Review: 'The Misheard World' by Aliya Whiteley

I have been reading and loving Aliya Whiteley since 2014 and she is an instant yes for me any time I see a new book by her. Recently, however, I have been struggling with a book she co-wrote with someone and so I went into The Misheard World with a little trepidation. That was gone within the first few pages, however, as I fell fully in love with her writing all over again. Thanks to Rebellion and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Pub. Date: 31/03/2026
Publisher: Rebellion; Solaris

Before wars are won, they must be witnessed.

Elize Janview is a soldier, one of the few survivors of an unimaginably terrible weapon, which ended the long détente between the North and the South and plunged them back into all-out war. She enlisted with a dream of finding those responsible, of somehow getting revenge for the deaths of everyone she knew, but was posted to guard the prison at Crag, the fortress of the South, which has never fallen to the enemy.

Janview’s life is transformed when a rough wooden box is delivered to Crag, holding the performer and spy Marius Mondegreen, agent of the North: the Misheard Word, who can read minds, breathe fire, and make objects appear and disappear. Janview is to witness Mondegreen’s interrogation by his captor, the beautiful and cruel Allynx Syld, who promises the end of the war. As recorder – and by degrees participant – in the interrogation, Janview comes to question everything she knew about the war, and the very world she lives in…

What I adore about Aliya Whiteley's writing is that while she opens up different amazing worlds in her stories, she also always returns to the idea of storytelling itself. Her novels and novellas aren't necessarily meta in that they actively comment upon the writing itself, but they do always engage with what a story is, what it can do, and how powerful it is. Whether the story is good or bad, the telling of it does something and Whiteley is intrinsically aware of this. In The Misheard World, this awareness also grows in the protagonist and getting to witness it was a real pleasure. An even greater pleasure was the sheer breadth of stories she and I were being served. Whiteley teases all kinds of stories, be it kings in towers, girls in caves, or the cost of high-stakes gambles and none of them fully find an ending. In a weird way, neither does The Misheard World. I don't want to spoil anything, but Whiteley takes the open-endedness of story to heart. You can always tell a different story, you can always go on after the expected ending, and there is power and beauty in that. I continue to adore Whiteley and in The Misheard World she tells another story that will stay with me for a while.

The Misheard World is told in various parts. We meet Elize who is stationed at the Crag, a prison fortress, amidst a war between the North and the South. The destruction of her home triggered the war and also put Elize on a path of vengeance, but she has begun to wonder whether such a thing as an enemy and revenge truly exists. Then, the Unheard Word, Marius Mondegreen, is delivered to Crag to be interrogated by the Allynx Syld and Elize is meant to be a quiet observer during the interrogation. Always on the outside, Elize is slowly sucked into the complicated relationship of Mondegreen and the Sylduntil all of a sudden she is in the very midst of events. What if the world she knows is not as it seems? What if the stories that are told hold a kernel of truth? What will Elize do? What kind of story will she tell? I absolutely adored Elize as a main character. There is something very quiet but steely at her core and when this is shaken I felt that echo within myself. While most of The Misheard World is narrated through her, there is also a part told through another perspective and I loved how this switch in perspective also allowed a mix-up of focus and intent. Where Elize begins somewhat naive, the other narrator is full of cynicism, and when we return to Elize I felt happy to be back with her. The Syld and Mondegreen are also very intriguing characters who begin as cyphers and are slowly revealed. 

I am hardly an objective reader of Aliya Whiteley, since I've enjoyed pretty much everything she's written. However, with that kind of history comes the niggling worry that maybe, just maybe, this one won't hit the same way. My relief at this not being the case was almost immediately pushed aside by my focus on this new story, this new world, these new characters. Whiteley has a knack for crafting speculative worlds and settings that intrigue while being deeply familiar. Her characters also always feel deeply human, even if they maybe aren't entirely or do things we don't immediately understand. The same is true for The Misheard World. Another aspect to this novel, which it shares with her novel Skyward Inn, is the presence of war as a context for an investigation of storytelling. If we look at our world today, right now in April 2026, surely we can see how deeply entwined stories are with the horrors of war. Who is telling us these stories? What are they trying to get us to believe? Who is in control? These are all important questions to ask and novels such as The Misheard World encourage us to do so.

I give this novel...

5 Universes!

I adored The Misheard World and my only complaint is that it's over. However, I have the feeling it is the kind of book that will reward rereading. And otherwise there are always more stories to hear, tell, and read.