Review: Faerie Tale

2 stars. I almost never, ever, ever, ever regret reading foundational horror - even if it's weird, even if it's dark, even if it's, well, kind of bad. In this case, I actually kind of relished falling into this odd, odd story every time I picked it up (life was chaotic this week). But ultimately this one felt really, deeply outdated - not in an interesting or fun way, in a legitimately annoying way. So much can fall under that criticism - the awkward dialogue, the unbelievable (busty, horny) female characters - or maybe not. Maybe it just isn't the best thing out there. And that's fine!

A move to the East Coast puts the Hastings family directly in the line of supernatural fire: the creatures and monsters of mythology and folklore are real, and they inhabit the land of their new home. One by one each member of the clan experiences strange and unusual happenings around the property, only to forget them later. Finally, one is taken, and the others must use ancient knowledge to bring him back. 

I am sorry for being grumpy about it; I realize that this is a classic and many readers have fond memories of reading it in the 80s. I just kind of couldn't be convinced, not with the clunky POV shifts, forced attempts at colloquial conversation, and contrived character "development." It took awhile too, I think, to get to the point! And unfortunately I didn't find it scary at all. A star was docked for, in this case, a UCD (unnecessary cat death). Was it just me, or was there a lot of self-insertion - several writer characters, for example? 

Still, I absolutely loved the premise, and the passage describing Mark's encounter with The Wild Hunt. Who doesn't love a good Troll Bridge?! All of the scenes describing supernatural encounters were super vivid and compelling. The climactic sequence was stunning. I feel like Feist really did his research into folklore - I recognized echoes of one of my favorite books of this year, The Broken Sword. That sort of thing is interesting to me and I was actually hoping for more of it. 

Idk! It was... interesting, at the end of the day.

Faire Tale on: Amazon | Bookshop.org | Goodreads | StoryGraph