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The Language of Thorns: Midnight Tales and Dangerous Magic (2017) is a collection of tales set in the Grishaverse, the fantasy world of Leigh Bardugo’s novels. The fairytales are charmingly intertwined with Sara Kipin’s intricate illustrations, which makes the book a wonderful gift for any dedicated Bardugo fan. The layout is similar to J.K. Rowling’s Tales of Beedle the Bard, set as they are in the world of Bardugo’s Grisha Trilogy. To fans of the Grishaverse, these tales would be enchanting. However, for the uninitiated like me, The Language of Thorns is both so well-written that I am tempted to read Bardago’s past novels, and self-contained enough that I could happily enjoy these stories without feeling as though I am missing something.
The Language of Thorns delves into stories of haunted woods and talking foxes, toys that come to life and wish-granting rivers. A personal highlight is ‘Little Knife’; the story of Yeva, a young girl so beautiful she has to be hidden away from her whole kingdom. As men begin to compete for her hand in marriage, Yeva becomes more and more concerned for her own future and particularly for her freedom. At the culmination of the story, Yeva rejects both the greedy prince and the classic hero. Neither of them see her or desire her for who she really is. The river that aided the hero in order to claim Yeva’s hand instead claims Yeva for its own, and Yeva escapes to live free “in happy solitude, and grow old, and never worried when her beauty faded.”
A dark twist on classic fairytales that champions mental strength and intelligence over physical beauty, these short stories switch the archetypical roles of villain and heroes cleverly and successfully. Throughout the stories, the lonely and the mistreated come out on top, but never in the way you expect. Bardugo manages to surprise the reader with each twisted resolution, making The Language of Thorns a wonderfully edgy alternative for an unromantic audience tired of typically sentimental YA fiction.
The Language of Thorns was published on September 28 by Macmillan and available in all good bookshops.
