The Obsessive Bookseller Reviews: “Walk on Earth a Stranger” by Rae Carson

Book review: “Walk on Earth a Stranger” by Rae Carson

No. 1 in the Gold Seer Trilogy. Young adult fantasy. Greenwillow Books, 2015. 448 pages.

As Rae Carson is responsible for my favorite young adult book of all time, “The Girl of Fire and Thorns,” I knew I had to read everything she published next. “Walk on Earth a Stranger” had all of the elements I loved from her first series: excellent characters, fantastic settings, and immersive writing that draws you in completely. While “Girl of Fire and Thorns” will always sit on a pedestal for me, this first book in the “Gold Seer” trilogy gave it a good run for its money.

My favorite thing about this writer is how she develops and crafts her main characters. In a market inundated with female leads who start out already good at everything, Carson’s heroines are anything but typical. It’s refreshing because these girls (Elise in”Girl of Fire and Thorns” and Lee in “Walk on Earth a Stranger”) are so much more relatable. They have flaws and insecurities like the rest of us, and experiencing how they cope with different trials celebrates their inner strength and fortitude and inspires me to overcome my own obstacles. Both leading ladies have magic, but it’s always their strength of character that gets them through the day. My favorite things about Lee in this novel are her resourcefulness and ability to make the best of some very tough situations.

Great characterization aside, another thing “Walk on Earth a Stranger” has going for it is the setting. This historical landscape immerses you in early America when the California/Oregon Gold Rush began drawing people west by the thousands. Not only was it interesting to read what came across as a well-researched timepiece, it also made me incredibly nostalgic about things from my childhood (most notably “Little House on the Prairie” and that old “Oregon Trail” computer game I used to play in grade school … does anybody else remember that?) but represented them in a much edgier fashion.

I have to admit that historical fiction is not my genre of choice, and even though “Walk on Earth a Stranger” had a few fantasy elements, they were nowhere near as integral to the plot as I would have liked. Well, perhaps the elements were indeed integral; they just weren’t always at the forefront. For that reason, I wouldn’t recommend this book with fantasy as a main selling point. Genre aside, at the end of the day it was still an engaging story that will have you clamoring for the next one: “Like a River Glorious,” No. 2 in the “Gold Seer” series, coming out Sept. 27, 2016.

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