Emily Wilde's Map of the Otherlands by Heather Fawcett: Book Review

Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands by Heather Fawcett
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I glared. I’m afraid I have not gotten over my resentment of him for saving me from the snow king’s court in Ljosland earlier this year, and have made a solemn vow to myself that I shall be the one to rescue him from whatever faerie trouble we next find ourselves in. Yes, I realize this is illogical, given that it requires Wendell to end up in some dire circumstance, which would ideally best be avoided, but there it is. I’m quite determined.

Emily Wilde's Map of the Otherlands journals Emily's activities as she searches for a door back to Wendell's faerie kingdom while dodging assassins sent by his enemy, following the trail of long lost scholars, bonding with her niece and saving Wendell.

The Emily Wilde series has a lot of components I like such as women in academia, researching magic systems and mysterious faerie worlds, but overall does not work for me. The characters seem flat to me, mostly because all the character development and important revelations happen off-page - as I noted while reading Book 1 Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries too. I couldn't relate to the characters - which is surprising as I would usually understand needing to be bribed with a book to attend a work party!

The plot rambled a little, suffering from the middle book syndrome. Or maybe that was just the dazed journal entries writing style - we get neither a clear third person narration of events as they unfold nor a reasoned documentation of relevant facts and important events written with hindsight. This detracts from my reading experience and I couldn't get invested in the story. Character relationships too are mostly glazed over - I would have liked to see more of Emily mentoring Ariadne (who could have been any assistant, her being Emily's niece was too much of a coincidence) and more of Emily's growing relationship with Wendell. What we actually see is too little for any private diary and too much to be included in a scientific journal.

The world-building, is interesting, but less detailed than I could have wished. I generally prefer magic systems that follow rules and complex worlds to stories that rely on random spells and artifacts acquired coincidentally. They also keep noting interesting tidbits suggesting they still don't understand much of the faerie worlds - to be expected - but don't seem to get around to researching any of them.

Overall, I might recommend this to people who like light academia as a quick read, but I don't think I'll be re-reading this series.

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[Half a star for the premise and whole book; 1/4 star for the characters; Half a star for the story; Half a star for the writing; 1/4 star for the world-building - Two stars in total.]

Emily Wilde #1: My Review of Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries

Emily Wilde's Encyclopedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett: Book Review

Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Emily Wilde's Encyclopedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett follows Emily in the last stages of collecting material for her Encyclopedia, but soon gets drawn into the local people's and Faeries' lives more than her academic dispassionate self would like.

I liked the premise - the academic study of Faerie species, habits and worlds, supported by the world-building. The writing, last century Cambridge English also helped set vibes.

The characters however seemed two-dimensional and detracted from the book for me. Emily and Wendell were colleagues and friends before the story began. There were two or three revelations about Wendell, both personal and academic, that were nearly plot twists, if Emily hadn't already known or guessed them. So her reactions, her thoughts, the whole book even felt a bit flat to me.

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The rating is 2 1/2 stars, rounded up to 3 as I'm interested in the series.

[Half a star for the premise and the whole book; Half a star for the characters; Half a star for the story arc; Half a star for the writing; Half a star for the world-building - 2 1/2 stars in total].

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