Books

Wildwood

  • Nov 30, 2020
  • Colin Meloy Carson Ellis
  • 374 responses.

Wildwood The first book in the epic middle grade fantasy series full of magic wonder and danger nothing less than an American Narnia from Colin Meloy lead singer of the highly celebrated band the Decemberis

  • Title: Wildwood
  • Author: Colin Meloy Carson Ellis
  • ISBN: 9780062024688
  • Page: 342
  • Format: Hardcover

    • The first book in the epic middle grade fantasy series full of magic, wonder, and danger nothing less than an American Narnia from Colin Meloy, lead singer of the highly celebrated band the Decemberists, and Carson Ellis, the acclaimed illustrator of the New York Times bestselling The Mysterious Benedict Society.Wildwood is the first in the Wildwood Chronicles trilogy.

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      Posted by:Colin Meloy Carson Ellis
      Published :2020-08-10T02:54:42+00:00

    About "Colin Meloy Carson Ellis"

    1. Colin Meloy Carson Ellis

      Colin Patrick Henry Meloy born October 5, 1974 is the lead singer and songwriter for the Portland, Oregon folk rock band The Decemberists In addition to his vocal duties, he plays acoustic guitar, 12 string acoustic guitar, electric guitar, bouzouki, and percussion As of 2005, Meloy has written a 100 page book on The Replacements fourth album, Let It Be, released as part of the 33 series.Meloy was born in Helena, Montana His sister is Maile Meloy, an author often published in The New Yorker He first attended the University of Oregon before going to the University of Montana, where he majored in creative writing He then moved to Portland, where he met future bandmates Jenny Conlee and Nate Query Prior to being in The Decemberists, Meloy was the lead singer and songwriter of Happy Cactus and Tarkio, both indie folk bands from Montana.In early 2005, he embarked on his first solo tour in support of the self released six song EP, Colin Meloy Sings Morrissey, which consists of six Morrissey covers Only 1000 copies of the album were made and they were sold only on this tour Meloy did a second solo tour in January 2006, playing with Laura Veirs and Amy Annelle On this tour, he sold an EP featuring covers of British folk artist Shirley Collins Shows from the 2006 tour were recorded for a live release.Meloy appeared with Charlie Salas Humara in the music video for Pillar of Salt by The Thermals.On February 24, 2006, Carson Ellis, Meloy s longtime girlfriend and graphic artist for the Decemberists, gave birth to a son, Henry Hank Meloy.

    374 Comments

    1. 2 for the writing + 4 for the illustrations which are amazing = 3 over all. I nearly abandoned after the Portland hipster preciousness of the first chapter. Seriously, apparently we needed to establish that 12 year old Prue rides a single speed bike and cruises the new used bins at the record store- very important for aesthetic. Also, it is probably a good thing the crows took the baby because eventually she was going to do some damage hauling him around in a flippin' red wagon tied to her bike [...]

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    2. BOOOOORRRRRRIIIIIIIINGGGGGGGG.It's a 541-page middle grade fiction fantasy that bored me to tears (except for one story about Prue's parents that was the only part I found interesting and I'd much rather have read about that for 541 pages). Meloy and Ellis call this work a love letter to the woods of Portland, Oregon, and a true collboration between their work. And that's admirable and beautiful, but I tried to quit this book a hundred times, until I realized I had already read so many pages tha [...]

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    3. I finally finished this book!!! I think it took me 2.5 months to get through this galley? That's usually not a good sign if it's taking me that long to finish something. To be fair, this book is a chunker--541 pages, to be precise. The concept was actually really fun, in the beginning. A sort of Narnia-meets-Portland kind of thing, but I got bogged down in the language and style really quickly. I mean, it's GREAT to have some complex vocab in a middle grade novel, for sure, but there were defini [...]

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    4. I first picked up this book because, I cannot lie, I love the Decemberists. After cracking open the first couple pages I was swept into the seedlings of a great adventure. The world created by Meloy is so close to our own yet so far apart. It takes place in the "Impassable Wilderness" of Portland. And by the end of the book I was thinking if I went to Portland I too would be able to find this magic forest existing today just beyond my imagination. It has everything I love: adventure! birds! anim [...]

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    5. What an enjoyable read this was. I confess to entering into this novel with conflicting feelings. I attended a young adult literature conference back in October. As we were getting settled in to listen to the keynote speaker (no less than Mike Lupica, not to drop names or anything . . . ), I caught glimpse of a confusingly familiar face moving across the periphery of the large, crowded room:Isn't that Colin Maloy of The Decemberists?I thought.Yeah, right, and he'd be at a young adult literature [...]

