#The Bone Houses

[wannabe-british-fangirl]

~ books read in 2023 ~

#32: The Bone Houses by Emily Lloyd-Jones

The gravedigger's children were troublemakers.

Rating: 5/5

[forestbookishwitch]

“She was half a wild creature that loved a graveyard, the first taste of misty night air, and the heft of a shovel. She knew how things died. And in her darkest moments, she feared she did not know how to live.” - The Bone Houses by Emily Lloyd-Jones

(Photos from Pinterest)

[missbookishmunchkin]

I started this book and omg it’s SO good so far!!!! I think this book is so underrated in the book community honestly, why wasn’t it more popular?? It’s a YA medieval fantasy with Welsh cultural elements and it’s a bit creepy and I just love it!! 🥰 bookstagram at bookishmunchkin

[annafromuni]

My August Reading Summary

Overall mood: eager. We’re back on the reading train this month! I’ll warn you know, this is a lot summary as I’ve managed to read 18 books (I know!) this month. I am adding a few more books to my regular list of reads each month for the next two months, and if you are familiar with this blog you may be able to guess why. The books I’ve read in August have been eye-opening, incredibly addicting,…

[tandewrites]

My Roman Empire Reads

This was originally going to be a list of my favourite books of all time, but I realised that my favourites shelf on Goodreads is littered with books I haven’t read or thought about in five years, I thought I’d focus on the books that still do occupy my brain space to this day, some read more recently than others. And I know the ‘Roman Empire’ meme is dead by now, but I have no other way to…

[con-alas-de-angeles]

“She was always smiling,

“Sometimes it felt as though she were more storm than person, bringing chaos and pain everywhere she went.”

[desdasiwrites]

– Emily Lloyd-Jones, The Bone Houses

[mothandnessieread]

In between the million and one things going on right now, I’m still doing my best to keep finding time to read. I may be making slow progress, but I’ve been enjoying The Bone Houses with the my chronic illness book club lately and I can’t wait to get some more time with it!

[nerdynatreads]

☆☆YouTube | Tumblr | Instagram | Storygraph ☆☆

book review || The Bone Houses by Emily Lloyd Jones

Upon re-read, I loved this even more. I think the first time I didn’t appreciate the wholesome familial relationships and particularly Ryn’s grief from losing her father, but both of these really stood out. I thought I would be focused on the gorgeous, whimsically creepy writing and the slow-burn relationship, but I had to start annotating for Ryn’s father as well. Each moment tugged at my heartstrings and I got misty-eyed more than once. You can truly feel the love she had for her father every time she thinks of him.

Slow fantasies are definitely my thing and the atmosphere was so immersive, coming to life as I read. Each time I picked this book up, I was transported to the story and the characters added to that as well. I love the grumpy-sunshine feel of Ryn and Ellis. They work so well as foils to one another and the romance that blooms between them is so sweet and wholesome. Throughout their journey, they become so protective of one another. I loved how Ellis’ chronic pain was talked about, as a part of him, a burden, but he refuses to let it overtake his life.

This held up so well and I definitely need to check out The Drowned Woods now.

5 / 5 stars

[catmint1]

The forest did not scare her; rather, she wanted to be like it: ageless and impervious, cruel and beautiful. Death could not touch it.

Emily Lloyd-Jones, The Bone Houses

[rosesandmary]

when he says ily but lloyd-jones wrote ""can you miss something before its gone?" ryn clinked her nail against the bottle. "i think im going to miss this, once its gone." he shook his head. "i mean—something else. a place, or a person." the silence that followed was full of unsaid things. he wondered if hed blundered into painful territory, if perhaps he shouldn't have said anything at all. but then she said "i think so. the anticipation of the loss hurts nearly as much as the loss itself. you find yourself trying to hold on to every detail, because you'll never have them again.""

[six-improbable-things]

Morrigan Reads - The Bone Houses

Book: The Bone Houses by Emily Lloyd-Jones Rating: 5/5 ⭐ Genre: Fantasy, Horror (does Horror-Fairytale count as a genre??) Trigger Warnings: Death, undeath, gore(?), animal death, parental death, violence.

Blurb (that really doesn't do this book justice): A mapmaker and a gravedigger (and a very loyal goat) venture into the mysterious and magical mountains to end an enchantment that has been causing the dead to rise for the past 15 years.

Spoiler-Free Review: This was my second time reading The Bone Houses, and I loved it just as much as the first. It feels exactly like a fairytale, both in writing style and in content. But it's also a horror story, and a beautiful one. The horror in this book doesn't revolve around shock value, but is actually deep and meaningful, while also creepy and scary. The characters are amazing and well-written, and there is a perfect balance between light-hearted and more solemn scenes. The story is also fascinating, and well planned out. In fact, this was a book where I wasn't mad in the slightest about guessing the "twist". Not just because it's a good one, but because it's not really a twist. It's a perfect pay off of things that have been hinted at throughout the entire book. And it's perfect. Not to mention the amazing use of Welsh folklore as inspiration and source material. It's wonderful.

