The Word for World is Forest

The first thing that really stood out to me about the book “The Word for World is Forest” is the title itself. The Athshean word for ‘world’ is ‘forest’ in their words. This world is technically built on dirt and dirt is where forests come from (excluding the oceans). Everything around us is built on dirt. Even though we only see roads and other things, deep under is still dirt.

This book is place in the future of our current Earth.  People from Earth, colonists take over a planet known as Athshe. If people have the techonology to go to another place, it was kind of weird that they did the olden style of colonization. They actually cut trees down, planted stuff and enslaved the locals (humanoids). The people from Earth have turned into invaders. Somehow this makes me think of us now. We are cutting down our forests to clear more land to build buildings and strengthen the economy. The animals are like the locals on the planet Athshe, but just not enslaved like them. (Just imagine, we capture a parrot and put it to work… that sounds cuter than anything else…). It is the start of another new world, like how people came to North America in history (just on another planet). The Athsheans were just like the Native American, they are people, but just different than others. War becomes inevitable at times like this.