I really liked that this one could stand alone despite being a book 15. The main girl is likable, plucky and good natured despite her circumstances which always goes well for one in a fairytale! Like the others in this series a great deal of attention is lavished on the food, clothes and surroundings to really give a sense of time and place. The magic is lighter in this one than some of the others but it suits the story and works well. The one thing I didn’t like was the dialogue. It’s all written in dialect and it’s thick back country no formal book learning for anyone dialect. If you just read it all phonetically it does start to flow more easily once you get used to it. It’s somewhere between a three and a four star book. I had fun reading it but it’s not brilliantly good. However I’ve always loved the positivity of Mercedes Lackey books so I’m rounding up to 4. Anything positive in 2020 deserves rounding up right?

I was so excited to get this book and then I started to read it. I absolutely hate when authors try to write dialogue in a dialect. Being from Appalachia, I especially hate when authors try to write in an Appalachian accent. What should have been a great book was ruined.

This book brings a breath of fresh air to this long-standing series. Jolene somehow manages to seamlessly blend Native American, Russian/European, and Southern American folklore as well as the trials of the time period in which it is set. The story itself is absorbing, yet enjoyable enough to read during a pandemic. Recommended for collections with a strong demand for fantasy, as well as fans of Mercedes Lackey's Elemental Masters series. I am hopeful for a British/American E.M. crossover in the future!

This book feels like a return to form for Mercedes Lackey. Her Elemental Masters series has long been a standout, with a fun take on magic set in the 19th and early 20th Centuries. Note that most of the Elemental Masters books can be read as standalones, with the only connecting feature being the system of magic. That continues with this novel, which takes us to the US. Set in post-Civil War Appalachia, we meet Anna May when she's sixteen and living in a mining town with her coal mining father and her mother who works to make every cent stretch as far as it can. Anna is a sickly young woman, partly through malnutrition, but partly because of her latent Earth Magic powers. (If you've read any of Lackey's previous Elemental Masters books, this becomes obvious very quickly.)

Anna soon moves to live with her Aunt Jinny, a "Root Woman" who makes and sells potions, where she comes into her own. She begins to learn how to use her magical abilities and makes friends outside of her family. She also meets a beautiful woman named Jolene (who, as you have probably guessed if you know the Dolly Parton song), has "flaming locks of auburn hair, ivory skin, and eyes of emerald green").. The final conflict of the book is inspired by the song Jolene, and we loved how the book worked with the meaning of the lyrics to both flesh them out but also make them a little more palatable for a modern reader.

Although the book suffers from some pacing issues (it's exposition heavy, with the plot and antagonist entering the scene after the halfway mark), it's an extremely enjoyable read. We also really enjoyed the unconventional setting. Recommended for young adult and fantasy lovers, and especially for anyone who has read previous Elemental Masters books.