Review: The Freedom of Birds

The Freedom of Birds by Stephanie Parkyn
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

An entertaining, well-written story, though a little too aimless for my tastes.

I love the writing, and felt the same towards the author's previous novel, Josephine's Garden. The language is beautiful and invokes real feeling, drawing you into the story. It's easy to fall into the setting and see the world of this story come alive in the mind's eye.

The story, however, was a little too bland for my tastes. I enjoyed the wanderings but ultimately they felt a bit pointless, with no real goal for these characters. I was entertained enough reading about their travels, but wasn't ever sure what I was hanging onto them for.

The characters themselves were unique, and I particularly enjoyed following Saskia. She was a character I really felt for, and empathised with. Remi was too obnoxious for me to feel anything but frustration towards him, and Pascal was so easily manipulated that rather than feeling sorry for him or admiring his loyalty I was quite disappointed in him. I wish I'd seen more growth from these two, but they seemed the same deluded two at the end of the tale.

The war talk did lose me a little, but the characters did see me through to the end. So while I wasn't too sold on the slow, meandering story I did enjoy the writing very much and ended up quite attached to Saskia.

An entertaining enough read that lovers of historical fiction should enjoy; a little slow for my tastes but beautifully written in such a way that the setting really comes alive.

With thanks to A&U for an ARC

View all my reviews