The Rain Heron

by Robbie Arnott

Ren lives alone on the remote frontier of a country devastated by a coup. High on the forested slopes, she survives by hunting and trading—and forgetting.

But when a young soldier comes to the mountains in search of a local myth, Ren is inexorably drawn into her impossible mission. As their lives entwine, unravel and erupt—as myths merge with reality—both Ren and the soldier are forced to confront what they regret, what they love, and what they fear.

The Rain Heron is the dizzying, dazzling new novel from the author of Flames.

Genres: Fiction, Fantasy, Magical Realism, Australia, Dystopia, Literary Fiction, Science Fiction

288 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2020

About the author

Robbie Arnott was born in Launceston in 1989. His writing has appeared in Island, the Lifted Brow, Kill Your Darlings and the 2017 anthology Seven Stories. He won the 2015 Tasmanian Young Writers’ Fellowship and the 2014 Scribe Nonfiction Prize for Young Writers. Robbie lives in Hobart and is an advertising copywriter.

Reviews

[Vit Babenco · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Rain Heron has a miraculous aura of a cruel fairy tale.
This mythical heron is a bird of supernatural abilities made of raindrops, mist and a cyan of the sky…

This water-risen heron was unlike any other they’d seen before – any other heron, any other living creature. Its blue-grey feathers were so pale, they claimed later, that they could see straight through the bird. Its body was pierced by strands of dusky light, and the tree was clearly visible directly behind its sharp, moist beak.

In spite of its fairytale plot the story has a tangible dystopian atmosphere… After the military coup, the generals ordered to capture the legendary bird and the rain heron is caught…

When I first saw the bird burst into its high grotto, when I watched its dance of wet light, I was mesmerised by it. Then it took my eye, and that feeling was replaced by terror, and with the terror came extraordinary pain, as I felt the icicle of its beak pierce the jellied rim of my eyeball.

Mankind always tries to win over the nature and the nature always revenges pitilessly.

[Marchpane · Rating 5 out of 5]

Shortlisted for the 2021 Miles Franklin Award

A spellbinding eco-fable, The Rain Heron delivers a powerful message about the human need to control and subdue the natural world.

Like Arnott’s debut Flames, his new novel is rooted in the landscape and the climate, but this work is subtler, more serious and controlled. Once again Arnott displays a gift for inventing myths that feel ancient. In The Rain Heron these myths are drenched in rain and seawater. As in a parable, the country is not named, but it has all the hallmarks of a climate-changed Australia.

The first half of the novel delivers three seemingly unconnected stories, set with reverent wonder in the fields, the forest and the ocean respectively. Each of the tales unspools hypnotic and beguiling, then slowly descends into terror.

The second half unites these parts into essentially a road-trip narrative, with greater focus on the human characters. While not quite as magical as the first half, it remains compelling to the end. It was only when I finished reading that I realised I had been expecting the heron to feature more prominently than it did, that there would be a climactic reckoning, but the novel’s ending is a gentler, reflective one.

Arnott’s lush, wondrous, fabulist approach to writing about the natural environment makes this story feel at once timeless and immediate. I’m officially a fan.

[♑︎♑︎♑︎ ♑︎♑︎♑︎ · Rating 5 out of 5]

There is something wonderful and sincere and yet elusive about this novel for me. There were aspects about the author's style and storytelling that made it difficult for me, the first time I read it, to immerse myself in the story. After a couple of re-reads, though, my mind has become accustomed to the rhythms of this novel. I've learned to appreciate its idiosyncrasies, and to let go of my own.

Here is the kind of sentence that comes along fairly frequently in the novel:

He didn't wear any small, expensive hats, but he seemed like the sort of man that would.

This sentence at first reminded me glancingly of the opening of Middlemarch:

Miss Brooke had that kind of beauty which seems to be thrown into relief by poor dress.

But Dorothea actually does wear plain things and people see her wearing them and still find her beautiful...Elliot's sentence reflects an actual state of reality in the novel. Whereas Arnott is describing something about a character's dress that isn't there, and that's quite specific: the narrator remarks on the absence of "any small, expensive hats." What I get from it is that Arnott is constantly reaching for something good and new in his writing, and quite often his looseness with semantic sense leads to some very beautiful things happening on the page, in particular when he's describing something as illusive as The Rain Heron.

Since my first read of the novel I've learned to appreciate this kind of writing. Such is the power of re-reading. Sometimes my first read of a novel is an exercise in fighting with authors about their choices, especially when these choices seem out of sync in some way, with my idea of how the story should go. This is a 'design flaw' in my reading that I'm trying to get over. Writing is not a promise. Authors aren't in a contract with me to deliver what I want to read. The more I let go of expectation, and the more I let go of trying to figure out the 'why' of an author's intentions, the better I'm able to immerse myself in conversation with a given book.

[Fran · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Above an enormous cliff...a tree-small, stunted, with ancient knots and whorls...at its highest point, in a clawing crown of branches, sat a bird...a heron...it seemed too big, too blue, too alien. Huge and silent, running its long beak through its pale cerulean plumage, water was dripping from the feathers as the bird preened...dove into the tarn...caused no splash, made no ripples...as if the bird had become one with the water."

"A farmer lived, but not well...success and happiness were foreign to her, and she had forgotten what it was like to go to bed unhungry". One day, a black storm...oceans of freezing rain...the unlucky farmer was found, "her body draped over the branches of an old leafless oak...more curious...a huge heron, the color of rain...a languid flap of its wings...came to rest in the crown of the oak, standing over the unlucky farmer, as if on guard." The unlucky farmer prospered and, humbled by lessons learned, shared her new found riches with her community...but...there was a greedy, jealous neighbor. "Nobody had spotted the great heron since the first morning of the heatwave." The farmer went from starvation, to cultivating verdant farmland and raising livestock, to "crop-roasting, pond-parching light." No one in the valley was spared.

Ren was a survivalist, a hermit living in the mountains. After silently observing a kind, seemingly patient man, she offered him milk-cup mushrooms. He responded in kind. He gave her a woolen hat. This set a precedent...a system of barter between Ren and Barlow. Ren depended mainly on foraging and hunting. While resetting a trap, she heard rustling, footsteps, and voices...five soldiers. Could the hunter now be the hunted? Eventually, they found her. Lieutenant Harker, the female commander, reminded Ren that since the coup five years ago, many people had fled their homes. The soldiers were after something nestled in the mountains. "Our orders: come to this mountain to capture the bird...the one that comes from the clouds. The rain heron." Despite Ren's protests that the rain heron was a myth, a fairy tale, her life would hang in the balance. She was forced to comply with these "gun-gripping, fast marching, unsmiling soldiers".

