Book Review: ‘Hemlock & Silver’ is the Darkly Charming ‘Snow White’ Fairytale Retelling Everyone Will be Talking About

Finally, FINALLY, the elder millennials are getting the FMC we deserve. No 19-year-old waifs with perfect bone structure and a hero complex here (not that I don’t love those too, but they are plentiful in Romantasy). Instead T. Kingfisher has graced us, refreshingly, with Anja, a 35-year-old tall and plump spinster who’s possibly got a touch of the ‘tism, and has constant commentary running through her head that had me laughing, or nodding along, being like, “Ok, fair.” Once again, in Hemlock & Silver, Kingfisher has delivered a superb fairytale retelling that looks nothing like the original. Yes, this is technically a Snow White retelling, but it’s so inventive, and goes a bit off the rails, that other than an evil Queen and some poison apples, it’s a whole new story. And I loved it. Did I mention there’s also the slowest of slow burns and a bodyguard trope?! Everyone deserves love—even someone who poisons herself on occasion while trying to come up with antidotes. Yes, our main character is a poison expert, keeps a chime adder she likes to call her ‘colleague’ (like a rattlesnake, but it makes a chiming sound), and she’s been tasked by the King to find out who and what has been poisoning his daughter, Snow. Oh, and did I mention the King killed the Queen when he found her cutting out the heart of his youngest daughter, Rose?! And you thought your family had complications. Anja has no filter, and I kind of love her for it. Oh, and there’s also the most condescending, talking, one-eyed cat, whom I’m obsessed with, and you will be too. Somehow this story feels like a cozy fantasy, that also has the highest of stakes, and some gruesome sights. If you like deep characters, trying to solve puzzles, and dark fairytales that still have a lot of clever humor, I think you’ll adore this book too.

Things to Know:

• Standalone

• Snow White retelling

• Bodyguard trope

• Tragedy

• 35 year old FMC

• Talking cat

Thank goodness for another excellent fantasy standalone. T. Kingfisher has become an autobuy author for me since I discovered their work a few years ago. I haven’t read anything I haven’t enjoyed yet, so I had high expectations going into this book. If I really want to nitpick, there are a few times where the phrasing feels a bit too modern for my liking (y’all know this is a pet peeve of mine in fantasy), but not enough that it really pulled me from the story this time.

We spend a good portion of the beginning of this novel getting to know Anja as a healer/poison expert, and traveling to Snow, the sick princess. And of course, nothing is as it seems. The King doesn’t really play a big part in the story, but there are a number of humorous moments with him that I appreciated.

I absolutely adored Javier, the stoic, grunting King’s guard who, along with his partner, Aaron, is set with the task of guarding Anja. And she realizes with a bit of panic, that her life may now be in danger, since she’s there to thwart a murderer. She exasperates Javier because she’s constantly getting herself in trouble. And no big spoilers, but let me just say, there’s a hair braiding moment, that is literally everything I’ve ever wanted. 100% written for the female gaze.

Now I might have nightmares from the mirror-gelds, but I’ll let you read the book to find out about those. If you’ve read Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn trilogy, they reminded me a lot of the Mistwraiths…

I’m trying so hard not to give spoilers, but I also thought the entire concept of the Mirror world was so interesting. Not that it’s never been done, but the way she used it to retell arguably one of the most well known fairytales was so, so well done. Beware of your reflection and imaginary friends.

And as a cat-obsessed, single girl approaching middle age, I naturally loved Grayling, the one-eyed cat who sometimes decides to be helpful (but he’s not a dog, so he never “performs for treats”). He reminds me a bit of the Cheshire cat, but that could also be from the excellent work of the narrator in the audiobook. Speaking of, the audiobook is fantastic, and I would recommend it on its own or as an immersive read like I did.

Many thanks to Tor and MacMillan Audio for providing ARCs to review. All opinions are my own.

Favorite Quotes:

“It was also safer, as a spinster-scholar, to look like a nun. People did not bother nuns, and sometimes they even listened to them.”

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“Sometimes you get a miracle. Mostly you don’t, but you still have to make space for the miracle to happen, just in case.”

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“The problem with being plump, middle-aged, and a woman was that people expected you to be motherly, as if that was your default state. I am not.”

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“No sense asking why he was like this. He was a cat. If cats were helpful, they’d be dogs.”

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“It does not matter how many cats there are! Any nonzero number of talking cats is significant!”

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“If you go around eating random plants without knowing what they are, then yes, sooner or later you’re going to wind up either very unhappy or very dead. Plants aren’t necessarily your friends.”

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