Customer Reviews

Except the Queen

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

In _Except the Queen_, two faerie sisters, Serana and Meteora, accidentally learn a scandalous secret about the faerie queen and let it slip. For their transgression, the two women are separated and banished to mortal Earth to live among humans. They are completely adrift in this new world, and if that weren't bad enough, their new human bodies are old and overweight.

I think _Except the Queen_ is meant - at least in part - as an exploration of aging. Most of us don't get magically zapped into older bodies overnight, true. But I think most of us feel sometimes like our aging bodies, with their aches, pains, and gray hairs, aren't really our "true" bodies. We still feel like the same person we were at 16, 18, 20, so who is this stranger in the mirror with the crow's feet? And I think we all feel disconnected, sometimes, from the new generation of young people: their slang, their fashions, etc.

Unfortunately, in _Except the Queen_, this alienation sometimes seems to tip over the line into "Kids These Days"/"Get Off My Lawn." Kids these days use the F-word and the S-word. Kids these days party too much. Kids these days get tattoos! I'm not sure, at 32, whether I'm supposed to side with the older women against the young hooligans or whether I'm supposed to feel like a hooligan myself.

I'm also disappointed that the Latino character's Spanish is wrong. I don't mean slang. I mean using "ustedes" to refer to a singular person, that kind of thing. It's strange, because this would have been pretty easy to research and get right.

Most problematically, the plot just doesn't have a lot of forward momentum, at least for me. The prose is beautifully crafted, but the story is not keeping me turning pages.

This is really a "DNF-for-now" rather than a "DNF-forever." I've greatly admired both Jane Yolen's and Midori Snyder's work in the past, and on the strength of that work and of the lovely writing in _Except the Queen_, I think I'll probably give it another shot someday. Maybe the second time will be the charm.

Except the Queen is a beautifully written tale with a myriad of viewpoints, a twisted and engaging plot and a satisfying conclusion.

I've read several sidhe/Fae tales and I'm pretty familiar with the basics most authors employ when describing the realm(s) of the Fae and the remarkable creatures that inhabit them. Sometimes this familiarity leads to boredom and much rolling of the eyes, but the ink spilled from the agile pens of Ms. Yolen and Ms. Midori managed to keep the lore of the Seelie and the UnSeelie fresh.

There are many disparate voices offered in this book and all sorts of POV formatting [switching from 1st person to 3rd person omniscient to straight up 3rd person and so on] so the plot takes a little time to get into... however, it's well worth wait.

Initially chapters read like misshapen puzzle pieces but eventually the pieces snap together and a clear picture of all players' intentions and their significance is unveiled.

Our heroines are definitely of the "unlikely" variety - a pair of Seelie sisters who are gossipy and concerned only with fun. They are flawed, biased, selfish, frightened and heartwarmingly real. One of my favorite aspects of the novel is how the authors manage to reveal the foundation of unshakeable loyalty and love between the sisters despite all their hardships.

Naturally, with "real" heroines, the villains are "real" bast- jerks and made out of the parts of nightmares.

And finally, even the character(s) in need of saving aren't always loveable either. IMHO, this just adds another special dimension to the overall tale.

I'd call *Except the Queen* an exceptional literary work. If I were a professor [alas, I'm not] and I had a class [of course I don't] - I'd assign this book because there are a lot of intelligent themes and artistic strands to admire and analyze. Guess I could always start a book club...

Bottom line... I had a really hard time putting Except the Queen down. The novel is a serious page turner that still managed to leave me feeling completely satisfied [when I read books too quickly I sometimes feel like I've overeaten, you know?]. Even though I'm happy with the ending as everything was neatly wrapped up, I definitely wouldn't mind if the authors collaborate to publish another installment. I'd love an occasion to revisit the Yolen/Midori Fae world once more.

The other reviewers have given you the plot basics so I'd just like to say that this a powerful, and yet very sweet, work. The characters and their relationships to one another sing! I am amazingly happy that these two wonderous authors have collaborated. They make me think of Charles de Lint's urban fantasy but with their own unique voices. A must-have for fairytale lovers.

My, these two play well together! I'm joking of course, anyone who's ever done any knows that writing is hard work and takes dedication, it's just that these two writers really meld their considerable talents together seamlessly in a way that seems like enchanted play. It hit absolutely all the right buttons for me: the faery lore was authentic, it made great use of herb lore & magic, it wove the far different worlds of Faery and contemporary America together in a way that felt like a balm to me, for our cement and iron cities feel like they could never touch the healing green, and yet maybe, just maybe. Also, as a middle aged woman myself, I couldn't help but relate to Meteora and Serana's plight with their new/old and very different bodies, though at least I've had time to grow into the reality of my own! The sisters adjustments to 21st century life added moments of unexpected humor, as the reader gets treated to just how strange our world looks and sounds, and the details we understand without even thinking of them (like the stamps that must be affixed for a letter to be taken by "Eagle mail" made their understanding and learning all the more real.

To me this novel is every bit the equal of the best of Charles deLint, but without any sense of borrowing; their voice and tone in this is very much their own. I think the first thing I ever read by Jane Yolen was a long time ago in a collection of short faery fiction edited by Terri Windling. Yolen's piece was titled _The Thirteenth Fae_ and as I read it, I quickly realized I was in the presence of a master of the genre. She sets a tone with language that makes you swear she must be working with something other than words alone. Such is the case here with _Except the Queen_. The language is fermented in some fae decoction that just took me away. Though I don't know quite how they divided the work, the blending of ideas and tone is flawless. This book is one I will read again, just to perhaps discover how they did it, though I don't think for a minute I will -- it's a faery touched work for sure, and I'll bet I'll only be shown as much as they want me to see.

