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A review by kblincoln
Black Swan Rising by Lee Carroll
4.0
This is Urban Fantasy, and I totally see why people might compare it to Harkness' "Discovery of Witches", but really it isn't quite like that at all.
Garet James is in severe financial trouble, her father is in the hospital and is suspected of insurance fraud, and their recent acquisition of Pissaro winter snowscapes have been stolen.
Then she walks into a mysterious jeweler's store she's never seen before and agrees to open a mysterious silver box with the same swan seal as a ring her dead mother gave her.
Only opening the box will also open her eyes to the fae that live in New York. Garet must travel around New York physically and fae-wise in order to gain the information necessary from stopping the nefarious John Dee from his ultimate plan of chaos.
So this was fine. It was readable, the version of fae here, tied in with the elements with names like Obie Smith, Noam Erdmann, and Melusine were cool. The backstory of how Garet's mom ties in with John Dee and the darkly handsome Will Hughes was also fine.
But...goodness I'm not sure what my problem was. I never got into Garet. I never got into her luuuurrve for Will, and never felt the excitement or urgency of her encounters with John Dee.
Maybe its because everyone seems so matter-of-fact about everything? Maybe its because I felt so emotionally removed from Garet, she was just too...plainly Mary Sue in some ways. Or maybe the romance never took off with me because how little face time Will and Garet spend before being drawn to eachother.
I probably won't go out and seek the sequel, but I'd read it if I came across it accidentally at the library. As I said, the backstory and world building (and endless details of New York. If you live in New York you probably would love this book, it's very focused there) were cool. I just didn't connect with Garet at all.
This Book's Snack Rating: Sour Cream and Chive Lay's for the somewhat cheesy romance on a fae-dwelling New York love affair of a story with a slightly distant heroine
Garet James is in severe financial trouble, her father is in the hospital and is suspected of insurance fraud, and their recent acquisition of Pissaro winter snowscapes have been stolen.
Then she walks into a mysterious jeweler's store she's never seen before and agrees to open a mysterious silver box with the same swan seal as a ring her dead mother gave her.
Only opening the box will also open her eyes to the fae that live in New York. Garet must travel around New York physically and fae-wise in order to gain the information necessary from stopping the nefarious John Dee from his ultimate plan of chaos.
So this was fine. It was readable, the version of fae here, tied in with the elements with names like Obie Smith, Noam Erdmann, and Melusine were cool. The backstory of how Garet's mom ties in with John Dee and the darkly handsome Will Hughes was also fine.
But...goodness I'm not sure what my problem was. I never got into Garet. I never got into her luuuurrve for Will, and never felt the excitement or urgency of her encounters with John Dee.
Maybe its because everyone seems so matter-of-fact about everything? Maybe its because I felt so emotionally removed from Garet, she was just too...plainly Mary Sue in some ways. Or maybe the romance never took off with me because how little face time Will and Garet spend before being drawn to eachother.
I probably won't go out and seek the sequel, but I'd read it if I came across it accidentally at the library. As I said, the backstory and world building (and endless details of New York. If you live in New York you probably would love this book, it's very focused there) were cool. I just didn't connect with Garet at all.
This Book's Snack Rating: Sour Cream and Chive Lay's for the somewhat cheesy romance on a fae-dwelling New York love affair of a story with a slightly distant heroine