A fresh new take on the Robin Hood legend that includes gender swapping?!?! YES PLEASE!!
When Sylvie's older brother takes over her family estate, due to her father's health declining very rapidly, Sylvie decides she can't stay there any longer; she refuses to live under the cruel, scary brother that makes the hair on the back of her neck stand up. Sylvie leaves her home, and all the comfort that comes with it, with her best friend (and crush, but don't say that out loud, Bird to live it the forest they played in when they were young. 
Together Bird and Sylvie will start to steal to help the people that start to join their community and pretty soon they will learn what it is like to lead a rebellion.

A gender-swapped retelling of Robin Hood... what more could you want?

This book was fully immersive, and the cinematic descriptions really brought the story to life. I haven't read Mechinna, but didn't feel as if I was missing out on anything, and will now read this too.
The characters were brilliant, there were some I loved, and some I loved to hate, but they all added to the plot. 

If you are a fan of fantasy with a twist, this is the book for you! Perfect for fans of Marissa Meyer, Once Upon A Time and Disney

I wanted to love this book so much. A female retelling of Robin Hood? Obviously sign me up. Sadly, I was left pretty underwhelmed by The Forest Queen, which I found rushed, vague, overly simplistic, and admittedly a bit lackluster. I didn't hate this book, by any means - there were many parts of it I liked. There were some great girl power moments in here and a few scattered commentaries on women's self-determination, strength, yada yada. However, it often felt out of place in the larger context of the book and like it was just thrown in because it sounded good/fit in with the author's intended ethos. 

The plot dragged a bit, with things not really kicking off until the last 30-40 pages or so, which is fine because scene setting is important. However, I feel like we spent so much time on stuff that didn't matter, like building a treehouse and how to live in the wild in general. I'd have preferred more background on Sylvie's upbringing in Loughsley and more importantly, what happened to John to make him so unequivocally evil, as he was portrayed in this book. It's hard to become invested emotionally in a story when there's no real depth to the characters and there really wasn't here. Everyone was half-sketched, even Sylvie herself. We just know that her brother was a creep who wanted to marry her off and she'd had enough. Because of this, I just felt kinda "meh" about the whole thing. I appreciate what the author was TRYING to do, but this is perhaps an example of a book that actually should have been multi-volume, so we had some more time for the ever-important world building that would've lended so much more to the story she was trying to tell. A quick, light read, but ultimately just a little disappointing.

This was a well crafted genderbent retelling that unfortunately feels very timely.

This is a retelling of Robin Hood with most of the gender roles reversed.  The characters aren’t all that fleshed out, but it’s still entertaining to read this take on a rousing revolutionary story from a female perspective.  In fact, Silvie, the soon-to-be “Queen of the Forest” takes on her role as “Robin Hood” after discovering another female, “Little Jane,” who is despondent over having been in a #MeToo situation.  Rape, in most previous eras and even today in many cultures, is regarded as evidence that the female is wanton, and she is “dishonored” and scorned.  Silvie has [thus far] escaped the worst elements of that fate, but she doesn’t feel totally safe in her home situation. But as Silvie muses, “Surely there’s more honor in - in going on.”  Little Jane can’t go home, and so Silvie opts to join her in exile in Woodshire Forest.

They don’t go alone; they are joined by Robert Falconer, known as Bird, who is trustworthy and totally devoted to Silvie, as well as being devoted to the welfare of their city.  After the threesome spring a midwife (“Mae Tuck”) out of the jail in order to help with Little Jane’s impending childbirth, others soon join their ranks in the forest.  In order to feed and care for everyone, they start robbing from the coffers of the Sheriff and even of the King, and redistributing the money to their band as well as the poor of the town.

Most of the characters from the original Robin Hood’s Merry Men make an appearance.  There are almost no women in the classic Robin Hood stories, so many of them are transformed here to women.  For example,   Alan-a-Dale is now Alana Dale.  There is even a switch of species, as with Much and Scarlett. 

Discussion:  There isn’t a lot of world-building, but there really doesn’t need to be.  The underlying plot of rich, oppressive, and abusive overlords doesn’t need much in the way of embellishment.  Except for Silvie and Little Jane, the characters aren’t well developed either, but most readers will know the original stories of Robin Hood.  The delight comes from the fundamental changes in form the author makes, rather than from any deepening or rounding out of different actors in the story.

Evaluation:  This gender-switched Robin Hood makes for a fun and satisfying read.

