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ian_barr 's review for:
The Fairy Bargains of Prospect Hill
by Rowenna Miller
Solid 3.5 stars.
This sort of book isn't my usual kind of read, but I picked it up as I was looking for something with humans dealing with fairies, and it didn't disappoint in that. Mostly.
The plot was a bit meandering at times and there were whole chapters where I was left wondering why they were included at all. The feminist overtones were a bit heavy handed at times, and there could have been half as much description of period appropriate clothing.
But despite all this, the book does offer what the title promises: bargains with the Fae. And while the trading trinkets to the wild with little rhymes before the inevitable face-to-face bargaining with a fairy takes place was neat, I just wish we had gotten to the magical adventure meat of the novel much sooner instead of wading through Perrysburg society, bad marriage, divorce proceedings, the couple strange side plots which had no real bearing on anything, before we finally came the heavily foreshadowed twist. Pretty much the first thing Imogene warns Alaine about is that they'll trade for your firstborn child if you're not careful and then she frets about that fear a few times before Delphine accidentally bargains away her sister's first born child... Which didn't necessarily make sense to me; the child is not Del's, she should not have been able to use her in a bargain to begin with, but I guess that's just my opinion
Anyways, aside from its faults, this was an enjoyable read. The parts where Delphine was in the Fae world had me devouring pages. It was well written, an interesting twist on a Fae world I've never really seen before, and gave Del a neat redemption arc where she gets to step out of Alaine's shadow finally. Well done.
This sort of book isn't my usual kind of read, but I picked it up as I was looking for something with humans dealing with fairies, and it didn't disappoint in that. Mostly.
The plot was a bit meandering at times and there were whole chapters where I was left wondering why they were included at all. The feminist overtones were a bit heavy handed at times, and there could have been half as much description of period appropriate clothing.
But despite all this, the book does offer what the title promises: bargains with the Fae. And while the trading trinkets to the wild with little rhymes before the inevitable face-to-face bargaining with a fairy takes place was neat, I just wish we had gotten to the magical adventure meat of the novel much sooner instead of wading through Perrysburg society, bad marriage, divorce proceedings, the couple strange side plots which had no real bearing on anything, before we finally came the heavily foreshadowed twist. Pretty much the first thing Imogene warns Alaine about is that they'll trade for your firstborn child if you're not careful and then she frets about that fear a few times before Delphine accidentally bargains away her sister's first born child... Which didn't necessarily make sense to me; the child is not Del's, she should not have been able to use her in a bargain to begin with, but I guess that's just my opinion
Anyways, aside from its faults, this was an enjoyable read. The parts where Delphine was in the Fae world had me devouring pages. It was well written, an interesting twist on a Fae world I've never really seen before, and gave Del a neat redemption arc where she gets to step out of Alaine's shadow finally. Well done.