The party has to follow a series of instructions, losing members along the way, in order to arrive at their final quest goal and complete their mission it’s not the best or deepest of plots, but Lo’s telling of it adds layers of emotional depth and complexity, especially as she goes on to deal with the ramifications of the end of the quest.

The plot is less innovative Huntress is in many ways a standard quest narrative, with some added mystic destiny elements. As such, switching from the timid, mystic point of view of Taisin to the more down-to-earth but colour-focused viewpoint of Kaeda or the grounded but youthful perspective of Prince Con lets us see the world of Huntress in very different ways, an approach which reaps huge rewards in terms of characterisation as well, as emotions creep through the viewpoints as well as their explicit discussion.

We see a number of viewpoints, with fluid switching between them from a limited third-person perspective the kind of observations made by each character differ, as do their voices, each marking a distinct individual powerfully and effectively. Lo’s greatest strength here is the character work. Her decisions at the end of the novel disappointed me slightly, as a result, since they fall into one of the most frustrating tropes I have come across in LGBT romances, and that lets the rest of Hutress down a bit, although it is set up that way from the start. Lo captures the embarrassment, tentative shyness and awkwardness of young love excellently, and portrays a lesbian relationship between teens as meaningful and not just exploratory, but also as something acceptable within her world, not seen as odd or disapproved of. Taisin and Kaede’s growing romance is well-portrayed, especially Taisin’s resistance to falling prey to destiny being overcome by her attraction to Kaede. So when looking for LGBT genre fiction, her name kept coming up, and after being disappointed by Ash, I decided to try Huntress…įor the most part, Huntress doesn’t disappoint on this front. Malinda Lo has, consistently, proven herself one of the most outspoken, forthright and interesting commentators on LGBT YA fiction she’s also the author of some of the most well-regarded examples of it herself, Ash and Huntress especially. Taisin is a sage, thrumming with magin, and Kaede is of the earth, without a speck of the otherwordly.īut the Kingdom needs only one huntress to save it, and what it takes could tear Kaede and Taisin apart for ever…

To solve the crisis, Kaede and Taisin are picked to go on a dangerous and unheard-of journey to the city of the Fairy Queen. The people’s survival hangs in the balance. Worse yet, strange and hostile creatures have begun to appear. The sun hasn’t shone in years, and crops are failing. Nature is out of balance in the human world.

Huntress malinda lo