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    6. :(I know an emoticon is not a review, but There is nothing right about this book.For one, it is ridiculously boring. The pacing is awful--by the end of the first half (so 300 pages in), it felt like absolutely nothing of import had happened. The characters are bland and unlovable, which is key when you're writing a timeless (read: totally stereotypical) fairy tale.The plot often doesn't make sense. Now, I'm not saying that everything has to be explained--I don't care that some animals talk, and [...]

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    7. This is a delight of a young-adult book.After reading a number of reviews here and on amazon, I can only add to the discussion that the largest complaints seem to be that the vocabulary is troubling and perhaps not age appropriate. To that I say, "Buy a dictionary, suck it up, and read better books." All the praise that has already been doled out sums it up: it's a great tale that's just different enough from everything else in the genre of kids' fantasy to be really engaging and delightful.

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    8. Wildwood me surpreendeu bastante. Primeiro por ser um livro infantil bem longo, são 500 páginas só de história (as ilustrações não são contabilizadas). E segundo por ser um livro infantil épico. No sentido de O Hobbit e As Crônicas de Narnia. O livro não foge da violência, da complexidade do texto (tive dificuldade com algumas palavras e aprendi várias) e de oferecer um sistema político e social. Nada aqui é mastigadinho pra criança e isso me deixou muito feliz. O legal da Prue - [...]

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    9. Reviewed by Rusty Key Writer: Jordan B. NielsenRecommended for: Ages 7 to 10, mainly as a read-aloud book for parents. The content is far beneath that, in maturity, of a true middle grade book, but the sheer heft of this volume will likely intimidate younger readers away from reading it themselves. One Word Summary: Tedious.Full disclosure: I stopped reading this book after 110 out of its whopping 541 pages. The notion of grinding through the next 431 pages was too discouraging, and I found it u [...]

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    10. Sanki 500 sayfalık bir çocuk kitabı okudum ama bundan gram sıkılmadım. Evet çocuk kitaplarını seviyorum :')

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    11. Halfway through this book, I got that sinking feeling.That, oh no, this is a series, feeling.I was going to want more, and more, and more, and after every book, I'd have to wait for the next one. Happily, this first Wildwood novel ties up quite neatly and stands on its own. I'm not going to have to wonder what on earth happens next for the next few years, the desire for a new Wildwood novel warring with my desire for a new Decemberists album. Poor Colin if he is one of my favorite singers AND on [...]

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    12. Oh my gosh, I loved this. A really good story, and beautiful illustrations! Full review coming soon.

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    13. I DNF-ed this book in the end, despite reading over 80% of it I just didn't enjoy it. The more I read, the less I liked it and that's a real shame when it comes to a kids book, because they are often so imaginative and wonderful, but this one just left me cold. I will say that the illustrations within this are lovely, and I had no issue at all with them, in fact they were a large part of why I persevered because I was at least enjoying them, but then it just got too long and tedious for me and I [...]

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    14. Why is it that every time I hear/read about a story about a girl who sets out to rescue her baby brother from some magical creature in a whole fantasy-esque land, my thoughts immediately turn to Labyrinth? I mean, it was kind of hard for me to ignore it in The Iron King but I also got those type of vibes in this book too. But you know, without the awesomeness that is David Bowie. Readers, please - contain yourself.But eventually, as I continued reading - this book became this reminder of several [...]

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    15. I couldn't get into this one.The cover is gorgeous, the writing is strong, and the vocabulary fantastic, but the storyline just didn't grab me at all, and the level of war and politics felt very adult - in the dullest sense of the word. It took almost a month to get through and I skimmed the last few chapters to get to the end, and I can't quite put my finger on why as it certainly isn't bad

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    16. 3.5-3.7 starsThis book is a promising start to a series, introducing a magic wood just outside Portland—a wood with talking animals, sentient trees, coyote soldiers, corrupt governments and highway bandits. It is fascinating and imaginative, with a fairytale-ish quality for MG readers, as well as twists creepy and dark enough for adult readers. The plot is not super complicated, as this book is about introducing the world, but the solutions didn’t feel too convenient, and the plot is great i [...]

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    17. Really excellent. A proper review to come.So, proper review - my main, shameful, criteria, for liking anything goes something like this: if I wish to have written, created, taken photograph, worn that item of clothing or thought of that - if I am a little bit jealous of not having come up with the idea - if I want to be the writer and the main character - that's what I love.Wildwood made me feel both wistful for being twelve and reading it and pretending to be Prue and going on my own adventures [...]

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    18. Meh. I really liked the concept here: a sort of Alternate Portland with an Impassible Wilderness in St. John's, with the St. John's bridge as a ghostly portal. But I was pretty disappointed with the execution.The language is often kind of overwritten and clunky. Prue and Curtis are not well-defined as characters; I wasn't even able to put my finger on how old Prue was supposed to be until she came right out and said she was twelve at one point. First I thought she was much younger, if precocious [...]

