Made with love
© Victoria Gryson 2024
October “Toby” Daye, a changeling who is half human and half fae, has been an outsider from birth. After getting burned by both sides of her heritage, Toby has denied the Faerie world, retreating to a “normal” life. Unfortunately for her, the Faerie world has other ideas…
The murder of Countess Evening Winterrose pulls Toby back into the fae world. Unable to resist Evening’s dying curse, which binds her to investigate, Toby must resume her former position as knight errant and renew old alliances. As she steps back into fae society, dealing with a cast of characters not entirely good or evil, she realizes that more than her own life will be forfeited if she cannot find Evening’s killer.
I’ve had this book on my tbr pile for 4 years, and I’ve finally managed to read it, yay 😀
It’s been a looooong time since I’ve read a real, honest to god, urban fantasy, and it actually makes me want to reread Dresden as well 😀
So many books, so little time…
The book’s prologue really sets the tone for the story, and we’re thrown right into the action.
Apart from some flashbacks here and there, we remain in present-day San Fransisco with the occasional hop into Faerie. There is a lot of information in this first book of the series, no surprise there. Still, there wasn’t any dreaded information dump but rather a more continuous information gathering.
The scenes and settings were well-written en detailed enough.
October ‘Toby’ Daye is a changeling. Her mother is fae, and her father is a human. She was a P.I. and a knight in the service of her liege before unfortunate events (I’m not spoiling!) caused her to turn her back on the fae world. Unfortunately, the fae are not done with Toby yet, and she is set with the task of solving the murder of a friend.
While she may not like the fae overly much (some exceptions, of course), I do feel that a ‘normal’ life was never in the cards for her (I mean, working in the 7/11 aint all that).
She has a good head on her shoulders, quickly feels responsible for those she cares about, and doesn’t give up (even if it would be so much easier just to let go). I look forward to seeing her grow and finding her place in the rest of the series!
Devin, her old lover. She grew up at his feet, became his lover, and left him for a human in the end. Now he is back at her side, wanting to pick up where they left off and help her solve the mystery of her friend’s murder.
Tybalt, the King of the Cait Sidhe. I really liked Tybalt, and if there was any romance in the series, I hope he is the guy/fae/cat Toby goes for. At the start of the book, however, they have a whole distrust/hate thing going on… so it might take a while 😀
Sylvester, Luna, Lilly, Connor, Dare, Manuel, Quentin,… I could go on and on about all the characters that we encounter (and I hope we will read about them a lot more), but I’d be here for hours more 😀 But I can say this: all characters feel alive, with hopes and dreams, machinations and motives. Some are good, some are absolutely not, and most are still in the grey zone where they stand in the grand scheme of things (will we ever know, though?). They have genuine depth to them. Superb writing!
It took me a while to get into the story, but as soon as I did, it gripped me and wouldn’t let me go until the end… kinda like the curse Toby got stuck with (less lethal, though, lol).
Outstanding balance between all the conversations and action.
The book was well written with no (noticeable) errors. There is a tad of romance and a little sexual tension, but no sex described in the book (if that is important to you).
The book has 346 pages, but that is with a prequel novella “Strangers in Court” included. The story itself is 264 pages long, spread over 27 chapters, and is told from Toby’s point of view.
This was the first book I’ve read by the author, and I was pleasantly surprised! As I said at the start of the review, it’s been a long time since I’ve read a pure urban fantasy novel, and it reminded me why I love this genre so much. The magic, the mystery, and all that in our present-day lives… I mean… what if, you know?
I wholeheartedly recommend this book!
© Victoria Gryson 2024