Hello, everyone! Today I’m reviewing one of my most anticipated releases of the year, The Salt King by Natasha Pulley. I never know exactly what kind of story I will get from Pulley, but I always expect to love it. Did her latest release live up to these expectations? Read on to find out!
A novel about belief, religion, and the power of myth that blends the gripping, end-of-the-world storytelling of The Passage with Natasha Pulley’s biting wit and queer romance.
Jesuit priest Avelyn Brocken was born into a mining family in Hreodwater, a small, isolated salt town in England. At 16, after a mining disaster killed his family, he fled.
When a fellow priest is miraculously healed only to then be turned to salt after a visit to Hreodwater, Avelyn is sent to investigate. When he arrives, the town’s doctor, Jericho, tells him that the priest is not the only one experiencing strange cures—and may not be the only one in danger from a substance in the mine that the locals call “salt light.”
As Avelyn and Jericho team up to protect the Hreodwater from salt light, strange happenings occur at mines around the world. At an archaeological dig on the Dead Sea, electrical devices froth salt, while at a huge salt works in Poland, communication is lost, and rumors circulate of total annihilation.
As salt light devastates cities around the world, Avelyn must decide what to believe—and whether his faith is strong enough to withstand an apocalypse.
***Thank you to Bloomsbury Publishing for providing an advanced copy of the book via NetGalley. My review contains my honest thoughts about my reading experience.***
I’m not surprised I loved The Salt King. Pulley is easily one of my favorite authors. There’s just something about her writing that sucks me into the story in a way not many authors achieve. It has an almost dreamlike quality to it, which is helped by the fact that so many of her stories are weird AF. This story felt like apocalyptic horror at times and a slice-of-life fantasy at others, but it totally worked somehow. Of course, it also had Pulley’s typical soft, sad boys in love at its center, which I always enjoy.
I don’t want to say much of anything about the plot of The Salt King because I don’t want to ruin the experience for anyone. However, I will note that I appreciated the use of different POVs throughout the story. Avelyn and his return to Hreodwater is very much the beating heart of the story, but the other POV characters added a lot, as well. They gave the story a wider sense of impending doom from being able to see firsthand the havoc being caused by salt light around the world. The nuclear scientist, an expert in disbelief thanks to living with frequent hallucinations, was also such a perfect counterweight to Avelyn’s intense beliefs.
One thing that really stood out to me in The Salt King was the small interpersonal moments. Amidst all of the weird and horrifying happenings in this book, the way Pulley wrote the quiet moments between the characters felt genuine and down to Earth. One scene, in particular, is seared into my memory because of the absurdity of its simplicity. The characters were at mass having a really great conversation. Someone shushed them for being distracting, and that person was eating a peach. Not only was I hanging on every word of the conversation, but I literally laughed out loud at the audacity of someone eating a peach at mass criticizing someone else for being distracting. This type of small moment was scattered all throughout the book, and I could not get enough of how much they endeared me to the characters.
The other things that really wowed me about The Salt King were the world-building and themes. I don’t want to say too much about the world-building, but Hreodwater was such a fascinating place. The specifics and mechanics of salt light were really freaking cool and tied into the themes of the story so well. Ultimately, this was a story about belief. It balanced highlighting the positive and negative aspects of having strong beliefs really well. The story did include some criticisms of organized religion, which might make some people uncomfortable, but I didn’t find them to be vicious attacks for the sake of putting down what people believe. The whole thing was more abstract than that and focused more on the power of belief to both save and destroy depending on the context.
All in all, The Salt King was yet another Natasha Pulley book that I loved. It is rare than I want to pick up a book almost immediately after finishing it, but I’m already craving a re-read of this one. This was a thought-provoking story that completely consumed me, and I can’t wait to see what else I discover when I do finally pick it up again. Therefore, I rate this book 5 out of 5 stars.
There you have it! My thoughts on The Salt King by Natasha Pulley. Are you a fan of Pulley’s books? Have you read this one? Let me know your thoughts down in the comments!