Tess of the Road by Rachel Hartman
In stores February 27, 2018
Rachel Hartman's breakout novel from 2012 Seraphina (reviewed here) was a phenomenal work of fantasy about a woman who was half-dragon trying to come to terms with her heritage in a world where humans and dragon have an uneasy truce. A sequel to that novel, Shadow Scale (reviewed here), continued Seraphina's story. Seraphina had a pair of twin younger sisters, Jeanne and Tess Dombegh, who received a few mentions.
In 2018's Tess of the Road, Hartman allows Tess to come to the forefront. Despite Serahpina's rise and rank on the court, her father has lost his law license and the family has struggled. Jeanne is seen as the family's best chance to marry a suitable rich member of court, and Tess throws her energy into finding a match.
Tess, however, is angry, drunk, and combative nearly all the time, and suffers crippling self doubt. Feeling trapped into a life with no opportunity, and with a bit of a push from Seraphina, Tess hits that road with little more than a new pair of sturdy boots. She quickly stumbles upon an old friend, a quigutl named Pathka whose life Tess had saved in the tunnels below her house years before. Together, they head south to search for creatures out of myth called the World Serpents.
Hartman spends the first third of the book building Tess's difficult world, including her rocky relationship with a mother who blames Tess for everything. With Pathka's appearance, the novel hits it stride and Tess feels a higher purpose for perhaps the first time in her life. At first Tess steals and lies to survive, then discovers the joy of working physical jobs to get by.
Ultimately, Tess of the Road is a journey into one's self, a coming of age story that shows a leap in maturity as one deals with the immense pain of the past. The question with any companion book is how important is it to have read the anchor text in order to appreciate the companion? In this case, Tess can be read as a stand-alone. Hartman provides just enough information about Seraphina's backstory and distant relationship to Tess that the major backstory gets told without being in the way.
Tess herself has plenty of flashbacks to fill in her own backstory, including her history with Will, her first love and someone she's avoided thinking about to avoid both the pain of loss and the truth of what really happened. Hartman really shines in her craft as she tackles very serious matters late in the book that to which many young women might relate, and does it in a way that might help young women who've suffered similarly in finding hope among the dregs of despair and trauma. This is an expertly crafted tale that finds a deeper purpose than most fantasy books.
This is a definite purchase for any readers who enjoy fantasy, or for those who have found themselves in similar enough circumstances and need a light to guide them out of a dark place.
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