Fey Enchantments

Fairies have come a long way, baby.  It's not all Tinker Bell style when it comes to reading about the land of the fey in current titles for young adults & older-there's urban faerie, as popularized by Holly Black (co-writer of The Spiderwick Chronicles) & Melissa Marr, for teens; for adults, Laurell K. Hamilton & Karen Marie Moning have created suspenseful novels with more mature content.  On her website, young adult author Cassandra Clare (who refers to her novels as "urban fantasy") sums up the genre thusly: "I wanted to write something that would combine elements of traditional high fantasy — an epic battle between good and evil, terrible monsters, brave heroes, enchanted swords — and recast it through a modern, urban lens. … In fairy tales, it was the dark and mysterious forest outside the town that held the magic and danger. I wanted to create a world where the city has become the forest — where these urban spaces hold their own enchantments, danger, mysteries and strange beauty.”

I am a diehard fan of Laurell K. Hamilton's Meredith Gentry series, eagerly awaiting the next volume in the series to publish. In the interim, one of my reading challenges this year is Book Soulmates' ifae challenge. Earlier this year I read  Rosemary & Rue by Seanan McGuire, Wicked Lovely by Melissa Marr, Lament: The Faerie Queen's Deception by Maggie Stiefvater & Ash by Malinda Lo (all young adult books), & I'm trying to get back into it to finish the final 6 of the 10 books I need to read to complete this challenge.  Also consider:

Young Adult Fiction

Eyes Like Stars by Lisa Mantchev

Fairy Tale by Cyn Balog

Wings by Aprilynne Pike

Wondrous Strange by Lesley Livingston

Extraordinary by Nancy Werlin

Faerie Wars by Herbie Brennan

The Faerie Path by Frewin Jones

I Was a Teenage Fairy by Francesca Lia Block

Fiction

Darkling by Yasmine Galenorn

Eccentric Circles by Rebecca Lickiss

Ink & Steel by Elizabeth Bear

The Ladies of Grace Adieu & Other Stories by Susanna Clarke

Steward of Song by Adam Stemple

The Tooth Fairy by Graham Joyce

For all sorts of items about faerie, including humor, art, poetry, juvenile films, comic books & Fairyopolis, try searching in the library catalog using the subject heading "Fairies".

Of course, looking up titles for this post just led me to more books I want to read, as usual.  Next on my list: Lost Voices by Sarah Porter.  It's mermaid fiction!