So, please, if you love horror, or fairy tales, or goats, please read this book.

Spoilers Under The Cut:

This book... I don't even know where to start. I mean, I love Ryn, I love Ellis, I love the Goat. I love everything about it. But let's break down the best parts:

Goat being lovely. She's amazing, and I love that she didn't become aggressive after being turned. She was still stubborn and loyal, but she was lovely.

The settlement at the base of the mine. I- wow. This is one of the most interesting parts of the book to me. That some bone houses stayed true to their human selves, and that some people would want to live with their loved ones even after death. (Not to mention the subtle foreshadowing involved with everyone assuming that Ellis is dying.)

Ryn's Dad / the helpful bone house. God, that part gets me every time. When he reaches up and touches her cheek, and she doesn't pull away, even though she hasn't figure out who he is yet. And the fact that he made sure that she didn't find out who he was until he was gone, so that she could let him go, really let him go. The way that the love spoon being reunited is Ryn both finding and losing her dad all at once. How even though he knew what would happen if Ryn found the cauldron, he still showed her the way there.

The Lake. "Keep going, keep going, keep going." "What. Do you. Think. I. Am. Doing?!!?" makes me laugh every time.

Ellis's Heritage. I had actually figured this out way, way earlier, or at least had a very strong hunch. But like I mentioned before, I wasn't even mad in the slightest. In fact, I was satisfied. All the foreshadowing was perfect without being too heavyhanded, but enough to pick up on. And Ellis meeting his mother for the first time when she dies (again)...

The Aftermath. Ryn burying every single bone house because they were people and they deserve that respect, and because that's what she does. Also, the "I'd like to bury her." "That I think I can help with." exchange was so sweet. Also, Goat being found curled up in a tree.

The Lake, again. The Afnac returning Ryn's axe (complete with teethmarks) made me laugh. Plus the way that it was returned. It just came hurtling out of the lake, adjaksjd. I wonder if the Afnac understood what it was giving back, and to who. If it was saying thank you, or go away and never come back. Or if it just wanted to be rid of the axe.

[theyforcedmetogetablog]

"The Bone Houses" by Emily Llyod-Jones!

So, the online summary says: "The Bone Houses is a 2019 young adult horror fantasy novel by Emily Lloyd-Jones, following Ryn, a female gravedigger, and Ellis, an apprentice mapmaker, as they try to stop "bone houses" from roaming their world and affecting Ryn's family business"

Here is where I say, thank you online summary! I will take it from here!

Magic in the Kingdoms of Wales is fading, but Ryn the gravedigger still keeps to the old ways. She leaves out offerings to the fae that used to live in the kingdom that borders her town, makes sure the iron fences are in working order, and makes sure that the dead stay burried. She and the elders know that in the forest, beyond the borders of her graveyard, the dead walk.

The younger generations don't believe her, neither does the lord that threatens to take her home, until a mapmaker travels through town and the dead walk out of the forest. Ryn, along with the mapmaker named Ellis, journeys into the heart of where the Fae King himself used to live to stop the dead from walking once and for all.

So, what I really REALLY like about Emily Llyod-Jones' writing in this book (and in The Drowning Woods) is that she knows her stuff. I really like her incorporations of Welsh myths/legends into her stories. I also like how she begins her books as if she is a storyteller sitting by a fire. It's like if myths met a game of telephone in real time because she will tell you the different versions before getting into the REAL one.

There is shifting points of view, but it is sectioned off so there isn't any guessing about who is speaking. The characters feel fully developed, even the ones we really only see through their sibling's eyes. There are canon lgbt+ people in this book.

Trying to think of what else I really liked, there is more but I am blanking. Read it for yourself!

[shutupcrime]

I feel like so many problems people have with tv at the moment could be solved if we just went back to the good ole days of 20 episodes a season that’s just sixty percent filler and character development. Give the people what they want- less condensed story and more meaningless shenanigans

[meeghanreads]

WWW Wednesday — 29 May 2024

Hello friends!! Welcome to this week’s WWW Wednesday — 29 May 2024!! WWW Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Sam @ Taking on a World of Words, where you answer the three following questions: What did you recently finish? What are you currently reading? And, what do you think you’ll read next? Let’s see what I have been reading… (All images will link to Goodreads if you click on them.…

[hamsterdads]

having a lot of toh thoughts tonight, so here's a few :] I think that king and the collector would be life partners ( probably platonically, but mostly just whatever keeps them together forever hehe)

i also think the collector would take luz's passing the hardest (given their history with it and all...) and i think she'd know this and do her best to prepare them for it. so here's me trying to deal with all that.