The Hazel Wood by Melissa Albert

Shruthi | Holmdel High School, Grade 11

Rating: ***

The Hazel Wood is the first in a best selling series by Melissa Albert, surrounding Alice Proserpine, the granddaughter of the reclusive Althea Proserpine, the author of a book in very low circulation, called the Tales from the Hinterland. Alice’s mother, the only family she’s ever known, refuses to speak about her mother, further than admitting that she believed that there would be no more bad luck for the two of them after her mother died. Curious, and unable to get any more information from anywhere, Alice and a friend of hers who is a fan of her grandmother’s set off to travel to the Hazel Wood, to find some answers.

What I will say about the Hazel Wood is that it is intriguing, and an excellent change from the usual fiction story, in that there was no romance. The story itself was slow at parts that made me feel like I was trudging through peanut butter, but when it picked up, it was pretty interesting. What I didn’t love about the story was that some parts didn’t really make sense, and I found myself wondering, “okay, why though?” The story didn’t really have much of a plot, or a resolution either. I didn’t hate it, but I didn’t love it either.