Title: Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries
Author: Heather Fawcett
Series: Emily Wilde #1
A pleasant surprise
Much thanks to Heather Fawcett, Random House/Del Rey, and NetGalley for allowing me to read a free ARC in exchange for an honest review.
This novel was a surprise to me. I’m not sure what I expected, but it wasn’t Veronica Speedwell with faeries. That’s a pretty accurate pitch. Emily was a more socially awkward and reserved version of Deanna Raybourn’s Veronica Speedwell. Framed as a starkly honest journal and everything. I could hear Angele Masters narrating. Which is perfectly fine with me!
I liked Emily. As someone who’s also socially awkward and would prefer to be left alone with her books, I found her very relatable and sympathetic. And she had a beautiful character arc—proud, cold, repressed, superior to….less so. Which sounds underwhelming but truly, her arc was great.
As for Bambleby….. First, I gotta get this off my chest. I hate the name Bambleby. My brain can only read it as either Brambleby or Bumblebee, and at some point while reading I got sick of stumbling over it and just starting reading it as Brambleby. Also, “Wendell Bambleby” sounds fae to me, and I can’t understand why he chose that as his mortal alias. Maybe not “Wendell” so much, but “Bambleby” just sounds silly. (Apologies to anyone with the name Bambleby.)
Aside from his name, I’m undecided how I feel about him. He was no Stoker, that’s for sure. On one hand, he’s annoying as fuck, always running his mouth and getting out of doing any work. I would NOT be able to live with him—except for the fact that he cleans and likes things tidy and cozy. That was a hilarious development! But at times I just wanted to take him by the shoulders and scream “Would you stand still and be serious for half a second?!” He’s like a lazy, smarmy, entitled teenage boy with ADHD. But then when you’ve nearly given up on liking him, he turns around and does something thoughtful or productive, or has an earnest conversation. He’s entirely self-aware. Thus my indecision. I’m not super fond of him, but I don’t dislike him, either. I admit he had a great line when he pointed out that “capable” is not the same as “inclined.” *slow clap*
I was shocked when he told Emily he loved her and asked her to marry him. I mean, it was obvious that he liked her beyond friendship, and that she was more fond of him than she was willing to admit, but then it suddenly went from 0 to 60 and I got whiplash. They hadn’t hugged, they hadn’t kissed, they hadn’t shown any signs of growing desire or love aside from their usual banter—then bam, marry me. I’m not against it, my point is just that as relationship development goes, this was poorly done. I have a very hard time imagining them married, but I look forward to watching their relationship progress.
(Though I really hated that he paraded his conquests in front of Emily. Maybe that’s me being prudish, but it just seems disrespectful to flaunt your very active sex life in front of the woman you’re secretly in love with. I can’t imagine how that was supposed to endear her to him. I understand the trying-to-make-her-jealous angle, but I don’t like it; that seems immature. So I suppose it suits him. *shrugs* Sorry, just something else I had to get off my chest.)
The other characters were great as well, but Poe was the stand out. He was so cute. I almost fell in love with Wendell on the spot when he healed Poe’s tree, but then he had to go be a dismissive dick after. I’m sick of bread, make me something to keep me warm in this godforsaken tundra! Hey. Don’t take your trauma out on little Poe, Wendell; he was last asked to make bread, so that’s what he did. If you wanted different payment, you could have been polite—even friendly!—about it. Just because he’s your inferior doesn’t mean he doesn’t deserve some common decency. Stupid whiny prince-king.
The beginning is well written from a narrative perspective, but some readers, including myself, may feel it’s slow because it takes a bit for anything truly exciting to happen. Otherwise the pace was pretty steady. Verb tense started to annoy me, always switching from past to present, likely confused by the journal framing.
I don’t mind stories framed like journal entries, though it niggles my skepticism (it is realistic to remember events in such detail?) Also, the writer has to be careful not to crush the tension. For example, if you begin a chapter by saying okay, it’s three days later and I’ve recovered so now let me relate what happened, then go on to describe a life or death action scene—well, the reader already knows the character survives relatively unharmed. It can be tricky to pull off, but it can be done.
The only aspect of the journal framing I didn’t care for was the footnotes. Made it feel way too textbooky, which was likely the point, but I don’t want to feel like I’m reading a textbook. I read the first couple and then just skipped them. One could argue that if the information is irrelevant enough to be relegated to a footnote, it should be removed altogether; on the other hand, it could be argued that if the author wants to include irrelevant information as a kind of bonus material, footnotes is the appropriate way to do so. I understand it both ways.
One thing that disappointed me was that the narrative was set in 1909, but other than the lack of technology and machines, you really couldn’t tell. Social and gender conventions weren’t noticably antiquated; there was a lesbian (bi? unclear) couple and no one batted an eye. Which is good, but not historically accurate. I kept waiting for Emily to say to hell with dresses because they’re too drafty in that climate (wouldn’t a bunch of snow get up the skirt as you’re trudging and climbing through huge drifts?) and ask Wendell to make her pants.
Jeez, I didn’t realize I had so much to say about this book. The last thing I want to mention is how well plotted it is! At first it seems like separate subplot threads and a slow burn main plot, but one by one they all get tied together and suddenly you’re like, holy shit, it’s all connected! At least as far as I can remember. That’s not easy to do; that’s exceptional writing.
Overall, I was pleasantly surprised by this book. Wendell’s personality leaves me wanting but I can hope he’ll continue to grow as a character; the journaling device can be tricky; and I would really ask that Fawcett embrace the historical setting; otherwise I really enjoyed this tale and look forward to book two!
P.S. – If you’re a Sarah Maas fan like me, you need to consciously set aside her faerie mythology in your mind. I kept anticipating the courtly fae here to be like Maas’s high fae—no, no, no. Different mythology. Do not expect a character like Rhysand to appear. At least not in this book.