The country's south coast with its beaches of cloud white sand and stark beauty "could not fill stomachs or clothe backs". People lived here for a particular resource found nowhere else. The fishermen employed a "secretive method of harvesting squid ink", an art passed down by villagers for generations. Zoe, an orphan, had watched her aunt harvest ink and anxiously awaited her turn to harvest, regardless of the cost. The squid ink would be sold to people in the North, ink that could also be used to enhance sauces and stews. The squid were treated humanly and returned to the sea after the ink was collected. A northerner walked the docks and wandered onto the pier. "I am here to revitalise the south-sea ink industry. To modernize it...to guarantee its supply".

"The Rain Heron" by Robbie Arnott is an eco-fable with seemingly different narratives that start in a valley, retreat into the mountains, then visit a port city in the south. The effects of a recent coup and the effects of climate change are explored using the myth of the rain heron. The narratives are intricately interwoven as penned masterfully by author Arnott. The strength as well as the frailty of the human spirit is explored. Are past behaviors redeemable? Will scars heal? "The Rain Heron" is a beautiful, mesmerizing tome I highly recommend.

Thank you Farrar, Straus and Giroux/FSG Originals for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

[Diane S ☔ · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very different book, original, using allegory and myth to describe events in a world run amuck. . In fact, it starts with a myth, or at least what sounds like one, of a supposed mythical heron that can bring rain or drought. Wealth or destruction, in a world where climate change is occuring rapidly. The political situation in this unnamed country is also a factor as a coup is happening and people are fleeing villages for other places where they hope to find safety. There are few characters, but each of them have former lives, lives that are no longer livable.

The book is divided into sections, and despite these crucial events, it is a quiet, but impactful novel. . Very much character oriented, and the two main characters are women from very different backgrounds. This is a novel of survival and the ways in which we need or choose to act to survive. Some of the scenes seem impossible, the allegories are paramount and open to a readers interpretation as to what they are meant to represent.

The writing is gorgeous, the descriptions eloquent and despite the often grim state of affairs, quite lovely. A very strange book about a strange time, but after the last year with Covid and a tense political situation, I found this to be a perfect book.

ARC from Netgalley.

[Neale · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Daniel thought about what he knew of rain herons – how in the stories they were associated with rainfall, abundance and harvests, but also with floods and destruction and death.”

The story opens with a starving farmer. Starving literally. It seems whatever she decides to do with her land, plant crops, raise livestock, fails. She tells us she has forgotten what it is like to go to bed unhungry. She is neither lazy nor unskilled, yet all her attempts at producing something, anything, are unsuccessful. The farmer has endured this for six long years, six years since her parents died and left her the farm.

Then one day there was a violent storm and the farmer was thought to have perished, somewhere within its violence and destruction. But when the storm subsided, she was found by a group of teenagers hanging in a tree, alive, with what appeared to be a ghostly heron standing vigil over her scarecrow strewn body.

Since that storm, the farmer's fortunes changed. Her crops not only grew, they prospered, wheat and rice growing in abundance. The animals no longer died, were no longer sickly, they were a picture of health, bursting with energy. The farm was so successful that the farmer became rich.

Over time her farm became the most successful in the valley. The farmer was a woman loved by all and she shared her new wealth around the valley and community. And on cloudless nights people said they could see the great ghostly heron flying above her fields.

Everybody was happy. Everybody but the son of her closest neighbour. With this son, jealously reared its ugly head. As with most jealous people he thought only of himself, forgetting the six years that the farmer had endured before her luck changed and the heron appeared. He and his father had been suffering since the storm and all the son could think of was that it was not fair.

He knew that it was the heron that had brought the good fortune to the farmer and he knew where the heron roosted. The same oak tree where the farmer was found. He decided to kill the heron, mistakenly thinking that this would somehow save his father’s farm. However, the son was dealing with something he did not understand and payed the price.

The son was found the next day with hideous injuries. His eyes having been gouged out. The heron disappeared and an intense heatwave descended on the valley destroying everybody’s crops.

This first part of the story is used to introduce the reader to the rain heron. Establish that it is very real, not just a myth, and what it is capable of. It’s a wonderful little narrative of it’s own, which leads into the main story.

The first part of the story takes place in a dystopian future where a coup has taken place and many people have fled the cities. One of these people is Ren. After escaping the city, Ren had been living tough for five years, in the mountains. Starvation and malnutrition plagued her every day. She lost count of the number of times and different ways she nearly perished. Ren had almost given up, given in to the mountain, acknowledging it would take her life, when she met Barlow and his son. After their initial meeting, Ren and Barlow work out a system of bartering and trading, enabling Ren with supplies and skills to survive.

One day a group of soldiers arrive, and we eventually learn they are looking for the rain heron. It is here that we meet the true protagonist of the novel. Lieutenant Harker, and what an incredible character Arnott has given us.

The narrative will then jump back in time for part two, and this part of the book is used to fill the reader in on Harker’s background and childhood, however again, like the first part of the book, this part’s narrative is strong enough to stand alone as a tale in it’s own right. Also, like part one, it has the feeling of a fable or parable with a message to be learned.

Part three returns to Ren’s present. Harker and the soldiers determined to find the rain heron.

Part four is told from Harker’s perspective. This is my favourite part of the book, simply because Harker is the most interesting character that I have read this year.

“But I have never been brave. Just strong, and at times, too many times, cruel.”

With Harker, Robbie has created an amazing character. Not a likeable one, in fact it is easier to dislike Harker. She is cruel and yet she is strong and determined. She recognises, acknowledges her cruelty, and knows that she has performed despicable acts throughout her life. And yet, she also retains a hint of kindness. An urge to do the right thing, and we see glimpses of this through her thoughts and conversations in this final part of the novel.

As with “Flames” Arnott’s flare for writing mesmerising poetic prose, especially in describing the natural world, its storms, the fauna and flora, is found, at times, it seems on every page. And although the country where this tale unfolds is never given, the narrative not needing one, the mention of marsupials, eucalypt trees, droughts and storms, give the location a very antipodean feel.

This is a magical wonderful book. 5 Stars!

Thankyou to Text Publishing and Netgalley for the ARC.

[Libby · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a strange tale that reads like allegory, as though the author is delving into deep truths through his characters. Within these pages are two magical beasts with magnificent powers, a rain heron, and a squid. The rain heron is most prominent and we find that when this great bird arrives, he is a harbinger of prosperity, and when he leaves, a devastating drought falls over the land. When the heron comes up out of the water, there are no ripples, and when a boy reaches out to touch him, he feels no feathers, only sorrow and guilt. The bird is made of water and has immeasurable shapeshifting skills.

Author Robbie Arnott also wrote ‘Flames,’ which I have not read, but it was long listed for the Miles Franklin Literary Award among other awards. Reading this book makes me want to read that one. Arnott is very descriptive about the setting, the landscapes, and the creatures. The characters are not magical, have no powers, but are at the mercy of life, which is often grim and sometimes brutal in this story. There is some violence, but the tone of the book conveys that anything can happen, and probably will. Luck and calamity are themes as are strength and weakness. The behavior of his characters as they react to calamity are of great interest. Another theme is sacrifice. Whether Arnott suggests that life requires sacrifice or that important things like clarity, understanding, and elevated perceptions of beauty are granted only with sacrifice, I will leave to each reader to determine.

Humankind’s treatment of nature is also a theme. Zoe lives on the coast with her aunt and they go out to sea to collect a magical substance from squid. They collect this ‘ink’ in a very ritualistic manner, one that is learned over time. A northerner shows up with an obsession, a money making scheme about collecting and distributing the ‘ink.’ He has no regard for the squid, no regard for a learning process, even if the villagers would tell him anything. They will tell him nothing. The ‘ink’ when added to paint makes colors vivid and the painting is alive. This makes me think about what nature means to me, the rituals of learning and being in nature that I grew up with. Picnics with my parents, sunbathing in hidden forest glades, the kind of quiet, and silence that only comes in a forest far away from people, a vacation in the Great Smokies. There is magic in those childhood rituals and if we let them, they will paint our lives with vivid colors. Will we commercialize our forests and parks, our public spaces? As much as possible, I hope not.

Ren is an older woman who’s taken refuge in a cave on a mountain. Barlow comes to barter with her, but mostly to be sure she’s all right. Ren lives on the edge of survival; she’s almost died many times. The items that Barlow brings, boots, sometimes medicine, a head torch, batteries, are things that have kept Ren alive. One day Barlow shows up to tell Ren that soldiers are in the village asking questions, they are interested in something on the mountain. Ren’s precarious existence will become threatened.

There are other prominent characters in the story and Arnott weaves a beautiful tapestry as he builds his story. The story is written in 4 parts and it’s not until the last part that we understand how the characters are connected. When I got to Part 2, I was a little upset that it seemed a totally separate story. It is not. Patience will be rewarded. When the segments are sewn together at the end, Arnott provides the reader with a satisfying ending.

[Carolyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Stunning, immersive and hugely original, 'The Rain Heron' is a richly imagined allegorical fable for our times. Set in a slightly futuristic world where climate change has impacted severely on the land and its people, Arnott spins three tales of strong women making lives out of the damaged land.

In the first, a poor farmer first encounters the rain heron when she is close to death after years of drought. Wrought of water, it brings her wealth and prosperity by healing her land. But as her neighbour discovers, the heron can not only be benevolent, gifting rain to the land, it can also be cruel and vengeful, plunging the land back into drought.

In the second tale, Ren has taken refuge in a mountain cave in the forest after her city was overrun by a military coup. She lives off what she can grow or find in the forest but fears the news that the military are coming to her mountain looking for something. The young woman lieutenant Harker, leading the soldiers is relentless and will not stop until she gets what she wants.

The third tale tells of Zoe, a young woman, living on the coast, whose Aunt teaches her the traditional way of harvesting a special and costly ink from the sea, until their lives and way of life is disrupted by a Northerner who wants to steal their secret in his quest to be rich.

Together these tales culminate in a picture of a world where the environment is subject to greater forces than can be controlled by mere human will. Arnott's crafting of the exquisite rain heron as a fearful power over the climate, either benevolent in bringing gentle rain or cruelly scorching the land, shows it is heedless of what humans want from it, refusing to be controlled by man. His writing is beautiful and lyrical with the sights and sounds of richly imagined landscapes brought to life.

With many thanks to Text Publishing and Netgalley for a digital copy to read

[Jennifer ~ TarHeelReader · Rating 4 out of 5]

What an unusual, but beautifully written book!

Told in parts that eventually (mostly) connect to one another, The Rain Heron is a story that feels real and contemporary but yet involves myth coming to life in the form of a rain heron who brings the weather. The writing throughout is impressive - precise, yet still descriptive of this time and place. The author is immensely talented.

That said, the first two or three sections of the book were my favorite. I was riveted and learned so much from them. One was about a survivalist woman living on a mountain near the rain heron. Another section involved a teen girl and her aunt who caught squid (but then released them) capturing their ink for sale. Where the early life of one main character was explored, the same wasn’t true for the survivalist, and that’s where I wanted more.

I was left with many questions that weren’t explored in the story. I think the first half could have easily made for an entire book because it was so full, and that’s the part I wish were explored more.

I’m a relaxed kind of reader and happy to go where the author and book take me, and this was a book that held such promise. While it delivered in so many ways, I just wanted more. That said, I will happily read more from this author and look forward to it.

Thanks for reading this with me, Beth.

Many of my reviews can also be found on my blog: www.jennifertarheelreader.com and instagram: www.instagram.com/tarheelreader

[PattyMacDotComma · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5~4★
“A farmer lived, but not well. If she planted grain, it would not sprout If she grew rice, it would rot. If she tried to raise livestock, they would gasp and choke and die before they’d seen a second dawn (or they were stillborn, often taking their mothers, which the farmer had usually bought with the last of her coins and hope, with them). Success and happiness were foreign to her, and she had forgotten what it was like to go to bed unhungry. All she had was her hunger and her farm—and her farm, as far as she could tell, wanted her to starve.”

Dystopian fiction. Not my thing. Robbie Arnott’s writing is as good as ever in this novel about the not-too-distant future if we keep farming and disturbing the balance of nature as we have been.

The rain heron is a mythological bird who lives in – or is – a lake, high in the mountains. When the world is in drought, people want to find it to bring rain. Eventually, there are storms and horrific floods, washing everything away. When the weather eases and it’s safe to take boats out, some teenagers discover the woman.

“Paddling nearer, they saw that it was the unlucky farmer, dead or unconscious, her body draped over the branches like a nightgown hung out to dry. But more curious than this was what they saw next: a huge heron, the colour of rain, suddenly emerging from the flood in a fast, steep flight, leaving not even a ripple on the water beneath it. With a languid flap of its wings it came to rest in the crown of the oak, standing over the unlucky farmer, as if on guard.

The teenagers brought their boat to a stop. This water-risen heron was unlike any other they’d seen before—any other heron, any other living creature. Its blue-grey feathers were so pale, they claimed later, that they could see straight through the bird. Its body was pierced by strands of dusky light, and the tree was clearly visible directly behind its sharp, moist beak.

A ghost, one claimed. A mirage, said another. But before they could get closer the heron hunched its neck, flapped its wings and leapt into the sky. A thick spray of water fell from its wings, far more water than could have been resting on its feathers. Then it disappeared into the remnants of the storm.

The teenagers watched it vanish, not sure what they were seeing, not trusting their tired eyes and waterlogged minds. At that moment the unlucky farmer rolled in her cradle of branches, coughed out a spurt of black mud and sucked at the air with great need, great violence.”

That’s the opening. Arnott’s descriptions of the overwhelming devastation of drought and floods are gut-wrenching. But it’s not just the story of an unlucky farmer.

The next story moves to a woman and her niece, who make their living fishing, although their ‘catch’ is unusual, involving secrets, blood, and octopus ink with magic properties. When an evil northerner (they are down in Tasmania), tries to steal their secrets, the story takes another dark turn.

Then we move to a woman living on a mountain as a hunter-gatherer, avoiding soldiers and the army who are apparently running the country. She barters what she catches with a farmer who gives her other goods she needs. It’s a nuts-and-berries life.

Another part of the story involves soldiers, hunting for the rain heron, led by a young lieutenant, who seems a hard-nosed young woman, accompanied by, among others, a medic who is more compassionate. The soldiers don’t know what their mission is, clambering up this mountain, so she tells them they’re looking for the rain heron.

“Why do they want it?
Who?
The generals or whoever’s in charge.
Men want things. They hear about something and pretty soon they’re convinced it belongs to them.”

Arnott’s characters in this novel are most unusual, and I can’t say I cared about them as people, but I admired how he chose them to represent his grim warnings. They cope with situations and pain that are hard to read about.

The only copy available when I wanted to read it was an audio, so I listened. The two women narrating were very good, but I would have appreciated the story more had I read it instead of listened to them. Perhaps hearing the words aloud made it more confronting – I’m not sure.

I could read some of the preview pages at Amazon online, and I can see are no quotation marks, for those of you who avoid books like that.

The writing is excellent, of course, but I’m glad I read Limberlost first, because if I’d read this, I probably wouldn’t have read more of his work. As it is, I admire him as a fine young Aussie writer, but you’ll need to be in the mood for a dark story.

5★ My review of Limberlost, which I prefer.

[Bianca · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Rain Heron was original and quite imaginative. As someone who’s got no imagination, I’m in awe and a bit jealous of those who possess it. Paradoxically, while I admire and respect highly imaginative writers, I seem to still prefer realistic literature. I was a bit reluctant to read this, but my curiosity and the fact that so many GR friends loved it encouraged me to get to it. It paid off.

This novel blends beautifully the imagined and the surreal with realistic characters, who find themselves in unique, richly imagined environments and situations.

The writing was simple yet highly evocative; I could easily picture the different environments, the mountains, the sea town and being on the sea, the road trip through a variety of landscapes, I could feel the cold, the humidity, the heat, the wind.

If you’re after something accessible yet different and original, then you should try The Rain Herron.

I’m happy to jump on the Arnott bandwagon. I’ll go find his debut novel.

[Henk · Rating 4 out of 5]

This novel starts of as a dark fairytale about a transparent heron that seems to bestow agricultural riches while simultaneously maiming people. The narrative is situated in a vague, undefined dystopian tomorrow, with psychologically warfare, human cruelness and missing parents
So much was ruined, either slowly or in red instants, and nothing was getting better and nobody was doing enough about it. And through the quiet carnage of the world I kept moving.

The Rain Heron reminded me a bit of the work of Jesse Ball in terms of vaguely futuristic, dystopian setting. The focus is similarly on how people interact with each other and to what extremes they go, but also on what capacity of goodness and human connection they are nonetheless capable in these circumstances. Starting off with a woman living on a mountain who does not want to be found, we have confrontations with soldiers, a seemingly random story about harvesting ink from squids and encounters in an abandoned wildlife sanctuary. Economic exploitation of natural resources ending badly for everyone involved is a recurring theme, as are missing parents, increasingly erratic weather phenomena and untreated wounds (both physical and mental).

An atmospheric work, with dark undertones relating to a coup and no longer having access to mental health treatment, that feels like a better version of Booker shortlisted The New Wilderness.

I would definitely read more by Robbie Arnott.

Quotes:
I can’t help crazy people.
Are you sure?

Every choice was a compromise between what she could manage and what could keep her alive

It’s not that I wanted to die, I just couldn’t see the point in continuing to live.

He was one of those men who feels entitled to something because he knows it exists

I made a lot of mistakes but I liked to think I didn’t repeat many.

Does nothing change at the end, of we reflect?

[Andrea · Rating 5 out of 5]

If anyone had concerns about Robbie Arnott suffering from difficult-second-novel-syndrome, if there is such a thing, then don't worry. The Rain Heron is every bit as good as Flames, and some readers may even find it to be better, with a more comfortable (i.e. traditional) structure and storytelling arc than his debut. I loved it.

The first part of the story is essentially a parable. Set in an agricultural area, we are introduced to the rain heron and come to understand that it can control climate, and with that, also control the fortunes of people. The action then moves to the mountains, where Ren, a middle-aged woman, has been living as a hermit for 5 years, escaping from her family, the coastal city where they once lived and loved, and most importantly from the coup. For this unnamed country has been brought to its knees by a ruthless military. Ren's contact with the outside world is minimal, so when she becomes aware of a military troop on the mountain, she goes to great lengths to escape their notice. What she hasn't bargained on though, is that this troop has an exceptional leader, Lieutenant Harker, and the whole time Ren has been evading the soldiers, they have been setting her up to draw her in. Harker wants Ren's help with their mission - to capture the rain heron. But the rain heron is just a mythical creature, isn't it?

I can't think of a writer in recent years who excites me more than Robbie Arnott. His ability to write landscapes and the environment and the creatures that inhabit it, is unsurpassed. Coupled with a brilliant imagination, he creates scenes that will stay in my mind forever. For example, the squid inking scene is something completely alien to me, but I could just picture it so clearly and I'm sure it's now imprinted on my brain for life.

With thanks to NetGalley and Text Publishing for the opportunity to read an advance copy of this book.

[Sonja Arlow · Rating 3 out of 5]

I loved LOVED part 1 and 2, especially the section that deals with Zoe’s childhood and the coastal town of fishermen with their magic ink. If the whole book was about that I would easily have given this a 4.5 star rating.

Unfortunately, I really struggled with the pacing in the rest of the book. Particularly the part where the soldiers were in transit. I found those sections dragging with nothing really happening.

This was not an easy book to read but the author is a strong writer with a unique imagination so will be reading Flames at some point.

[Kerry · Rating 5 out of 5]

A shape-shifting bird made out of rain
Two women as main characters whose lives change each other in irrevocable ways
A myth with a meaning that is slippery to grasp. It sometimes floats away on a mist
Or is obscured by fog.
A story about eyes and sight and beauty and what is of this world that is seen and seen but remains unknown.
Tightly woven yet without a clear plot. Mistakes made, regrets lived.
A book I will be thinking about long after I've forgotten the details and will need to read again in order to wonder some more.
The #1 read of the year so far
Shortlisted for the Australian Miles Franklin Award. The only mystery is how it did not win.
It was Amazing. I hope it gets the readers it so deserves

[John Gilbert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not sure just how to review this one, much less rate it. Robbie Arnott is certainly an imaginative and creative writer of great skill. As difficult as this dystopian novel is to read, the violence, the destruction of habitat, the cruelty to life, it was never boring. I had absolutely no idea where he was going for most of the book, but the characters were certainly alive, if mostly flawed.

I only heard of Robbie Arnott recently, although he is Aussie. I read Limberlost first, which is a far different book than this one. I can't say I enjoyed it, but it certainly kept my interest all the way through, as painful as much of it was.

3.5 rounded up I guess. Read as an ebook from a local library.

[Text Publishing]

The following book reviews have been shared by Text Publishing – publisher of The Rain Heron

‘Arnott’s writing is clear and compelling, particularly in descriptions of the folkloric bird, with its “rain-smeared transparency”.’
New Yorker

‘Daring, atmospheric...The novel moves at a quicksilver pace, shimmering with menace and electric visions of forests and lake-filled valleys.’
New York Times

‘In The Rain Heron, Robbie Arnott has turned his gaze to civilisation’s need to control and understand the natural world. This is a book full of heart—it’s so richly imagined, inventive and beautifully written, with a strong message, but is never didactic. It’s like nothing I’ve read and Arnott has quickly become one of my favourite authors.’
J. P. Pomare

‘With its emotional power and rich symbolism, The Rain Heron is an immersion in landscape, climate and an animal world that lives despite us, not for us. Robbie Arnott has imagined a creature, by turns exquisitely beautiful and terrifying, the likes of which I have never seen in Australian literature.'
Jock Serong

‘The Rain Heron is exquisite. Reading it feels like hearing a legend from our past, from our near future; like remembering something you had always known but somehow forgotten. It is both fantastical and deeply true.'
Jane Rawson

‘The Rain Heron is an intoxicating fable from an extraordinary imagination. Robbie Arnott writes like the words want to be his.’
Anna Spargo-Ryan

‘The Rain Heron is genuinely and completely magnificent—a magical thing.’
Robert Lukins

‘Robbie Arnott is singlehandedly reinventing Australian literature. The Rain Heron is a soaring feat of the imagination.’
Bram Presser

‘The Rain Heron is an evocative and poetic ecological myth…Mesmerising and beautifully written…Each narrative thread could stand as a shocking, beautiful and moral short story in its own right, but Robbie Arnott weaves them seamlessly together into a satisfying whole.’
Scotsman

‘Arnott’s eco-fable, set in a politically broken near future, explores the constant push-pull that exists between our capacity for enchantment and our need to exploit what we find…It’s sad and satisfying.’
The Times

‘The Rain Heron is fantastic. The ripping pace of a thriller combined with the emotional complexity of a Shakespearian tragedy, delivered in diamond-sharp prose. It pulls you into a world of myths come to life, where environmental destruction collides with sociopolitical decay, and you can't help but feel for all the characters as they navigate through the wreckage. Highly recommended.’
Kawai Strong Washburn, author of Sharks in the Time of Saviors

‘The Rain Heron is a patient and rooted fable told as naturally as a tree grows. With timeless and captivating prose, Robbie Arnott has a talent for making it look easy. I was transfixed.’
Catherine Lacey, author of The Answers and Pew

‘Astonishing...With the intensity of a perfect balance between the mythic and the real, The Rain Heron keeps turning and twisting, taking you to unexpected places. A deeply emotional and satisfying read. Beautifully written.’
Jeff VanderMeer, author of Annihilation and Borne

‘In this lush and harrowing novel, Ren joins Harker, a soldier, in her search for the mythic rain heron and both are forever changed by the quest. Robbie Arnott chronicles their voyage through a harsh and wondrous landscape in gorgeous, lyric prose, while his plot moves with the swift elegance of an expertly crafted page-turner. The Rain Heron is a potent fable that speaks urgently to our present times.’
Laura van den Berg, author of The Third Hotel

‘Flames (2018) was one of the more eye-catching debuts of recent years…the work of a writer with imaginative reach, a vivid sense of detail, and a willingness to try his hand at a variety of styles…[The Rain Heron is] more confident and focussed…an exemplary work of popular fiction…It is a richly imaginative work that appeals to a sense of wonder.’
Sydney Review of Books

‘Vibrant and violent…Arnott fascinates with fable-like stories and thoughtful meditations…Beautiful imagery and magical moments.’
Publishers Weekly

'Superb descriptions of nature and weather, of human emotion and animal instinct...evoke a landscape that is both startlingly immediate and mysteriously otherworldly: the perfect setting for a tense narrative of eco-disaster and fragile endurance. At once an urgent thriller and an elegiac fable, this mesmerizing tale is as lyrical as it is suspenseful.’
Kirkus

‘Amazing…One of the ones that is closest to perfect of all the Australian books I read this year…An extraordinary book.’
Cassie McCullagh, RN Bookshelf

‘Inventive and arresting and full of images that stay with you.’
Kate Evans, RN Bookshelf

‘Reminiscent of Cormac McCarthy’s visceral The Road, an air of savage solitude infuses Arnott’s lyrically atmospheric postapocalyptic novel, where trauma and resilience are connected to memory and the loss of both self and surroundings.’
Booklist

‘One of the very, very rare books that completely stunned me…Very beautiful and a little bit terrifying. It’s an intensely Australian novel but in a way that is utter unlike any Australian writing that’s going on at the moment.’
Jock Serong

'A gorgeous and spellbinding eco-fantasy.'
Margaret Kingsbury, Buzzfeed

'Astonishing...With the intensity of a perfect balance b/w the mythic and the real, The Rain Heron keeps turning & twisting, taking you to unexpected places. A deeply emotional & satisfying read.’
Jeff VanderMeer

‘A dazzlingly visual novel…This is the visuality of myth, in which images are important not for their beauty or grandeur but for their resonance, their power to encapsulate deep truths more fully and potently than any amount of exposition ever could…It’s a powerful story, beautifully rendered…The Rain Heron is a new story about learning to heed the old stories.’
Los Angeles Review of Books

‘A beautifully poetic, hypnotic, barreling ride…As delightfully brutal as it is captivating…It is as pitch-perfect a second novel as could have been anticipated…Arnott displays stunning talent on every page…A stunning blend of mythologies, grim society, and fatefully interconnected lives.’
The Millions

‘Lush, brutal…Vivid descriptive passages…While the heron is Arnott's original creation, it feels as ancient and established as a unicorn…The unexpected notes of hope and redemption for multiple characters in the finale bring a memorable and satisfying sense of closure.’
Shelf Awareness (starred review)

’Inventive, arresting, original.’
Kate Evans, ABC RN

‘This book transported me…Totally absorbing…[The Rain Heron is] about the internal world of the characters, the acts of brutality they commit to survive and the survival of their humanity.’
Lenore Taylor, Guardian

‘This book astounds me not just for the quite brilliant conception and rendition of the eponymous rain heron, but also because of the portraits it offers: of generosity, of tenderness, of a turning towards rather than away from others…In a desolate social and ecological landscape, the human networks of compassion make this novel a thing of rare beauty.’
Conversation

‘Strange, intriguing and exquisitely written.’
Miriam Cosic

‘A sort of dreamy, dystopian, fantasy allegory. It’s vivid and strange…Definitely worth a read.’
Tim Carroll, Holy Holy

‘Robbie Arnott recounts great myths. We see emerge, before our amazed eyes, a brilliant blue heron, a multicoloured octopus…We truly dive into this magnificent book.’
Europe 1

‘A poetic and harsh atmosphere—this is a captivating book. It’s alarming, but there are moments of magic.’
France Bleu Armorique

‘Ecologically driven and stunningly constructed, Arnott’s novel has all the characteristics of a thoroughly engaging drama with a very important message of concern and change.’
NZ Booklovers

[Ebba Simone · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have never read a novel like this before. Highly recommended.

[Tom Mooney · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was quite disappointed by this in the end. After a promising start it sort of meanders around without reaching a satisfying conclusion.

The opening fable is magnificent, as is the section when we're with Ren, an old woman surviving alone in the wild on a mountain.

But this book struggles (as so many contemporary novels do) when we leave behind a character we've come to empathise with and pick up with other, less interesting characters. It's a hard ask to set aside one storyline and make the reader feel the same about another, then another... Before trying to tie it all up in a nice bow at the end. I don't know why authors do it.

Anyway, this one sort of peters out to a pretty dull ending, where the motivation of the characters - and the writer and reader - have largely withered away.

[Michael Livingston · Rating 5 out of 5]

A surreal, stirring fable filled with rare beauty, pain and deep humanity. This feels like timeless mythology and crucial, forward-looking fiction at the same time. An absolute joy to read.

[Paul Ataua · Rating 4 out of 5]

Three related stories that bleed into one novel that focuses in on man’s relationship to nature, and for the most, part man’s exploitation of it. The myths are as simple as they are inventive, and they are very well written. The less said about the plot, the better. Open the book and let it draw you in.

[Krista · Rating 4 out of 5]

The teenagers brought their boat to a stop. This water-risen heron was unlike any other they’d seen before — any other heron, any other living creature. Its blue-grey feathers were so pale, they claimed later, that they could see straight through the bird. Its body was pierced by strands of dusky light, and the tree was clearly visible directly behind its sharp, moist beak. A ghost, one claimed. A mirage, said another. But before they could get closer the heron hunched its neck, flapped its wings and leapt into the sky. A thick spray of water fell from its wings, far more water than could have been resting on its feathers. Then it disappeared into the remnants of the storm.

The Rain Heron begins with a fable: Heralded by the arrival of flood and black storms, sometimes this mythical bird made of cloud and rain will choose a person to attach to, granting their land the perfect conditions for a harvest of abundance. But like many fables, that of the Rain Heron contains a dark lesson: woe betide he who might seek to harm or exploit this mythical creature out of greed or spite. After this intriguing opener, author Robbie Arnott introduces us to a world gone sideways: Post ecological disaster, post resulting military coup, the residents of this unnamed country (most likely Arnott’s native Australia) are forced to make hard choices about survival (whether becoming involuntary conscripts in the military or finding ways to feed oneself while hiding from patrolling soldiers). The people on both sides are hard and impassive, but we eventually learn that everyone has a backstory, no one is the worst thing they have ever done, and while history might explain individual actions, it doesn’t excuse them: we always have a choice, and attempting to control the Rain Heron — to exploit and deplete the Earth for selfish gain — comes at a high price. Arnott’s landscape writing is lush and lyrical, even the “reality” of his post-disaster world has a hint of the fabulous to it, and as ecolit, the lesson of the Rain Heron is one we should all keep close to heart. I enjoyed the writing — from the sentences to the overall effect — very much and think this should be widely read. (Note: I read an ARC through NetGalley and passages quoted may not be in their final forms.)

She shrugged. Men want things. They hear about something and pretty soon they’re convinced it belongs to them.

After recounting the legend of the Rain Heron, the story introduces us to Ren: a grey-haired, cave-dwelling survivalist who finds everything she needs on her patch of mountainside. But eventually, like the Nazis and their storied search for magical artefacts, whatever remote military structure is (chaotically) governing this country sends soldiers into the mountains to see if they can actually capture a Rain Heron. It’s unclear whether the Generals believe that possessing and somehow controlling the mythical bird will reverse years of countrywide drought — or whether they aim to have one simply because “men want things” — but soldiers follow orders and those that go into the mountains sow fear and wreckage and pain.

This ends when you let it.

And as I wrote above, we eventually learn the backstories for some of the characters, but ultimately, what we learn is that they ought to know better: cycles of exploitation of nature and wildlife lead to collapse; lead to putting pressures on individuals to make questionable choices (accidents are no accident) that initiate further cycles of pain and loss. If the fable of the Rain Heron is an analogy for how humanity exploits and depletes the Earth, and how the planet might fight back, the lesson truly is: we ought to know better. The temporary, immediate gain isn’t worth the longterm ecological effects. That’s the big picture stuff — which all worked for me — and I also really appreciated Arnott’s small-scale word choices:

With no river to follow the road blanded out into a long, turnless ribbon. The lack of water changed the landscape; as the hours stacked up, the pastures lost their greenness, fading into beige and hazel. They flattened, losing the humps and rocks of the foothills, and their fences straightened and strengthened, gridding the land into stiff fields. There was still no sign of people. The fields poured on, yellow and dry, and their blondness began to feel eternal. No mountains rose in the distance now, no hills, just a weak tide of golden crests undulating towards the fuzz of the horizon.

(Google Docs does not like the word “blanded” and I can’t completely picture what is meant by “fading into beige and hazel” [like the colour of hazel eyes?], but quirky/invented vocabulary always works for me.) For the most part, The Rain Heron centres on the experiences of individuals — we don’t see the workings of the military government or learn how (or exactly why) the coup played out, we only see the effects of this system on the people; we don’t see how the climate has changed, we only see the pressures this puts on individual survival — but near the end, we are shown how things are getting worse:

That summer millions of fish rose to the surface of the country’s largest river, bloating the banks with rot. Dry lightning licked once-wet forests into infernos. Peat fires burned underground in the marshes of the highlands, fires that might not go out for centuries. A few months later, frost entombed the roots of palm trees on the coasts. So much was ruined, either slowly or in red instants, and nothing was getting better, and nobody was doing enough about it. And through the quiet carnage of the world, I kept moving.

So, do we just keep moving through the quiet carnage of our world, business as usual, even as a pandemic tries to thin our number? I believe the lesson is: we ought to know better.

[zed · Rating 4 out of 5]

Robbie Arnott’s 2nd Novel is, as his first, a Tasmanian Goth fantasy that had me listening to the audio at every opportunity.

Australia, though unnamed, has suffered a military coup and during these troubled times a band of soldiers is sent by the authorities on a mission to capture the mythical Rain Heron for what can be only to see if they can control the weather. The telling of the story forces us, as a species, to face our own inhumanity to each other and to the ecology of the world around us. One’s imagination has to confront all the flaws that each of the characters has, as nature exposes us as just another doomed species. When we respect nature, it assists us. Times are plentiful on the farm and in the sea until……..? As a species, can we be blind until coerced by forces out of our control not to be?

I said of Robbie Arnott’s very good debut that it was recommended to all us that know and enjoy Tassie Literature. Nothing changes with this thought-provoking and parable like second.

[Ari Levine · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5, rounded down. An imaginative and moving reading experience, which will probably end up being one of my favorites of 2021. Arnott builds an immersive world of near-future ecological disaster, where the seasons and climate have been disordered by human intervention, and a military coup rules the ragged survivors. His descriptions of natural landscapes are vivid and evocative, masterfully painting widescreen panoramas of landscapes-- deep forests, frozen coastlines, bleak deserts-- almost devoid of human presence. This deep naturalism supercharges the novel's fabulistic and magic-realist elements, which are genuinely poetic and unsettling. The allegorical message is subtle and oblique, and Arnott doesn't judge his morally ambiguous characters, so that the final arc of redemption feels genuinely earned. My only quibble was that the novel's sections were more effective as individual, self-contained parables, and that the muted denouement didn't quite deliver the pyrotechnics I was expecting.

Thanks to Netgalley and FSG for providing an ARC of this, in exchange for an honest review.

[Jenny (Reading Envy) · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have to admit - I am not the reader for this book, but I think some of you might be. It has been described as an eco-fable, and while the writing was beautiful, I struggle with stories written around a moral lesson. To me it feels less real than a space opera.

The rain heron makes multiple appearances but there is also a story in the middle with squid.

I had a copy from the publisher through NetGalley, and the book came out February 9th. I have long been interested in this author and I'm glad I got a chance to read him, finally.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Arnott's debut Flames was one of my surprise favourites of 2018, so I was excited to see he had a new novel coming out this year. And I'm pleased to report this one is even better.

Once again seamlessly melding literary fiction and magical realism, The Rain Heron transports the reader to a world at war, a world where the environment has been severely impacted as a result. The blurb describes the novel as an "eco-fable" which I'd agree with - the narrative follows two main characters, Ren and Zoe, and examines the relationship humans have with the natural world, and how our dependence on it is a blessing we too often take for granted -- and how our relentless manipulation of it will ultimately be to our detriment. The landscapes Arnott portrays are beautiful but devastated, and the combination of this with well-painted characters makes for a stunning novel.

Thank you Netgalley and Atlantic Books for the advance copy, which was provided in exchange for an honest review.

[Marianne · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Above her the sky was dark and clear, a navy sheet shot through with stars, and with fuzzy clarity she remembered that she loved the mountain. The scrubbed, endless sky; the sweet-clearing scent; the tossing wind and the bending trees and the high peaks and the running, freezing glassiness of the streams.”

The Rain Heron is the second novel by award-winning Australian author, Robbie Arnott. In their youth, the children of this country hear the story of the rain heron. They learn that the rain heron is “associated with rainfall, abundance and harvests, but also with floods and destruction, sometimes death.” When they grow up, they realise, of course, that it’s only a fairy tale. Unless they saw it for themselves.

“Its blue-grey feathers were so pale, they claimed later, that they could see straight through the bird. Its body was pierced by strands of dusky light, and the tree was clearly visible directly behind its sharp, moist beak.”

Barlow has warned Ren that soldiers are coming to the mountain, her place of refuge for five years now. She keeps a low profile, tries to stay under their radar; but when the moment arrives, she knows what they want and, gradually, she understands that her defiance is futile against their concerted campaign of methodical disintegration of resistance.

Medic Daniel resented being drafted into the army from medical school, unaware he had been chosen for his capacity for kindness, but feels a fierce loyalty to his squad, particularly their leader, Lieutenant Harkness. “She was cold, yes, but she was also smart and merciful and, with one recent notable exception, nonviolent.”

Her “uncanny nous for strategy, her nose for manipulation. She had moulded them into ambushers, infiltrators, outflankers. By the end of the coup they were primarily being used for shadow missions, spilling little blood but achieving significant victories. Minimal fuss or collateral damage.”

Their latest action, though, he questions: the reasons, their methods, and casualties and the ultimate results. “The generals want it because they heard it existed, and they’re in charge. Maybe they think it will make them look powerful.” The world is already in upheaval. What have they planned for this magical creature?

Arnott’s second novel is part-myth with a hint of paranormal, part-admonitory tale, set in a credible dystopia, mere steps from today’s world, where some rationalise questionable behaviour as following orders or simply by entitlement. The inclusion of the symbiotic squid ink harvest is a fascinating touch. Arnott gives the reader gorgeous prose, rich and lyrical; this and the quality of story itself will likely forgive the lack of speech marks for most readers. Utterly mesmerising.
This unbiased review is from an uncorrected proof copy provided by NetGalley and Text Publishing.

[Claire · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoy fable-like stories or those that reference them and when I saw this title, I was captivated and intrigued by the image and concept of a rain heron. It reminded me of reading The Crane Wife and so I thought why not, see what this eco-fable was about.

The first chapter tells what I imagined was the original fable of the rain heron and the unlucky farmer, and from what I can gather, the author has made this story up as well. It's a story of a woman running a farm, the daughter of generations of farmers, but one who struggles for many reasons no matter what methods she tries.

Until one day a big storm comes and destroys nearly everything; at the end of which she is found curiously draped over the branches of an old oak tree. More curious than this was the large heron that rose out of the floodwaters, leaving not a ripple behind it, that landed on the branch beside her. The birds blue grey feathers were so light, they were almost transparent. When it flew off, water fell from its wings like rain. Its appearance changed the fortune of the unlucky farmer, until the neighbour's jealous son's envy caused her bad luck to return.

So is it a fable? It's a tale of someone who has bad luck, who for a period their luck changes, but as with life, good luck causes jealously in others, who have destructive tendencies. And so the bad luck continues.

"I just set out to write a story where real characters or characters that felt real had their lives intertwined with the nature fable."

Arnott then begins a new story in four parts, in which we meet Ren, a woman who has left her home after a military coup and gone to live in the mountains. She is virtually self-sufficient apart from occasional exchanges with a man named Barlow and his son. We don't know exactly why she fled or what the coup was about, but the man alerts her to the presence of soldiers searching the mountainside for something, a group of four lead by a young woman referred to as Harker. They are in search of evidence of a myth and they will make Ren suffer until she divulges what she knows and leads them to its source.

In the second part, we go back in time to a seaside settlement in the South and meet Zoe and her Aunt, just as the girl is being initiated into the village tradition of ink gathering, a secret trade that is shared with no one. A Northener arrives seeking knowledge and is spurned, he turns towards destructive means and with everything that follows Zoe leaves.

The story returns to Harker and her troops and their journey, here I felt the story waned, a few connections had been made and the interwoven nature of the parts revealed, but neither the landscape nor the characters gain traction, Harker is determined in her mission, but self-destructive in her nature and has lost whatever empathy she ever had. Her previous actions are hard to understand.

Most of Arnott's characters are women and I did find myself pausing early on and wondering why he chose to inhabit so many female characters, the unlucky farmer, the woman surviving in the mountain, the leader of the army group. I made a note when this thought arose, because these women were all acting in ways often attributed to men, Harker uses brutal tactics to change Ren's mind; Ren has abandoned her son.

In an interview Arnott says it made more sense for him to portray those characters as women, because it required them to demonstrate resilience, something he considered more of a female trait within the story. Because they were spending a lot of time in the wilderness, he thought writing them as male characters would come across as cliché, referring to woman as having:

"that gentle, firm, methodical way of dealing with problems as opposed to letting anger and frustration rise to the surface"

The author says he wasn't trying to convey a particular message, but the situations he puts his characters in and the familiarity of some of the climatic events that occur make it a thought provoking story, and I think it's all the better for not coming to any conclusion or moral, but for it to exist as a catalyst for discussion of those various controversial situations that arise.

My favourite character and the one we spend too little time with was the rain heron, who spends most of the book hidden away, but listening to Arnott talk about his inspiration behind the bird, who had magical qualities and was a kind of anti-hero, made me wish that the bird had had more of a presence. His point there was that in nature, birds and animals are really not interested in humanity, not in the way humans are interested in them, acting from instinct not from consideration. That said, he has created a creature that readers are indeed likely to be fascinated with!

[switterbug (Betsey) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lately, every few books I pick up are myths, fables, or adult fairy tales. Perhaps this pandemic is spinning into allegory. Arnott vividly blends a provocative parable with the extreme, dystopian effects of climate change, a terror that has upended our lives by encroaching closer to reality than myth. Narrative, characters, theme, and story combine the conventional with the strange. Think of a redemptive eco-thriller--a survivalist fable with a clear moral compass. Despite the predictability of the finale, it is a captivating tale of an interior journey framed by a magical bird.

It starts with a short fairytale that serves as prologue or preface, chapter “0,” in which envy creates destruction. A gentle farmer’s lands have been ruined by climate change. One day, she is trapped in a flood, but is saved from drowning by a bird made of water. The water bird, or rain heron, subsequently saves her farm and causes it to flourish. A young boy on another farm is jealous, and strikes after the rain heron, but is blinded by the bird’s ice beak. The heron departs, the kind farmer’s fields revert to barrenness again, and the farmer eventually dies from untreated first-degree burns. The young boy’s father finds her. From this fable come themes of blindness (real and metaphorical), greed, survival, and disaster. And humanity.

The story then opens, also in third person, in chapter 1, after a coup has occurred. A surviving young woman named Ren lives alone in the wilderness and intends to protect the rain heron from cruel soldiers that are attempting to track it down and bring it back to their generals. She meets their lieutenant, also a young woman, Zoe, who forces Ren to take her to the heron after poisoning and intimidating her repeatedly. The next action resembles the first fairytale, which angers Zoe into a shocking action, which I will leave for the reader to discover. Zoe quickly takes the caged heron and leaves with her soldiers.

The fascinating complexity of Zoe is the thrust of the next section, now told in first person by Zoe, the only character with I, me, my. Zoe is not your typical fairytale villain; rather, she eclipses the archetype and evokes sympathy from readers. Her backstory and early life emerges from the shadows as the story moves along. Her adolescence in a fishing village reads like a fable, also, with blood and squids and ink that comprise the premise and wages of the inhabitants. A “northerner” intrudes on the village intending to steal their secrets. This section was so wildly imaginative that it raised the novel to five-star status. It arrested me with its beauty and darkness.

Zoe and her soldiers remove the caged heron, and take the long journey to the generals. Arnott’s talent in describing the landscape shimmers with violence and beauty. The animals have human parallels at times, and some of the humans have animal natures.

The magical beast, the water bird, the rain heron persists. The bird represents both the endangered and the enduring. Throughout the story, these concepts rise and break the surface of the plot. The squid adds color—astonishing and radiant, and the color adds lucidity. Arnott’s story gripped me, with its riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma. Wink.

Thank you to Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux for sending me an advanced copy for an honest review.

[Nadine in California · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has many strengths, among them a fascinating story and writing that's a perfect balance of evocative and plain-spoken. But I think its greatest strength is its characters. It's rare that I find a book by a male author who writes female characters so deeply and convincingly. And the women in this book are especially tricky – a flinty, taciturn lot who prefer independence and isolation over community. The male characters are the opposite, attuned to other people and drawn to help them, although there is one male exception whose demise must be one of the most original in fiction. This switched male/female dynamic could be formulaic, but not in Arnott's hands -his characters are too complex for that. There is one other essential character in the story who exists outside gender – the rain heron itself. I don't know how Arnott does it, but this creature of legend exists seamlessly in this harsh and very real world and brings beauty to it. The only problem I'm having with this book is whether the ending is just a shade too well-wrapped, but the only reason I'm even noticing it is because the rest of the book was so terrific.