Thanks to NetGalley & the publishers for a chance to review this arc!

The lost art of the oracle is a hopeful little story about the power of trusting one’s intuition & taking care of nature.

Because it’s such a short story - a lot of aspects I would’ve wanted more answers on weren’t included. The magic lore was dropped as forms of info dumps in dialogues. The pacing was quite fast and didn’t linger but there weren’t really any character development. The story also didn’t go into depth about the character’s motives or how certain behaviours were corrected or discussed.

I liked how vivid the portrayal of the Forest was and I liked how the story ended.

This book is delightful to read! I enjoyed reading this and it brought back memories of stories I read when I was younger. The cover is beautiful as well.

The Lost Art of the Oracle was a sweet story about young Oura Poppy as she discovers magic and seeks to find her lost people.

What I liked about The Lost Art of the Oracle was the world-building and descriptive language. Nilsson genuinely builds a beautiful world that is easy to imagine in your mind. The Forest almost feels like its own character. I really enjoyed the descriptions of the Oura people and Nilsson gave enough information to make the world feel expansive and large, but not enough to overwhelm you.

The writing style itself feels very matter-of-fact and young, a little bit more tell than show in some parts. Because of this, it was difficult for me to connect emotionally with the characters. The book is also quite short and left me wanting to see more of the characters and their world, but I respect Nilsson for only including what was required to tell the meat of the story.

The conflict between characters also felt surface level and I wished there was a little bit more depth into their reactions. (For instince, between Moss and Tandie and Moss and the grandmother) I also wish that Moss's actions had been described more and the reactions and thoughts of the Oura people in general had been delved into.

The overall message of the story was so hopeful and beautiful. Trust your intuition and be one with nature. I believe this book will resonate with fantasy lovers who like magical, nature-y worlds. This book does such a fantastic job at creating a beautiful, interesting world with a lot of depth. It also has themes of chronic disease (with the main character having leg pain anytime she uses magic) and loneliness (the main character's family is all that's left of their people).