I think that I went into What Big Teeth expecting it to be coy about its magic and monsters, and was delighted when it quickly went full, unapologetic Addams Family ... The unraveling of this mystery does take its time, giving us lots of space to appreciate its cast of oddballs and misfits. The Zarrins are a tragic and prickly bunch, but as the story progressed, I found myself becoming increasingly fond of them ... Eleanor herself is sometimes a frustrating protagonist, retreating when I wish she'd fight and remaining silent when I want her to probe more deeply. But as the story progresses and we learn the true depth of her alienation from everyone around her, I found myself understanding and sympathizing with her somewhat passive approach ... Szabo is very adept at picking and choosing traits that telegraph understanding without anchoring the characters to everything that's come before ... What Big Teeth gazes into that darkness to face the monster that dwells within.
Szabo is upfront about the wolves suggested by the book’s title; they run through the trees in the very first pages. But other, less familiar creatures lurk in these pages, and it takes time—deliciously well-spent time—to understand how Szabo is using familiar images and types to tell their own kind of coming-of-age story. Yes, there’s a grandmother whose warnings ought to be heeded—but there’s a lot more, too, in this slinky and dark YA horror fantasy about love and desire and family secrets ... Eleanor Zarrin’s grandparents came to this country from across the ocean; their history, laden with crows and witches and islands, forms part of Szabo’s deliciously rich aesthetic. Szabo paints in jewel tones ... Just a few pages in, you’re settled in an in-between state, real and unreal, magic and earthly ... Szabo lets us see Eleanor’s mistakes as she makes them, lets us understand how badly she craves belonging and love after a lifetime of being the odd one out ... What Big Teeth is purposefully paced and absolutely full of longing: longing to understand oneself, to have a place in the world, to be part of a family in a way that feels real and true and secure. It’s a book about desire, and how baffling and contradictory desire can feel, how it can blur into a sense of wanting to consume or be consumed. It’s about knowing where the lines are between you and the people and things you love, and how to maintain those boundaries and your own malleable sense of self. These things echo through decades and generations, though the haunting story of Eleanor’s grandparents all the way to the book’s blazing finale ... Szabo packs so much into this strange, compelling, enchanting book: gorgeous imagery, dextrous use of tropes (the meddling grandmother, the handsome schoolteacher, the witch in a castle, and so many more), a mythic streak, and a surprising physicality. It’s not the wolves who feel muscular and raw, but Eleanor, with her contradictory desires, her drive to help free everyone from a heavy past.
A search for the self is at the forefront of this twisted coming-of-age story, as everyone insists on telling Eleanor who or what she truly is inside. Her journey is not only in discovering who she is, but also the transformation she must make in order to battle the destructive outside forces encroaching upon her family ... Like memory, much of the tale is cloaked in shadow with long passages containing dreams or dream-like sequences and murky flashbacks from various points of view. But it’s not all dark. The story is often injected with a brilliant, wonderland-like atmosphere as we see Eleanor singing the drakondia plants back to life as they 'bob and sway' behind her. Some of the more beautiful scenes are of Eleanor diving clothesless off a cliff into fierce waters, swimming toward her true self ... At times, extraneous information can weigh down the pace of the story, but overall What Big Teeth is a fun and enticing read with many intriguing questions driving the plot forward—though some of the answers seem confused or never quite resolved. It can be argued whether lengthy descriptions hinder or help young readers—as a young person, I found value in reading well-built worlds—but Szabo’s descriptions do lean toward lengthy. There is so much love contained within their details.
Half Gothic mystery, half meditation on the nature of family and inter-generational trauma, it is a book that intends to grab you and not let go ... Szabo writes with a deliberate pacing and genre awareness. They mix the tropes one would expect from a Gothic fantasy coming-of-age with a concerted effort to make the familiar unfamiliar. In the hands of another author, this might come off as more gimmick than heart. Szabo, however, ensures that this narrative remains thoroughly grounded as Eleanor struggles with desire, rejection, and loss—not all of it her own ... As with any coming-of-age story, love plays a major role. Here again, Szabo shows they’ve given this book deliberate thought and care. Love comes in many forms in this book, and Szabo takes the time to dig into what love means to a person who doesn’t even really know herself yet ... This book is slow and patient with its reader precisely because everything has a purpose ... As YA books go, this is a novel that doesn’t simply know its audience: it understands them.
... saturated with tropes of the gothic genre ... Szabo delivers on the weirdness, menacing pace, and unsettling themes. Half the fun of the novel was reading depictions of this bizarre house and its inhabitants. The other half of the fun was when the book was over, and I realized that I could have never predicted Eleanor’s disturbing revelations about herself and her family ... but each character was so confidently flawed and unwilling to change that I became a passive bystander while reading ... Aside from Eleanor’s naivety, there was an awkward childish element to each adult character that made it seem as if they were playing dress up in a house that no longer fit them. The unease never seemed to end, and Szabo deserves a heaping amount of praise for consistently sustaining this mood throughout the book ... What I really enjoyed is how well atmospheric and detailed Szabo made this story ... a deliciously creepy story about irredeemable family secrets and the monsters we contain within ourselves. The pieces of this book work like an elaborate puzzle, but are worth putting together by the last page.
A homecoming spurs a strange family’s transformation ... Extended chapters with long, florid descriptions of the setting make the story drag somewhat. Keeping the tale tightly tied to an atmospheric old mansion and a reclusive, tightknit, supernaturally dysfunctional family gives it an almost claustrophobic feel. The decline of an old family with European roots is a classic theme in literature, here given horror-novel elements, with a slowness and complexity best suited for patient older readers. Shadowy, gothic, labyrinthine.
