The Story

This is the second book in The Chronicles of Faerie.

A year after her twin’s death, Laurel returns to Ireland to attend a memorial that her grandparents are holding for Honor. Going by what is written in Honor’s journal, she believes her twin had fallen in with a cult before her death, because what she actually wrote about couldn’t really be true as faeries don’t really exist, right? Except Laurel has to question her disbelief in faeries when she meets up with the cluricaun that her sister had written about – especially when the cluricaun tells Laurel that she must go on a quest to save the imprisoned Summer King in order to light the Midsummer Fire and save her sister. And if the Midsummer Fire isn’t lit in seven days, it means grave disaster for both the Faerie and human worlds.

The Review

I got tired of waiting to see if I could find a copy of the original, instead of the updated version. I know that for the previous book, they changed the main character’s nationality in the updated version, so was a little unsure what would be changed in this one. Still not entirely sure, but I have a feeling the mention of LotR movie pictures is one of the changes… Just a hunch and all. ;)

On the whole, the book wasn’t quite as good as I expected it. It wasn’t bad, but it didn’t grip me. The characters were a little boring in all honesty. For example, it mentioned at one point how Ian seemed to have dual personalities and that was the fault of what exactly he is and the role he has to play in the book, but I guess I wasn’t looking close enough to see those dual personalities. To me, he just seemed like a moody teenage boy, and there’s been so much of that lately that it didn’t do anything for me.

I do, however, still LOVE the way Melling portrays her faeries. They’re a lot more authentic and dangerous, and that feeling made the parts where the Fir-Fia-Caw were after Laurel rather terrifying. There were even times reading this where I was tempted to go and grab my box of salt and put some at all of my doorways and windows, just in case. Yes, she made these particular beings up for the book, but they still felt very realistic when you compare them to other traditional faeries. So yeah, Melling must have done a fair bit of research when writing these books.

The Bottom Line

Not as good as The Hunter’s Moon. Probably won’t reread this, but would recommend the series as a whole to people who want to read books that are more true to the authentic Irish mythology of faeries.

Other Reviews

Twisted Kingdom, Wands and Worlds, Confessions of a Book Addict. Have you reviewed this book on your blog? Let me know and I’ll add your link.