Finnikin of the Rock by Melina MarchettaMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
"Everything is evil that humans can't control or conquer"
What kind of book is Finnikin of the Rock?
It's a fantasy book. Evidently.
It's a love story. Certainly.
But not only.
It all starts with three friends, a prophetic dream and a blood pledge.
It continues with an invasion, a terrible curse and the struggle of one people to take back what they lost.
For me Finnikin of the Rock is a book about identities. About a people, the Lumaterans, losing their national identity and fighting to get it back, about a man who's been imprisoned for 10 years and has lost his identity, about a girl who is concealing hers to save her country and about a boy who really doesn't know who he is.
In unmistakeable Marchetta's style, we are presented with a book that not only has got an intriguing plot, is full of action scenes, adventure, amazing and detailed worldbuilding, and as usual, characterization like only Marchetta can do, but also with a book with an underlying message that goes beyond our mere entertainment as readers.
It is a condemnation of war and of its horrors, it denounces persecutions for political, ethnic or religious reasons, it opens a window on people, at any latitude and climate, whose dignity has been taken away together with their homeland.
The words mass graves and ethnical cleansing are words which will be stuck in your throat during some passages of this book and I dare you not feel compassionate for the Lumateran people.
So, end in end, this is a book that is only disguised as fantasy but that, in reality, is well above that.
It's probably superfluous to say that I really loved this book and I can't wait to read its sequel coming out in October.
My favorite passage:
"Because without our language, we have lost ourselves. Who are we without our words?"
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