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Woodfeast
Not yet published
Expected 10 Nov 26In Woodfeast, the sequel to Necrology, Meg Ripley weaves revolutionary politics and dark fantasy for a blisteringly timely look at the rights, communities, and power of women.
As war rages between fundamentalist Freemen and the Dirty, practitioners of outlawed magic, nine-year-old Rabbit and her siblings have no idea how to ensure their culture’s survival. They have nine shards of the Woodfeast, a relic with unknown power, and a host of uncertain allies: Jane, a Dirty woman known to the Freemen as their apostate son; the Warrior, a beast formed from wolves; and Hyena, a storm razing the country and insisting that Rabbit must commit murder to be truly free.
To protect Dirt, each other, and the nation, Rabbit and her friends must understand the history of the Freemen—and the women they tried to destroy—before the Freemen can unmake the source of Dirt itself.
As war rages between fundamentalist Freemen and the Dirty, practitioners of outlawed magic, nine-year-old Rabbit and her siblings have no idea how to ensure their culture’s survival. They have nine shards of the Woodfeast, a relic with unknown power, and a host of uncertain allies: Jane, a Dirty woman known to the Freemen as their apostate son; the Warrior, a beast formed from wolves; and Hyena, a storm razing the country and insisting that Rabbit must commit murder to be truly free.
To protect Dirt, each other, and the nation, Rabbit and her friends must understand the history of the Freemen—and the women they tried to destroy—before the Freemen can unmake the source of Dirt itself.
- GenresHorror
324 pages, Paperback
Expected publication November 10, 2026
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
Review of advance copy received from Author
Woodfeast is a darkly radiant novel about a group of siblings, recently orphaned by their mother, a gifted practitioner of powerful magic. In this world, the magic is in all women, magic tied to the earth, the wilds, the Dirt. We’ve met Rabbit, Rook and their siblings before, in the beautiful yet heartbreaking, genre-defying novel Necrology. Woodfeast continues their story, with the orphans in hiding, lost and afraid, hunted by the deeply religious and corrupt Freemen, whose sole focus is to oppress and suppress all women, especially Dirty women.
Woodfeast is centered around three women, three POVs. Rabbit is a flawed yet earnest young FMC. She is the eldest girl and leader of her siblings but she is indecisive and overly cautious and burdened by guilt and responsibility. Floyd, the Supreme, a fanatical yet mistrusted leader in the patriarchal Freeman church, sees herself as a saint even as her body changes into a monstrosity. Jane, formally a Freeman and child of the ruling judges, is a trans woman, misunderstood by the church and fervent in her need to save the orphans and the Dirt.
Meg Ripley has created a world riddled with oppression and power hungry zealotry but, in the orphans, there is hope, love and loyalty, generational folklore and magic. There is a promise of freedom and the restoration of balance in the wilds. Ripley summons the spirits of Luke and Leia, Frodo and Samwise, Willow and Madmartigan, and their bands of rebels, and I was breathless following their quest. The battle between the Freeman, their Blackcoat enforcers, their corrupted and shallowly righteous leaders, their Blackbook of lies, misogyny and abuse and those practicing the Dirt, hungry and hunted, dismissed and deemed unworthy felt so current, so raw and so wrong, that I felt deeply moved by this novel. The injustice and anger is palpable, the violence just under the surface, the desperation near to overflowing. This is a book you savor, you annotate, you flip back to reread a passage, you pause and reflect upon, you gasp, you shake, you sweat.
What wouldn’t you do to be free?
Woodfeast is centered around three women, three POVs. Rabbit is a flawed yet earnest young FMC. She is the eldest girl and leader of her siblings but she is indecisive and overly cautious and burdened by guilt and responsibility. Floyd, the Supreme, a fanatical yet mistrusted leader in the patriarchal Freeman church, sees herself as a saint even as her body changes into a monstrosity. Jane, formally a Freeman and child of the ruling judges, is a trans woman, misunderstood by the church and fervent in her need to save the orphans and the Dirt.
