PanEWGregory fails to capture the spark of what makes so much of her previous work a gripping read. The novel is the definition of a slow burn, with your interest in its proceedings likely to rise and fall with the tides of its settings until its accelerated final third. Alinor’s ambitions, desires, and fears are certainly worthy of exploration in a novel. But Gregory strangely holds Alinor at arm’s length. She feels more like a fictional invention, a character lacking the complexities of a real person, than a living, breathing woman making a life for herself in treacherous times ... Gregory has never shied away from declaring herself a staunch feminist, but the book includes a perplexing abortion subplot that is perhaps the most heavy-handed thing she’s ever written. It’s difficult to get into specifics without spoiling its details, but suffice it to say that the plotting here feels decidedly antithetical to any political views Gregory has previously espoused ... Alinor is a worthy heroine, but Gregory is so intoxicated with her character’s status as an ordinary woman that the book becomes as dull, drab, and well, ordinary as the trappings of her heroine’s world ... Tidelands lacks the immediacy and vibrancy of so much of her work, often feeling just as mired in the fog and muck as her heroine. It’s not that we need Gregory to stick to royal women, so much as we wish this tale was told with half the urgency and exceptionalism that she has accorded them.
