Reviews

The River Has Teeth by Erica Waters

kiwikawai's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

henrygravesprince's review against another edition

emotional reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I was wary of this book at the beginning because Della and Natasha are presented as very unlikable narrators for the first few chapters; they do continue to be flawed human beings, but they also did grow on me. I actually found their dynamic appealing—

to me it does genuinely feel like a hate-to-love arc done pretty well

. I’ve found that Erica Waters is very good at writing the kind of conflict that stresses me out (which is meant as a compliment, to be clear) as a reader anticipating things going wrong within the relationships of the characters, in particular. So far, I enjoy the author’s work, particularly her well-rounded and earnest portrayals of grief, and I do intend to continue reading her backlog.

I like the throughline of grief, family, connection, as well the emphasis on sisterhood (Rochelle and Natasha; Sage and Ruby) and I think that’s one of the shining aspects of the novel. It’s pretty clear early on that the conclusion to the mystery

isn’t going to be that Ruby killed the girls, but I did actually fall for the red herring

. At about 40% through I assumed

Miles

was the culprit and that lasted for most of the novel. I’m glad

he wasn’t and that

I was actually surprised by the conclusion; frankly I was worried that the book was going to reinforce very specific classist beliefs about lower class Appalachian people when going down that route. The book does definitely portray characters with those sentiments, but ultimately, does not reinforce them. It does feel a little less nuanced in its portrayal of Appalachia than the portrayal of the flatland south in Waters’s debut, Ghost Wood Song. I don’t think this was intentional and am curious to see if her other more recent works set in the Appalachian mountains improve on that front.

All that being said, I do want to note some trends I’ve noticed between this book and her debut regarding the portrayal of nonwhite characters and the way certain issues are handled. As Orlando is portrayed as the skeptical nay-saying best friend in Ghost Wood Song, Georgia is portrayed as one here; on top of this being a cliche in paranormal YA, it sticks out to me that people of color are consistently being put into that role specifically in these books. I assume Waters is trying to avoid falling into certain stereotypes about people of color associated with magic, but even in attempting that she’s wound up writing the “nonwhite best friend who is barely present in the work and mostly is utilized to create conflict for the white protagonist and/or love interest” stereotype instead. 

 

Secondly, while the mention of missing white woman syndrome vs the lack of justice or attention given to victimized marginalized women (particularly BIPOC and trans women) is well-intentioned, I wish Waters had committed to actually discussing that in depth—instead it feels like a hollow attempt at circumventing criticism for this being a very white-centric novel that focuses primarily on missing white women. On its own, it comes across as a situation where an author is more concerned with convincing people they care about something than they’re actually concerned with the issue. Based on the fact that Waters mentions this multiple times throughout her books that I’ve read (and one I’m currently reading while writing this review), I do get the impression that she does care about the lack of attention given to multiply-marginalized women who are victimized, but if she’d engage more with the discussion around it within her books, I think it would be a lot more clear and would seem less performative.

In addition to this, I’m curious as to what adoptees think about the portrayal of adoption

(and the portrayal of Natasha and Rochelle as adoptees)

within this book. I’m not sure what to make of it and I’m unaware of the author’s personal relationship (or lack thereof) to adoption, but the way the book discusses it comes across as if it’s a bit of an afterthought

in Natasha’s backstory

, which gives me pause. I think thoughtful and earnest representation of adoptees is incredibly important and often neglected in fiction, and I’m interested to know if people who have experience with it think it was executed well (or not) here.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement, Grief, Death, Murder, Violence, and Kidnapping

Moderate: Gun violence, Classism, Domestic abuse, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Misogyny, Racism, Addiction, Blood, Vomit, and Sexual assault

Drugging/roofies

xiati's review

adventurous challenging dark mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

frogbabies's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

handapandaowens's review against another edition

medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.5

Love that it’s queer

mmwi's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? N/A
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

unwise_samwise's review against another edition

adventurous emotional mysterious reflective fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

akernan33's review against another edition

5.0

What a great book! It made my tear up!

jenhurst's review against another edition

4.0

4.5.
I’m a huge fan of mystery/thrillers with a fantasy/scifi twist so I really enjoyed this. The ending was pretty obvious, but still very enjoyable.

dmoony's review against another edition

3.0

Not bad but I just feel like if you've read one of this type of a book, you've read all of them. The women are never at fault and can do no evil, magic is for women, men are bad yada yada. Despite basically saying all this with words, this book's storyline actually disproved some of it, which I appreciate. Like there were alright men, and men could also have magic.  

As for romance... sigh, I guess I'm doomed never to find a sapphic book where I can actually ship the leads. I did not really understand why these two liked each other so much, other than physical attraction.