Uprooted by Naomi Novak

Uprooted by Naomi Novik.  435 pages.

Naomi Novik takes a break from her Temeraire series and focuses on telling an Eastern-European-flavored fairy tale, complete with dragons (kind of), heroes, villains and magic.  Agnieszka lives in a quiet village, where she's quite happy, even though there's a corrupted Wood that lies on the border.  Every ten years, the Dragon, a local wizard, comes down from his tower to claim a young woman to serve him.   Convinced that this next choice will be her best friend, Agnieszka is afraid.   However, things take a turn when Agnieszka, herself, is selected by the Dragon.    Leaving everything she knows behind in an instant, she is faced with having to live with this wizard, and also figuring out what to do when she discovers her own magic.

This book is based in folklore and has an old-fashioned story kind of feel to it, and Novik gives us a strong-willed and outspoken female main character.   The story is told through Agnieszka's point of view, so you discover things as she discovers them.  So, as she learns how to master her own magic, you are right there along with her.  The system of magic relies on the spoken word, and changes in how something is said can directly affect the outcome.   A few times, I felt like I could see some of the plot approaching, but there were some twists and turns.   There are bits of humor sprinkled through the story, and I found most of the characters to be well-written and believable (or at least, memorable).   However, I did not find this to be a pageturner.   A few times, I put the book down and picked up something else for a while, because I wasn't finding it compelling.  I'm not sure if that was because I was finding it to be too predictable.

As mentioned, Novik writes the Temeraire series, which can best be described as The Napoleonic War with dragons.   Sounds odd, right?  When I read the first one, I was surprised by how much I liked it.   League of Dragons is due out in May, 2016, and I'm eagerly anticipating it (even though I am also sad that it'll be the last one in the series).