Reviews

Otherland by Louie Stowell

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Myra and Rohan celebrate their birthday together every year, because it also happens to be the day they died. Myra always wants their party to go off with a bang and this year her antics end in disaster when Rohan’s baby sister is taken by a fairy queen as a changeling. With the help of a ‘fairy godmother’, Myra and Rohan travel to Otherland and take on three impossible challenges to win his sister back.

I loved this funny take on a fairytale – full of quirkiness and a lot of silliness that children will love. This was a quick read that would be perfect for year 4 up, providing a good deal of humour and fun throughout. The plot was perfectly paced with plenty of suspense and drama alongside the funny parts.

Myra is a bit of a free spirit, seemingly with very few boundaries at home and she initially seems to like her life and this lack of control from her mum. However, quickly it turns out that Myra feels that maybe her life in the real world isn’t what she thought it was. She was an interesting character and I enjoyed seeing her dilemmas and thoughtful questions about whether that lack of boundaries showed her mum caring. Rohan, on the other hand, has a completely different life and the pair complement each other well. Side character fairy godmother Mab is fabulously bonkers and completely unexpected in the way she reacts to everything.

All in all, Otherland is a twisty turny sort of fairytale with a real sense of good versus evil and some excellently evil fairies making very unfair decisions!

A quick and fun tale that will be loved by many children, 5 out of 5 stars.

Thank you to NetGalley and Nosy Crow for providing an e-book review copy.

bigbeardedbookseller's review

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4.0

As you may have noticed recently I’ve bemoaned the fact that I couldn’t settle down to read anything and I was finding it more and more frustrating as it went on, I eventually thought ‘why not go back to the fun of middle grade?’

The first pick on the top of a very large pile was this book ‘Otherland’ by Louie Stowell.

It turned out to be the perfect choice!

A fantasy adventure riffing off themes of the fey. Using Spenser’s Gloriana as the Fairy Queen, and Shakespeare’s Mab as their fairy godmother, there was definitely a Midsummer Night’s Dream feel to some of this, and it really worked.

Full of adventure, peril, twists, and ultimately about friendship and family.

We have Myra and Rohan, who couldn’t be more different from each other, working together to overcome the challenges that, Gloriana, has set them to retrieve Shilpa, Rohan’s kidnapped sister.

Along the way they meet various other fairies, gods, and monsters, all of whom want to either help or hinder the duo.

Loved Tony, brilliant character in a cave of wonders.

A world I would love to visit again, well apart from possibly meeting the faceless face-eaters.