Goodreads Monday (9/28/20)–Song of the Dryad

Happy Monday, bibliophiles! Hard to believe that September’s almost over, but at least SPOOKY SEASON starts on Thursday! 🎃🦇☠️🍁😈

Goodreads Monday is a weekly meme created by Lauren’s Page Turners. All you have to do to participate is pick a book from your Goodreads TBR, and explain why you want to read it.

I put this novel on my TBR at the very beginning of this year. I haven’t heard much about it–it’s from an indie publisher, so I haven’t seen many reviews, if any, floating around the blogosphere–but it looks like an intriguing fantasy!

Let’s begin, shall we?

GOODREADS MONDAY (9/28/20)–SONG OF THE DRYAD by Natalia Leigh

Blurb from Goodreads:

Seventeen-year-old Charlotte Barclay is still haunted by an encounter she had eight years ago – a run-in with a fairy beast that had eyes like witchlight and a taste for flesh. Charlotte has avoided the Greenwood ever since, pretending fairies don’t exist and choosing instead to focus her energies on graduating from high school and perfecting her audition piece for the Bellini Institute. However, everything changes when her mom goes missing, kidnapped by the fairies that haunt the forest behind Charlotte’s home. 

When Charlotte’s search for her mom leads her into the fairy realm, she discovers that she hails from a line of Shrine Keepers – humans tasked with maintaining ancient fairy shrines. Charlotte’s family has failed their duties to the fae, and now she has no choice but to strike a deal with the dryad, an ancient and powerful tree nymph responsible for her mom’s disappearance. But the dryad only gives her a month to complete her task: retrieve five stolen fairy stones and return them to the ancient fairy shrine. If she doesn’t return the stones in time, the dryad has threatened to imprison another of Charlotte’s loved ones.

Charlotte dives into a world as magical as it is deadly, coming face-to-face with fairy creatures that never get mentioned in the story books – including the creature that haunts her dreams. She must embrace her task and conquer her fears, or else she’ll never see her mom again.

So why do I want to read this?

Accidentally wandering into the realm of Fae and discovering that you have a connection with it is a fairly common trope I see in a lot of YA fantasy, but Song of the Dryad looks like it’s put an inventive twist on it! I also hardly ever see dryads as the star of the show as far as mythical creatures go in fantasy novels, so I’m excited to see how Leigh handles them. They hold so many possibilities for twists and plotlines, not to mention atmospheric imagery.

All in all, Song of the Dryad admittedly has the possibility of falling into several unfortunate tropes, but having the plot center around a dryad is giving me enough faith to keep reading.

Today’s song:

That’s it for this week’s Goodreads Monday! Have a wonderful rest of your day, and take care of yourselves!