it. While the banning of books and written word is explained away as the cause of the plague, their habit of being mindful of their utterances is never given more reason than superstition (as how would spoken word effect a plague that they literally all believe is sourced from tangible ink?).

"I want to trust him. I want it more than anything."

I also wish that Shae, our main character, had come across as less naive, though I'm sure that was by design. Instead of putting her faith in the people she has every reason to trust, she looked for acceptance and friendship from someone whose loyalty should have been questioned from the start. Even as she learned to second-guess the narrative around her, she remained woefully ignorant to what I'm sure most readers saw coming from a mile away.

I found there to be an overall similarity to another YA fantasy - Red Queen, which I feel is an extremely overrated series - though more development in the magical system she set the groundwork for would have easily set it apart.

I enjoyed the book, but I didn't love it. Whether or not I'll seek out the the second book remains to be seen.

Words hold more magic and power than life itself in this fast-paced read, which introduces an intriguing theme and world.

Written words and ink can kill and are forbidden in Shae's world. Considering she lost her own brother to the plague ink brought, this is something she'll never question. But sometimes words hold magic in the spoken form too. When the Bards come to town, their Tellings can bring the blessings so desperately needed, but their price is a tithe that the town can't afford. Shae herself is sure, after her brother's death, that she might be cursed thanks to the plague too, and seeks out the Bards for help. Instead, she finds her mother dead on the floor, stabbed with a golden dagger. But despite promises of finding the murderer, the town tries to shove the death under the rug. Shae refuses to ignore her mother's death and decides to take matters into her own hands. But when she travels out to find the Bards and, hopefully, the murderer, she runs into more than she would have ever dreamed.

First off, I had no clue this was written by a well-known personality, one of Mia Farrow's children. Which in this case is probably good because it definitely didn't effect how I saw the book.

This is a very interestingly woven theme and surmise. The readers meets Shae in a small, rustic, farming town, where people work hard, food is scarce and life is tough. The author spends a few chapters letting the reader get to know Shae and her situation. It's hard not to like Shae and root for her as her desire for truth, difficult past, and shunned status make her easy to sympathize. The writing flows very well in these first chapters, introduces friends, secrets and heart-ache. The first encounter with the Bards offers a wonderful touch of mystery and magic and nods at what is to come. These chapters drew me in and had me excited to read the rest.

The rest, however, isn't as tight.

The writing is honestly well done and the author definitely has talent, but the story didn't always take the time to give characters enough depth to care about them and often made decision jumps, which made me wonder what in the world had just happened. It's as if too much was pushing through too fast, and there were even a couple moments which confused. Yet, I didn't want to put this one down, either, because it is an interesting tale with so many tense moments and intrigue. But the further along the story goes, the more stumbles hurt the flow. Especially the ending left me with a 'huh?' as a character from early on suddenly reappears to 'help', which I have no clue why. It just happened as if it had to for whatever comes in the next book. And that is too bad because I could have loved this read and desperately wanted to.

Shea begins to notice strange things happening around her after her brother dies of the Blot (a deadly disease thought to be caused by ink) Her mother has stopped speaking, the village is suffering from a severe drought, and, strangest, of all, many of the things she embroiders appear in reality. Convinced this is being caused by a curse, and despite being shunned by the village, she decides to seek out the Bards to get them to lift it. Unfortunately, when she is finally able to speak to one, he tells her to leave. Hours later, she discovers her mother dead, murdered by a golden dagger used by Bards.

She moves into the village but her insistence that her mother was killed by a Bard causes the villagers to insist she leave. She decides to find High House, the home of the Bards, to seek justice for her mother. Instead, she discovers secrets about the curse, her mother's death, and herself.

Hush is the debut fantasy novel by Dylan Farrow and, honestly, I liked it but I didn't love it. There was a great deal of potential especially in her description of a world where education and even writing are considered dangerous and where a legend that has sustained people for centuries is now banned. The biggest problem with the novel is Shea herself. Many of her actions seems, at best, naive and I found myself questioning many of her actions which contradict everything she should know to be, at best, very unlikely and, at worst, extremely dangerous and not just to her.

Still, as I said, it is a debut and, if it frustrated me at times, it kept me reading to the end and wanting to know what will happen next so, overall, I would give it two stars for character development and four stars for world building and plot so three and a half stars it is.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review½