Author: Catherynne M. Valente
The book
This is
the second book in the Fairyland series. I thought it was a trilogy, turns out
it isn’t. Lots of books. Anyway. The first book tells the story of 11-year old
September who lives in Nebraska in the 40s. Her dad is in France fighting
Germans and her mother is fixing cars and things. September is bored and wants
to have something exciting happen. One day she is whisked off to Fairyland. In
this book she goes back to Fairyland. She is 13 years old and she has a heart,
but not a shadow, since she left it there last time. Her shadow has been
causing a lot of trouble as the queen of Fairyland-Below, bringing the shadows
of Fairyland-Above down to her kingdom. September has to go to the bottom of
the world to find Prince Myrrh, who is the rightful king. And it is amazing.
What I thought
It’s just
so beautiful and wonderful. The writing is amazing, as always. It’s also very
clever. September has to go on a quest and the different parts of quests are
explained, and sort of broken down. It’s delightful.
I thought
it was interesting and beautiful. It’s darker than the first book and possibly
more teen than children’s books. It’s set in a world of shadows so clearly it’s
darker. September has grown a lot in the year and a half-ish that passed
between her first and second visit. Children don’t have hearts, but teenagers
have raw and wounded hearts and we see this in September. She is more
introspective and thoughtful. She doesn’t just act instantly, she shows
kindness and mercy and it’s just lovely.
I loved
A-through-L and Saturday’s shadows. The idea is that shadows are part of you,
but the dark part of you, so we see the darker, wilder parts of Ell and
Saturday. It’s interesting to see how the shadows would like their own lives
and don’t want to go back because they have their own, awesome lives.
It’s
creepy sometimes, with the Alleyman taking shadows and creating revels down in
Fairyland-Below. It’s always odd to not know where you have characters you
thought you knew, like Saturday and Ell. Because you like to think you know
them, and suddenly they’re acting completely differently from how you would
expect, and it’s sort of unsettling.
It has a
dodo, and I love dodos. I don’t know why. Because they’re awesome probably. I
always have loved them, and this book has a huge Night-dodo named Aubergine, so
I’m pretty pleased. I like dodos, because I’m weird.
I quite
liked the ending, it was beautiful and sweet and hopeful, and I can’t wait to
read the next book, because, you know, awesome. Valente is good at tying her
books together, and I look forward to that. So, yey.
Final thoughts
It was
funny, it was a little dark, it was sweet and so well written and beautiful.
And there are dodos, and Wyveraries and Winds and Alleymen. There’s a tapir at
the bottom of the world, I loved it.