Red Headed Femme: Review: Red in Tooth and Claw

November 25, 2024

Review: Red in Tooth and Claw

Red in Tooth and Claw by Lish McBride
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This young-adult weird Western has two parallel slow-burn threads: one of setting, and the fact that for all its boots/hats/horses/chaps y'all-come-back-saloon patter that sounds like a direct descendant of the American West, this story is taking place on a secondary world with magic that is not Earth. (Which is just as well, as that avoids the Native genocide issue.) The second thread is one of characterization, as our protagonist Faolan Kelly slowly learns to open up, trust other people, make friends, and even snag a young man, a Rover (this world's wandering clans) named Tallis. Both these threads are subtle and absorbing, and expertly paced.

We also have a horror element that slowly reveals itself to be a sort-of portal fantasy, with a demon cave cat that really isn't a demon, but a live creature unwillingly snatched from another world. (The way this cave cat is described, it kind of sounds like a white sabertoothed tiger with rosette-marked fur instead of stripes. Which made me wish an artist's representation could have been on the cover, but that would have definitely been a spoiler.) This cave cat is controlled with magic and turned into a monster by the book's villain, the cult leader His Benevolence Gideon Dillard, who runs the Settlement the underage Faolan is sent to after her grandfather dies.

I really enjoyed the characterizations in this book--Faolan has a fascinating arc, and the secondary characters are all well-drawn and believable people. Faolan is a practical, stubborn, taciturn protagonist, a young woman who has been pretending to be a boy for years so she won't get married off, and who painstakingly constructs a new found family through the course of this book. Part of her arc is that Tallis' clan of Rovers accept her for who she is and don't look askance at her short hair and chest binder.

This is an interesting blending of several different genres, and one of the more unique books I've read this year.

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My Ratings System

Disclaimer: I do not get paid for any of this. I just post these reviews because I like doing it. Anyone and everyone following along, welcome aboard.

One star: Bad to awful; usually don't finish. If I finish a book and label it one star, it's almost always because the ending was so horrid it spoiled everything that came before.

Two stars: Marginal. I generally finish these, but they have significant flaws in worldbuilding and/or characterization (my two main criteria) with just enough good points (barely) for me to tough it out to the end. Sometimes I go into detail regarding these flaws; it depends on how much the book irritated me.

Three stars: Liked, with caveats. A lot of first novels fall in this category. The flaws still exist, but they are lesser, and the promise is definitely there.

Four stars: Really liked. These are books that excite me, with minor flaws.

Five stars: Launching my socks into orbit amazing; hits all my sweet spots. The pacing is spot on, the worldbuilding is logical and well thought out, and the characters have depth. I can usually rave about these books for several paragraphs (and do).

Quote of the Day

"I know some who are constantly drunk on books as other men are drunk on whiskey." ~H.L. Mencken

A fragmented excerpt from The Filer and the Astronaut by Louise Carol:

‘The time has come,’ the Filer said,
‘To talk of many things:
Of pups — and picks — and palimpsests —
Of Cadigan — and King —
And why this movie, cult is not —
And whether trolls believe.’

‘But scroll a bit,’ the Pixels cried,
‘Before you have your chat;
For some of us are full of links,
Oh do not rush so fast!’
‘No hurry!’ said the Astronaut.
They thanked him much for that.

‘A post of fifth,’ the Filer said
‘Is what we chiefly need:
Filking and Punnery besides
Are very good indeed —
Now, if you’re ready, Pixels dear,
We can begin to read.’

‘Pixels,’ said the Astronaut,
‘You’ve had a pleasant run!
Shall we be posting here again?’
But answer came there none —
And this was scarcely odd, because
They’d scrolled up every one.

~Comment from Stoic Cynic on File 770

I wandered lonely as an airship
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a fleet
A host, of modern dirigibles;
Above the lake, beyond the trees,
Floating and dancing in the breeze.
For oft, when at my laptop I browse
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of altitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the dirigibles.

[From Wordsworth’s steampunk phase]

~Comment by Camestros Felapton on File 770

I met a Filer from an antique Scroll
Who said — “Two vast and towering stacks of books
Stand in the bedroom … Near them, novels by Pohl,
And others of a Golden Age, whose frowns,
And uncracked spines, and sneers of cold control
Beckon toward the fan. They lay there waiting, and unread.
Worlds, though built, not yet explored by glance or looks
At pages filled with men of space, who from Earth have fled.
And on the nightstand, these words appear:
My name is Tsundoko, Stack of Books;
Look on my pages, Pixels, and Despair!

~Comment from Bill, on File 770

November 25, 2024

Review: Red in Tooth and Claw

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