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A review by mafiabadgers
Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett
1.0
First read 01/2025
I've thought about reading this one before, having heard that it was a very winter-y book, but I've never much gone in for stories about the fae, so I let it go. I only picked it up because I stumbled across it at the library. I was 140 pages into it before I realised it would work very nicely for the "A book you don't expect to like" square of my book bingo. Unfortunately, it lived up to my expectations.
Part of the problem is that I've just finished reading Fires' Astonishment, which has wonderfully imaginative prose. The male romantic lead chews on his shirt collar and the female romantic lead has psoriasis and an eye infection. It's terrifically down-to-earth. Here, everyone is beautiful—and forgettable. The prose is merely tolerable, and the Canadian author has no qualms about having her English narrator refer to autumn as "fall".
In fact, the setting is thoroughly disappointing. London is lit by gaslights, and Emily uses an inkwell, but she never seems to have any trouble writing in her notebook whilst on the go (presumably she uses a pencil, but it's never mentioned). The village woodcutter is a lesbian, and this is considered unremarkable. That's not to say that everything with a historical setting needs to be riddled with homophobia, but it ought to at least be remarked upon if the illusion of historicity is to be preserved. Perhaps the villagers have a culture of minding their own business, or a policy to never interfere in the relationships of others, or maybe Lilja spent long enough arguing with the rest of the village before the book started that they've resigned themselves to her ways. But it ought to at least be remarked upon. In a similar vein, Wendell Bambleby has a habit of swinging by the tavern to pick up local women for casual sex. Emily Wilde is annoyed by this, in an 'I'm definitely not in love with you and denying it to myself' sort of way, but it's never thought to reflect on the morals of either the women or Bambleby. The women are never even named or given characteristics beyond their hair colour and good looks (even in a small village, beauty is mandatory), which feels like a missed opportunity, both for some feminist commentary on sex and relationships and also for developing the romance between Emily and Wendell Bambleby. Which is a stupid name. It should at least be Brambleby.
On top of all that, the wintry landscape is not much more meaningful than stage scenery. Oh, the cold is mentioned frequently enough, but Fawcett isn't a good enough writer to capture the feeling of sweating inside your heavy furs even as your lips are going numb, or the constant stomping of boots to knock off snow and restore circulation, or the searing brightness of the winter sun reflecting off the snow, which muffles all noise and makes the world strangely quiet, as if the forests are holding their breath.
The only part of the book I did like was the romance, which always took second fiddle to the adventure; Bambleby didn't even show up until fifty tiresome pages in. The dynamic between the pair was generally fun, and the book was flatter when Bambleby wasn't around. Somehow it managed to both escalate the romance too quickly and not go far enough to hold my interest. I don't think I will be reading the sequel.
I've thought about reading this one before, having heard that it was a very winter-y book, but I've never much gone in for stories about the fae, so I let it go. I only picked it up because I stumbled across it at the library. I was 140 pages into it before I realised it would work very nicely for the "A book you don't expect to like" square of my book bingo. Unfortunately, it lived up to my expectations.
Part of the problem is that I've just finished reading Fires' Astonishment, which has wonderfully imaginative prose. The male romantic lead chews on his shirt collar and the female romantic lead has psoriasis and an eye infection. It's terrifically down-to-earth. Here, everyone is beautiful—and forgettable. The prose is merely tolerable, and the Canadian author has no qualms about having her English narrator refer to autumn as "fall".
In fact, the setting is thoroughly disappointing. London is lit by gaslights, and Emily uses an inkwell, but she never seems to have any trouble writing in her notebook whilst on the go (presumably she uses a pencil, but it's never mentioned). The village woodcutter is a lesbian, and this is considered unremarkable. That's not to say that everything with a historical setting needs to be riddled with homophobia, but it ought to at least be remarked upon if the illusion of historicity is to be preserved. Perhaps the villagers have a culture of minding their own business, or a policy to never interfere in the relationships of others, or maybe Lilja spent long enough arguing with the rest of the village before the book started that they've resigned themselves to her ways. But it ought to at least be remarked upon. In a similar vein, Wendell Bambleby has a habit of swinging by the tavern to pick up local women for casual sex. Emily Wilde is annoyed by this, in an 'I'm definitely not in love with you and denying it to myself' sort of way, but it's never thought to reflect on the morals of either the women or Bambleby. The women are never even named or given characteristics beyond their hair colour and good looks (even in a small village, beauty is mandatory), which feels like a missed opportunity, both for some feminist commentary on sex and relationships and also for developing the romance between Emily and Wendell Bambleby. Which is a stupid name. It should at least be Brambleby.
On top of all that, the wintry landscape is not much more meaningful than stage scenery. Oh, the cold is mentioned frequently enough, but Fawcett isn't a good enough writer to capture the feeling of sweating inside your heavy furs even as your lips are going numb, or the constant stomping of boots to knock off snow and restore circulation, or the searing brightness of the winter sun reflecting off the snow, which muffles all noise and makes the world strangely quiet, as if the forests are holding their breath.
The only part of the book I did like was the romance, which always took second fiddle to the adventure; Bambleby didn't even show up until fifty tiresome pages in. The dynamic between the pair was generally fun, and the book was flatter when Bambleby wasn't around. Somehow it managed to both escalate the romance too quickly and not go far enough to hold my interest. I don't think I will be reading the sequel.