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    19. Fun fact: When my husband was a child he was in a community theater play with Colin Meloy. Also, I listened to a lot of Tarkio in college in Montana and love the Decemberists. So I came to this as a fan of Meloy and was excited to hear his take on an "American Narnia without all the Jesus" as I've heard it described.But ye gods, what a snoozefest this turned out to be. I hated, hated, hated the main characters. I know this is supposed to be a fantasy, but seriously. What upper middle class Portl [...]

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    20. The ways in which this book is not for me are numberless, infinite, and really big. The words in this book which could have been eradicated, eliminated, removed and erased without marring the plot are legion, a host, plus a lot. The love Meloy has for helping words, adjectives, and descriptors is prodigious and bountiful. The animals wear clothes for no discernible reason. Plus they use weapons and tools and pencils and other things which require either opposable thumbs or some magical explanati [...]

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    21. Prue's brother is taken to the Impassable Wilderness. Prue decides to go after him, and she is joined by one of her classmates, Curtis. Once in the wilderness, Prue and Curtis encounter all sorts of interesting creatures, including talking animals. Adventure. Fantasy. Talking animals. Two brave kids go on an adventure in the woods to save someone. An entertaining fantasy novel geared toward kids. I listened to an audio version of this book.

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    22. So let me start off by saying, this book is beautiful. The illustrations are gorgeous! I love me a book with graphics and illustrations.The story itself was also quite excellent. I truly enjoyed Prue and Curtis's journey through the Impassable Wilderness, and with an abundance of characters, I found it remarkable to have been able to create so many excitingly different personas within the wilderness. The book follows the story of Prue whose infant brother was abducted by crows and taken into the [...]

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    23. It should really come as no surprise that Colin Meloy would one day turn his spirited imagination to the world of young adult fiction. He has been crafting some of the most exquisitely lyrical songs in rock for over a decade now, from rowsings descriptions of an opulent caravan's entry into a city and odes to America's most famous spy to lengthy epics about bandits on mist-wrapped islands and revenge tales to put Monte Cristo to shame. With a mind so firmly rooted in grand tales of picaresque ch [...]

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    24. Note: I received this book for free as part of First Reads giveaway.For all the other reviews that rave, I suppose I shall have to add myself to the 'eh' category. It was okay. The elements to create an epic fantasy story were there- bandits, talking creatures, a stalwart young'un with a birth secret on a quest to save (part of) her family, princes and kings, the rising of armies to (sort of) follow said stalwart young'un, etc etc etc. It just didn't make it to the "spellbinding tale full of wo [...]

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    25. 'We are the inheritors of a wonderful world, a beautiful world, full of life and mystery, goodness and pain. But likewise are we the children of an indifferent universe. We break our own hearts imposing our moral order on what is, by nature, a wide web of chaos.'Sometimes I wish I didn't give out star-ratings and only wrote reviews, I think sometimes that would be easier than feeling it necessary to justify a low rating despite the fact that I DID like it. But there were some big problems I had [...]

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    26. Wildwood earns four stars. Why? Because, as a book, as a physical object with a hard cover, dust jacket, paper and ink, color inset illustrations and maps, it is a wonder. It surrounds the story so well. A rare thing these days to feel such substance, that you are holding a work of art. Hats off to Meloy, Ellis, and their book designer, who should be acknowledged somewhere in the next edition. And to Harper Collins for not cutting any corners in its production.The story itself is inventive and a [...]

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    27. I’m not a big Decemberist’s fan, although I know who they are, have heard some of their music, but it had nothing to do with my decision to read this book. I suspect that this book is a must-read for any Portland area residents, It does require a high degree of leniency and a stretch of reality – but then again it isn’t meant to be a non-fiction book. A lot of people seem to have trouble with Prue’s character, but I read this largely because she reminded me a lot of the eldest of the y [...]

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    29. I sort of liked it, ish. It wasn't super good but it was better than ok (edit: it's not). Well-written enough, but Pru (the main character) is just not likeable and I wanted to see her character change and become less of a brat and a know-it-all. No wonder she doesn't have any friends in school if she's always correcting her parents and telling them it was a murder of crows, not a flock. She kind of gets on my nerves.1. I know parents put their kids in charge of their siblings. Weird, but I know [...]

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    30. Reading children's books is always interesting because you're going in with an adult mind and sometimes things don't work. One of the most beautiful things about this book is the illustrations by Carson Ellis. The story, for me, is not very original and it reminded me constantly of Narnia so comparisons were inevitable. My adult mind thinks this is an okay read. But I can see as well how this is something children will love. It's a fantasy world full of talking animals, bandits, a corrupted gove [...]

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