Wildwood Dancing

Book: Wildwood Dancing by Julliet Marillier

Pages and Format: 403/Hardcover

My Thoughts: Wildwood Dancing is about 5 sisters living in Transylvania, at the castle Piscul Draculi.  We have Jena, who is the second oldest, her oldest sister Tati, and her 3 younger sisters, Paula, Iulia and Stela.  Jena’s best friend is her frog Gogu, who she found in the woods.  Every Full Moon, the sisters go through a portal to the Other Kingdom, where they dance and talk with all of the different creatures of the magical realm. 

However, when their father falls ill, and travels to another town to get better, their cousin Cezar arrives to help oversee the castle.  Things quickly go downhill as Cezar takes over many of the responsibilities that were left to Tati and Jena, and goes on a hunt to get rid of the forest where the Other Kingdom is.

Honestly, I didn’t like Cezar at all, and it turned out, I had good reason not to like him.  His older brother “drowned” when Cezar, Jena, and Costi (Cezar’s brother) and Cezar did nothing to save him.  It turns out the witch of the forest saved Costi, and turned him into a frog…who happened to be named Gogu.

I also found Jena to be somewhat unlikeable too, especially with all her fights with Cezar about how she was in charge of the castle while her father was gone and could manage just fine without Cezar’s help.  She whined and complained about how she was responsible and in charge, and yet she didn’t seem to be very good at running the household in her father’s absence. 

I loved the setting, and the descriptions of the forest and area were amazing!  It started off slow, and then everything picked up. 

I liked Gogu/Costi, as well as Jena’s younger sisters, and I wished that the 3 younger sisters had more of an appearance.  She drew on the mythology and folklore of Transylvania, and she wove in elements of the frog prince as well.  The cover art is really pretty, and it definitely went well with the title of the book, and the whole Other Kingdom element of the book.

Rating: It gets a 3 out of 5, because Cezar and Jena were annoying, and I hated the fact that the family troubles were attributed to a witch, but there were a lot of other things that I really liked.