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- A Study in Drowning
Discussion
Topic: A Study in Drowning
My personal ranking of Ava Reid books so far: 1. đ€Juniper and Thorn 2. đA Study in Drowning 3. đșThe Wolf and the Woodsman 4. đLady Macbeth
3 comments
Max Edge I loved how strange, dark, raw, and vivid Juniper felt, just a fascinating character study using fantasy elements as metaphor. Reid has described ASID to be their most personal, and I could definitely feel that when reading it, the quote about the drowning starting with a drop is one that I think about a lot. I just finished Wolf, and while it was messy plot and pacing wise, I loved reading about the religion and mythology stuff. Lady Macbeth is the only Ava Reid book I've really disliked. The quicker but still beautiful prose was a nice change of pace, but it really lost the plot in the second half. The story didn't layer on itself as much as her other works, and the characters felt especially lacking. I can see why other people would really like it though.
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Max Edge Anyone else feel free to rank or talk about Ava Reid's books in the comments.đ· I'm just very invested in Ava Reid as an author, and I'm always curious to see positive and negative views on her work.
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lizard My first taste of her was lady Macbeth and I disliked it so much I (maybe unfairly) swore her off entirely. Iâve seen from reviews itâs pretty divisive, and a lot of people reference her other works as better. Maybe Iâll chance her again someday but man she left a very poor taste in my mouth.
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Max Edge I was very disappointed by Lady Macbeth, too, pre-ordered it and everything :( I'd say Juniper and Thorn and A Study in Drowning are Reid's best works so far(I have not read Fable for the End of the World yet). Gothic fantasy with literary prose, and themes of trauma around SA. I'd say if the style and themes of LM were interesting to you, the other 2 should have the depth and thought that you're looking for. I actually started rereading J&T today, hoping it holds up from when I first read it a couple years ago.
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Max Edge From what I've read, Reid is a very talented writer, especially on a prose and emotional level, and how they write a character's internal world. Sometimes the plots aren't as thought out as they could be, though, or sometimes things happening more because its dramatic and not because its a natural result of the plot or characters. J&T and ASiD both have this to some degree, but imo it doesn't outweigh what I like about the stories. Well, J&T is weird enough that it all kinda works, whereas ASiD is almost tight as a story but there's like a couple plot/theme things that could have been executed better. I think the other part of the decisiveness is that Reid is very stylistically distinct, so if you don't like the style you probably won't like the books.
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