Publisher: Boyds Mills Press
Format: Hardcover
Series: No
Pages: 216
Date Finished: 02.08.15
Rating: 4.5/5
Summary: Martine Leavitt offers a spellbinding story, interweaving elements of classic fantasy and high romance in this National Book Award Finalist. Keturah follows a legendary hart into the king's forest, where she becomes hopelessly lost. Her strength diminishes until, finally, she realizes that death is near.
Little does she know that he is a young, handsome lord, melancholy and stern. Renowned for her storytelling, Keturah is able to charm Lord Death with a story and thereby gain a reprieve but only for twenty-four hours. She must find her one true love within that time or all is lost. Keturah searches desperately while the village prepares for an unexpected visit from the king, and Keturah is thrust into a prominent role as mysterious happenings alarm her friends and neighbors. Lord Death's presence hovers over this all until Keturah confronts him one last time in the harrowing climax.
“It is life that hurts you, not death.”Excuse me for a moment whilst I gather my thoughts together. I just...this book...wow. Keturah and Lord Death is a relatively simple book about important and complex themes. It couldn't be further from fantasy porn, no matter what that cover may suggest. No, this book swept me away.
I ordered this book a few months ago because it sounded like an Emma-book--it reads like a fairytale, there's romance, it won an award and the writing is beautiful. Even so, I was apprehensive going in. Beauty by Robin McKinley was very much my kind of book at first, though I gave it an average rating because there wasn't enough passion for my liking. It was just too much like a fairytale without the emotional depth or confluict. Saying that, the writing style in Keturah is so similar but it didn't bother me in the same way that it did with Beauty.
“She knew she had never been truly alive until she met him, and never so happy and content with her lot until she was touched by the sorrow of him.”Keturah (and Lord Death too, I suppose) was the only truly developed character. Actually, on the whole characterisation was a little too shallow. I don't think that the book needed character depth--it's not that kind of book--, but I personally would've liked a little more. Keturah definitely has feminist strength, though it isn't in the same way that a lot of other characters do. Rather than being some kind of warrior, what she wants the most is to fall in love, have a family and live a relatively simple life. There isn't anything wrong with that, not at all, and it's really nice to see a character who thinks like she.
The writing in this book is absolutely beautiful. There are too many beautiful quotes than I can share in one review, and to really understand how wonderful it is you just need to read it. This book grabbed hold of me almost instantly and I think the lyrical prose is half the reason.
“You, my lord, are the ending of all true stories.”Even after I put the book down, I couldn't stop thinking about it. I thought that the ending was perfect, even though the message of the book is bittersweet as well as haunting. There is an underlying theme that death is inevitable, but in the end living is the real challenge, and death makes us enjoy life so much more (I tried and failed to resist putting in the below Buffy GIF).
I don't know what else to say, if I'm honest. Yes, this book isn't for everyone, but if you like fairytales (or authors such as Robin McKinley) I would definitely recommend this. It's such an incredible yet simple story, and I'm so glad that I picked it up.
“Tell me what it is like to die," I answered.
He dismounted from his horse, looking at me strangely the whole while. "You experience something similar every day," he said softly. "It is as familiar to you as bread and butter."
"Yes," I said. "It is like every night when I fall asleep."
"No. It is like every morning when you wake up.”
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