Meg Ripley has created a world riddled with oppression and power hungry zealotry but, in the orphans, there is hope, love and loyalty, generational folklore and magic. There is a promise of freedom and the restoration of balance in the wilds. Ripley summons the spirits of Luke and Leia, Frodo and Samwise, Willow and Madmartigan, and their bands of rebels, and I was breathless following their quest. The battle between the Freeman, their Blackcoat enforcers, their corrupted and shallowly righteous leaders, their Blackbook of lies, misogyny and abuse and those practicing the Dirt, hungry and hunted, dismissed and deemed unworthy felt so current, so raw and so wrong, that I felt deeply moved by this novel. The injustice and anger is palpable, the violence just under the surface, the desperation near to overflowing. This is a book you savor, you annotate, you flip back to reread a passage, you pause and reflect upon, you gasp, you shake, you sweat.
What wouldn’t you do to be free?
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
Thank you to NetGalley and Bindery Books for the eARC in exchange for an honest review! ♡
4.5 for real.
Woodfeast is furious in a way I wish more fantasy was allowed to be.
There is magic here, and monsters, relics, war and folklore, all the good shit. But beneath all of it is a story about who is permitted to hold power, whose history is allowed to survive, and what happens when a culture built on the control of women begins to fracture.
This is a much bigger and more politically charged story than I expected. There is also an incredible amount of rage in this book, particularly feminine rage, and I mean that as one of its greatest strengths. It is not polished into something palatable. It is frightened, ugly, communal, protective and destructive. The novel understands that resistance is rarely clean when the thing being resisted has spent generations defining the terms of survival.
I also loved the folklore running through the world. The magic feels old and bodily rather than decorative, and the Woodfeast itself becomes more interesting the more its history unfolds. There is a constant sense that the present conflict has roots far deeper than the characters initially understand, which gives the story an almost mythic thing about it.
My only hesitation is that the book is extremely dense. Trust me, I love a dense book. But, there are moments where the mythology, politics and movement of the plot arrive all at once, and I wanted a little more space for certain revelations to breathe. This is definitely a book that rewards attention!!
But the ambition here is enormous, and for the most part, it works.
Woodfeast is dark fantasy about inheritance in every sense of the word: inherited violence, inherited belief, inherited stories, inherited anger, and the terrifying question of what you choose to keep when you are finally given the chance to build something different.
Beautiful, brutal, odd, and absolutely seething. Yuck!
4.5 for real.
Woodfeast is furious in a way I wish more fantasy was allowed to be.
There is magic here, and monsters, relics, war and folklore, all the good shit. But beneath all of it is a story about who is permitted to hold power, whose history is allowed to survive, and what happens when a culture built on the control of women begins to fracture.
This is a much bigger and more politically charged story than I expected. There is also an incredible amount of rage in this book, particularly feminine rage, and I mean that as one of its greatest strengths. It is not polished into something palatable. It is frightened, ugly, communal, protective and destructive. The novel understands that resistance is rarely clean when the thing being resisted has spent generations defining the terms of survival.
I also loved the folklore running through the world. The magic feels old and bodily rather than decorative, and the Woodfeast itself becomes more interesting the more its history unfolds. There is a constant sense that the present conflict has roots far deeper than the characters initially understand, which gives the story an almost mythic thing about it.
My only hesitation is that the book is extremely dense. Trust me, I love a dense book. But, there are moments where the mythology, politics and movement of the plot arrive all at once, and I wanted a little more space for certain revelations to breathe. This is definitely a book that rewards attention!!
But the ambition here is enormous, and for the most part, it works.
Woodfeast is dark fantasy about inheritance in every sense of the word: inherited violence, inherited belief, inherited stories, inherited anger, and the terrifying question of what you choose to keep when you are finally given the chance to build something different.
Beautiful, brutal, odd, and absolutely seething. Yuck!
Review of advance copy received from Author
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ ARC
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
Все ж ця книга будується лише на цікавій світобудові. Тому друга частина, де вже все більш-менш зрозуміло та ясно, стає нудненькою. Бува.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews