The Raven's Tale

This book caught my eye because it’s a fictionalized version of Edgar Allan Poe’s youth.  Add a little mystical fantasy touch and I knew I wanted to read it.

In school, you read Poe at some point, whether it’s The Raven or The Pit and the Pendulum or The Tell-Tale Heart.  He’s seen as one of the great gothic writers of the weird and macabre.  But what if he dreamed of being a romantic?  A satirist?  That’s the question this book revolves around.

We meet a seventeen-year-old Edgar Allan Poe, orphaned when his theatrical mother died of tuberculous when he was three and adopted by the affluent Allan family.  Poe is anxiously wanting to leave Richmond, Virginia, and cannot wait to start university classes at the University of Virginia.  But his adoptive father is threatening to not send him if he doesn’t stop his frivolous writing habit, his adoptive mother is constantly sick and in a fragile state, and the love of his life is being wishy-washy about commitment for fear of her father’s disdain of Poe’s lowly background.  Basically, Poe’s feeling pressure from all around to be successful.  So this is not the most ideal time for his gothic writing muse to spring from his imagination into real flesh and blood.  His muse, named Lenore (obviously), spends a year trying to convince Poe that telling ghastly stories about death is his true path so she can evolve into the raven she’s meant to be.

I really enjoyed the language in this book, the way Cat Winters weaves her words together using language from the 1800s (I guess it’s the English teacher in me).  The author also spent a quite a bit of time researching Edgar Allan Poe’s life to keep it as accurate as possible. However, the tale was just okay.  It was an interesting concept, but unless the reader is really into Poe, then I don’t see them really connecting with this book.

If writing that springs to life, ghostly specters, and tormented artists don’t catch your reading fancy, then this YA novel won’t hold your attention.

**Thank you, NetGalley and Amulet Books, for this free copy in exchange for an honest review.**