diyatriestoread 's review for:

Saffron The Yellow Fairy by Georgie Ripper, Daisy Meadows
4.0
funny lighthearted reflective fast-paced
While I don’t think that Saffron’s book had the same impact on me that Amber’s book did, I still really enjoyed it! 

Given that this is the first series, the fairies all have such distinct personalities that complement each other really well and create this legitimate sisterly bond that I don’t think exists with other fairies. Saffron is very little sister coded, but in a different way than Amber. I think Amber to me screams second-eldest/middle child, whereas Saffron has the most dramatic bratty younger sister energy, I think she’s just so chaotic and unserious. When we first meet her, Saffron is literally chilling inside a beehive, not a care in the world for the damage her absence has been causing (at least Amber was trapped inside a clam). Or when Rachel’s trying so hard to hide her and she’s complaining - none of the fairies now have this much personality. Oh, Saffron is also the most irresponsible fairy we’ve ever had, but I kind of love it because it just fits her personality. This girl forgot her wand by the birdbath she swam into so her wings would no longer be sticky, and it’s one thing after another with her, she’s like an agent of chaos. Her actions caused the goblins to get their hands on her wand and now her bee friend Queenie is hurt trying to protect her and get her wand back. 
And terms of how Ruby and Amber complement her, Ruby is so motherly that you can’t see her as anything but the eldest sister, given the way she instantly comforted Queenie and told her all these wonderful things like how brave she was for protecting Saffron against the goblins. And Amber’s the crafty one with all the solutions - I like how she was the one to mend Queenie’s wing, and how that also provided such an interesting piece of Rainbow Magic lore.

I also loved seeing the girls’ quick-thinking in this book! They were just so sneaky and had a solution to every problem, especially Rachel. 
  • Rachel being the one to remind Saffron that like, ‘hey you need to get your shit together because I’m not dealing with a world completely devoid of colour and warmth just because you wanna hang out with bees, you can do that your own time when the world isn’t in jeopardy, now get up.’ (Very in character of her.)
  • Rachel Walker the icon that you are. I would not have shoved a honey-covered fairy into my pockets, I really hope someone magicked her shorts clean.

I wanted to talk about the art and the goblins as well. There’s a simplicity to the old art that I think while I can appreciate, it just makes me laugh now. I don’t think you understand just how weird the goblins look! (The mini shadows of them running away while still arguing was pretty funny though.) Anyway, same as with Amber’s book, this is the only series where Jack Frost and his goblins should be viewed as villains. They actually did seem pretty scary and I thought their introduction was great! Current goblins are not like this at all. (However, I will say that I think Isabelle the Air Fairy’s book mentioned that fairy wands can do no harm, but maybe that was lore that they added later because the goblins in this book did cause harm with Saffron’s wand.)