by Noah Medlock
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
The first three quarters of The Botanical Daughter is beautifully written with a rich gothic feel. We meet our closeted gay men and feel the sorrow at how close a secret their relationship must be kept. As we progress into getting to know our other main character, and leading lady, we realize she too has the calling of ‘forbidden love’ (ugh, hate to call it that but it’s the right terminology for the day) and has been hurt. Throughout the first sections of the book we meet the plant entities (in various forms) and create a bond with the botanical character that surprised me. I loved it and felt it was just an innocent in all everything, even in some of its more horrific moments.
There are clever messages of love is love embedded into the narrative, both blatant and subtle; even making myself (a bisexual woman) wonder if there is a limit to love being love. For the record, the answer is no. Love is always beautiful and always correct. When love becomes obsession or greed it is different; but in its rawest form love is never wrong, by any definition. Noah Medlock does a beautiful job of expressing and showing this sentiment that in different ways and creates a truly safe space for sexuality and identity of any/all kinds (even for a plant).
Moving through the story we have some bloody moments, of retribution and revenge, that are all very gothic and satisfying. It’s all wonderful! Then we reach a point, around the last 100 pages, in which things start to unravel a bit. The pacing felt lost, the outcomes were disjointed, and lacked common sense. For a very smart story, with very clever characters, to suddenly feel less intelligent hurt. Additionally the plot choices continued forward in ways I did not expect that just didn’t satisfy my gothic/horror desires. I have come up with three distinctly different ways to close off this novel that would have been more gothic, satisfying for the reader, and still have held to the final message of the story.
Thus the final conclusion was, for me, very unsatisfying. Not necessarily because of the events but more so that the gothic overtones are played down, there is a lack of scientific discussion to talk about what the future might hold based on the ending (where some horror could have been injected), and in general I just had trouble focusing (and started wanting to just be done with the book). I would have ended the story a bit sooner with a more open ended ending that would have fit the gothic romance feel quite well. Or if taken to where it was I would have at least given some scientific questions for the reader to ponder about the implications of the final state of things. Sadly we get neither of these and therefore I just can’t give this a higher rating.
All that said, for a debut author, this is amazingly well written up to that last 100 pages. It does have an odd pacing at times, but that kind of fits with our quirky men and the unpredictable nature of plants growing. Sometimes they grow quick, other times slow. I would still recommend A Botanical Daughter as a good gothic read; but I would warn the potential reader to brace themselves for an ending that may not be as satisfying as one might have hoped for. I will however watch for future stories by Medlock as I think all the right foundation is there, it’s just the final execution (admittedly always the hardest part of any horror novel) that suffered here. In a different story, and with some different feedback I think Medlock could deliver us the kind of LGBTQ+ gothic romance that most readers will be craving by the end of The Botanical Daughter.
Please note: I received an eARC of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. This is an honest and unbiased review.
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My rating: 3 of 5 stars
The first three quarters of The Botanical Daughter is beautifully written with a rich gothic feel. We meet our closeted gay men and feel the sorrow at how close a secret their relationship must be kept. As we progress into getting to know our other main character, and leading lady, we realize she too has the calling of ‘forbidden love’ (ugh, hate to call it that but it’s the right terminology for the day) and has been hurt. Throughout the first sections of the book we meet the plant entities (in various forms) and create a bond with the botanical character that surprised me. I loved it and felt it was just an innocent in all everything, even in some of its more horrific moments.
There are clever messages of love is love embedded into the narrative, both blatant and subtle; even making myself (a bisexual woman) wonder if there is a limit to love being love. For the record, the answer is no. Love is always beautiful and always correct. When love becomes obsession or greed it is different; but in its rawest form love is never wrong, by any definition. Noah Medlock does a beautiful job of expressing and showing this sentiment that in different ways and creates a truly safe space for sexuality and identity of any/all kinds (even for a plant).
Moving through the story we have some bloody moments, of retribution and revenge, that are all very gothic and satisfying. It’s all wonderful! Then we reach a point, around the last 100 pages, in which things start to unravel a bit. The pacing felt lost, the outcomes were disjointed, and lacked common sense. For a very smart story, with very clever characters, to suddenly feel less intelligent hurt. Additionally the plot choices continued forward in ways I did not expect that just didn’t satisfy my gothic/horror desires. I have come up with three distinctly different ways to close off this novel that would have been more gothic, satisfying for the reader, and still have held to the final message of the story.
Thus the final conclusion was, for me, very unsatisfying. Not necessarily because of the events but more so that the gothic overtones are played down, there is a lack of scientific discussion to talk about what the future might hold based on the ending (where some horror could have been injected), and in general I just had trouble focusing (and started wanting to just be done with the book). I would have ended the story a bit sooner with a more open ended ending that would have fit the gothic romance feel quite well. Or if taken to where it was I would have at least given some scientific questions for the reader to ponder about the implications of the final state of things. Sadly we get neither of these and therefore I just can’t give this a higher rating.
All that said, for a debut author, this is amazingly well written up to that last 100 pages. It does have an odd pacing at times, but that kind of fits with our quirky men and the unpredictable nature of plants growing. Sometimes they grow quick, other times slow. I would still recommend A Botanical Daughter as a good gothic read; but I would warn the potential reader to brace themselves for an ending that may not be as satisfying as one might have hoped for. I will however watch for future stories by Medlock as I think all the right foundation is there, it’s just the final execution (admittedly always the hardest part of any horror novel) that suffered here. In a different story, and with some different feedback I think Medlock could deliver us the kind of LGBTQ+ gothic romance that most readers will be craving by the end of The Botanical Daughter.
Please note: I received an eARC of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. This is an honest and unbiased review.
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1 comment:
This sounds pleasantly creepy, but not to the point where it gives me sleepless nights. I might pick it up eventually.
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