moonbasket 's review for:

Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett

5.0

adventurous emotional funny hopeful lighthearted medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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Emily Wilde is a low empathy autistic woman who is the romantic hero of her own story. This book is amazing and healing as an autistic person who has been through so much rejection. Watching Emily succeed and flourish and learn to love and be loved without losing or masking her autistic traits was the best part of this book. I loved the fairies, too, but feelings are where it's at for me.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Death, Gore, Blood, Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Ableism, Animal death, Confinement, Mental illness, Misogyny, Self harm, Sexual assault

Minor: Kidnapping, Grief, Alcohol, Classism

Blood, Injury detail:

Wendell is hit in the arm with an axe by Emily. He bleeds a lot and there is description of the injury. He is tended and lives.

Gore, death:

Wendell kills a number of common fae who were threatening Emily in a gruesome way by skewering them on a tree and then ripping them apart.

Animal death:

There are furs and skins, but the only animals that die on screen are a flock of ravens killed while helping revive the ice king. It is mostly upsetting because he revives them zombie-like and its gruesome.

Ableism: Emily is very autistic and has trouble communicating with others. This leads to people not liking her and some shunning her. Self harm:

Emily hacks of her own finger to break a magic spell.

Sexual assault, confinement:

Emily is unwillingly kissed by the ice king a couple times and then he promises to marry her and traps her in his castle for a couple months until she can be rescued. The kisses are perfunctory on his end, as is the prospect of marrying her. It's scary because he is powerful and magic not from a sexually threatening stand point.

Child abuse:

Emily stabs a changeling child in the chest with iron and interrogates him. He is not irreparably harmed, but it is surprising. Later she also interrogates him by burning and melting his favorite doll while he cries.