Book review: The Twisted Tree by Rachel Burge Hot Key Books
FOR a generation so obsessed with the self(ie) never in history have teenage feelings of self-worth and self confidence been quite so challenged.
Enter Martha, a one-eyed gawky teenager with a strange gift –and distinctly unwanted mission to vanquish a Norse creature of the undead. Martha lost the sight in one eye when she fell from the eponymous tree, but she gained a new talent – she can tell things about people just by touching their clothes, as if their thoughts and emotions have been absorbed into the material.But this talent only hints at the terrifying and strange ordeal this daughter of Odin is about to face when she arrives in Norway in search of her grandma, Mormor.
The Twisted Tree is pegged squarely at the literary female teen reader – with handsome, moody goth Stig serving as suitably brooding romantic interest.
And the novel cleverly weaves Norse mythology into a modern suspense tale, all impressively written with fine economy of time, place and action - the latter of which rattles along with proper page-turning pace.
However, for all its attention to Norse detail, The Twisted Tree is really a classic coming of age novel, a story of self-realisation and growing adult self-confidence in a young woman daring to face life square on and emerging victorious.
And for this honest and untainted role model alone Ms Burge’s novel should be applauded.