The Forest Queen is a book of rebelling for the right reasons. Its a book that gives hope to the little guys. Its a book that gives the feeling that things will always get better. Its a book that shows all different forms of love. 

If you cant tell already from my intro I really enjoyed this book and all it had to offer my ever starving brain. The main character is a lady of a noble house and has the benefits of all that comes with it. Until one day she finds herself second guessing all of her reasons for staying where she is and the adventure begins. 

I learned a few things in reading The Forest Queen. 
Love in all its forms is not easy, it's rough and it's raw.
Always have hope, even in the unknown, even when you think there is nothing left to hope for. You never know where it will get you if you just keep hold of that sliver of hope. 
And most of all I learnt I need to know what other books have been written by the wonderful Betsy Cornwall.

Happy Reading booknerds =]

I absolutely loved this book! It was fresh and original, despite being a re-telling. It really stood on it's own two feet and didn't feel like reading a re-telling of Robin Hood. It was a quick and easy read, as I read it in one afternoon, but it was highly entertaining and I loved the character development over the novel. Highly recommend.

I tried to read this book but the copy was not able to be downloaded in pdf or sent to my kindle. 

Sorry!

Safe and protected from the corruption of the outside world, Sylvianna grows into a kind and philanthropic young woman who denounces the ways of her household, runs away into the forests with her closest of friends, Bird, imagining a life with just the two of them. Life gives them an unexpected twist to their plans with the arrival of Little Jane, who happens to be pregnant.. 

The initial part of the book describes Sylvianna's life at home to be a safe haven yet brutal under the guardianship of her ruthless brother, John. Once in the forest, Sylvianna, Bird and Little Jane, learn survival skills to weather the coming winter. When Little Jane's health starts to suffer, they are forced to go into to town and find the one person who can help them, Mae Tuck, who happens to be in jail for going against the wishes of John. 

With the Mae amongst them, a new phase begins in this book. The villagers, trying to escape John's oppression, join Sylvianna and her friends in the forest. This motivates Sylvianna to become a champion to her people and find ways to destroy John's greed for power, control and torture.

Betsy Cornwell, has used beautiful imagery throughout the book. She outlines how Sylvianna fights for the freedom of her people and struggles in giving up her own freedom when it comes to the romance she shares with Bird. Excellent story line! I'm positive that the readers would enjoy sharing experiences with Sylvianna, especially her survival in the forest and her time in the Oubliette.

Absolutely loved the evolution of the main character.

Robin Hood except everyone is a girl.

As a confirmed compulsive reader of every possible Robin Hood retelling, I SURE WAS EXCITED for this one! It's okay, but overall it seemed really incredibly short. There was barely any time for anything to happen, and everything that did happen was super straightforward.

Some people aren't girls: the bad guy, and the main love interest. 

These two guys, the main character Sylvie, and Little Jane are really the only 4 characters that you actually get to know. Which kind of kicks the ratio of "Robin Hood except everyone is a girl" back down to "Robin Hood except half the people are girls." Disappointing. 

We just needed more time, and more complexity, so that we could have spent more than two seconds with Alan-of-Dale and The Saracen and Mae Tuck and literally everyone else who wasn't these 4 characters. The first half of the book that almost solely focused on Sylvie, Bird, and Jane was great -- as soon as they began adding more people in the second half, though, it felt increasingly like the author had just started checking off required "Robin Hood" boxes so quickly they became meaningless.

We didn't get to see them growing together as a band. We saw them pull off one unrealistically simple heist. The fantasy Not-England country the story takes place in is apparently the size of a shoebox, and I'm confused by the lack of worldbuilding in general. We got only TWO isolated instances of Sylvie even shooting a bow, both of which took places before they had been outlawed. There just was not enough here, and what was here seemed far too simplistic.

I was looking forward to this book but I wasn’t able to get the file to work.

As much as I'd love to read this book, I was unable to due to available format.

First off I will say I love the cover. I was really looking forward to reading this story but I could not review the book in its current format. It continually crashed my computer after the first chapter. Which by itself was good (the 1st chapter, not the computer crashing), but I am sad I could not get to read more.

My apologies -- I could not review the book in its current format :( If it is available as a kindle book, I would love to review.

"The huntswoman sounded her horn and hounds rushed like water around our horses' feet..."

Started off beautifully, with a gorgeous, evocative first line. <i>And then the murders began...</i> However, then it continued on being way too descriptive of animals in pain due to human male's ineptitude. Hunting turns my stomach, could not finish and can not rate.