Overall, quite a treasure for lovers of fae or urban fantasy.

Dawn Killen-Courtney,
author of _The Trollton Chronicles_

The two Fae sisters, Serana and Meteora accidentally uncover a secret that at a minimum would ruin the reputation and credibility of the Fairy Queen. Before they can react, the pair loses their magical skills and looks, separated and exiled to Earth.

Serana lands in the strangest world she has ever seen, New York City; Meteora likewise feels the same way about Milwaukee. Serana meets a homeless boy who suffers from dark apocalyptic visions; Meteora meets a young girl with an incredible tattoo on her neck that could only mean an artist with magic powers who wants to kill the beholder of his work. Soon all will conjoin as the mortal and Fae realms are threatened with total destruction.

This is a great urban fantasy with an atypical feel to the story line that enhances the otherworldly tale. Fast-paced from the onset, fans will welcome the siblings as each struggles with adjusting to the world of the mortals. The sisters make the thriller work as their adaptation is slow and before they can partially adjust, they are caught up in a save two realms scenario. Jane Yolen and Midori Snyder team up with a winner as fans see New York and Milwaukee through the eyes of "political immigrants".

Harriet Klausner

I sat up until two o'clock in the morning finishing this wonderfully crafted story. I have long been a fan of Jane Yolen, and this collaboration with Midori Snyder didn't disappoint.I absolutely fell in love with the two sisters and how they adapted to their changed situation. We had little time to understand their character before they were exiled, but they must have been compassionate in the land of fairy for them to bring those qualities with them to the world of humans. While I found Baba Yaga's explanation of the "f" word hysterical, it does prevent me from recommending the book to my middle school students. Having just finished The Sisters by Nancy Jensen, where two sisters are separated and never get back together, the way the sisters in Except the Queen found each other and worked to help each other was very satisfying.

I am just going to say that this book just blew me away!! And I can't believe it is not in all of the stores. So go grab a copy and read it!!

I think that this is a great book. Two sister fairies, Serena and Meteora, are banished from Greenwood because they have embarrassed the Fairy Queen. Both fairies are very old, but they still live like twenty year old nymphos. They see their queen in a compromising position with a human male. The queen banishes them from Greenwood after they let her secret slip. The Queen turns them into older, overweight women and removes all of their magic. They learn how to live in the human world with their small magics, but the unseelie court has something brewing in the human world.

I think that this book is well-written and never lulls for a minute. I understand why the three-star review did not finish the book. This book gives a positive light to living a quiet life and not a very positive one to partying college students. However, I felt the characters in this book. Also, there was never a slow moment in the book. The characters turn from shallow fairies into old women with depth and skills and personality. It follows their personal journey.

When Meteora and Serana get cast out of the faerie realm of Greenwood and shoved into aging mortal bodies in the modern world, you've got you expect that things will be interesting, not just for the characters but also for the reader. Banished from their home not even for a prank but for knowing too much about the Queens secrets, they have to do their best at making their way in a life that's difficult for those who have been brought up to it, let alone those who are used to something quite dissimilar.

Naturally, this leads to a whole host of humourous misunderstandings, both linguistically and culturally, made worse by the fact that they aren't plunked into this world together but instead sent cities apart. Aside from having to adjust to the annoyances of aging bodies that don't work half as well as they're used to, the sisters experience shocks at the way people will casually fling about vulgar curses without a care, misread "Co-op" as coop and wondering why there are no chickens running around, and send letters to each other by pigeon until they discover the baffling system of postal service, which they refer to as "eagle mail." You can't help but chuckle at what they get themselves into and how they misinterpret all the little things we take for granted.

But this book isn't all fun and games, and it takes a look into the darker side of the faerie realm and fey natures. Interwoven with Meteora and Serana are the stories of Sparrow, plagued by nightmares and unknowingly marked by an UnSeelie fey as part of his blood tithe, and Robin, son of and slave to an UnSeelie fey who's spent his life at his father's beck and call, thinking himself no better than a dog. Their stories weave in and out and around each other like ribbons on a Maypole, making the story rich and intriguing, and brings everything together at the end in a convincing and satisfying way.

Which, is we discover, is exactly how it should have been all along. It goes without saying that things aren't always as they appear, especially when you're dealing with the fey.

The style and pacing of this book is flawless, fascinating, and as an introduction to these two authors, I can safely say that my curiosity has been piqued enough to make me want to check out what else they've done. If it's even half as good as Except the Queen, I think I'm bound to enjoy it. With its dark background, mythological interest, and sense of humour, this book is highly recommended to fans of urban fantasy and faeries.

Sisters Meteora and Serana are exiled from the Court of the Fairy Queen, without their magic and are made aged. (Well, they are aged, but they never noticed it.) They are sent to Milwaukee and New York City, and there they must learn to cope without what made them special. Each of the sisters finds a person needing her help, a young girl who cries every night, and a young man, a fiddler, who is lost.

This is an unusual and delightful urban fantasy novel, for though it takes place in the present, Meteora and Serana's perceptions and misunderstandings are not of the here and now, but of the Greenwood, from whence they came.

"I glanced down and gasped, seeing for the first time what had become of me. Gone was may slender torso, the small hard breasts, the flat belly. Now I was stolid and thick-waisted, my breasts pendulous. My thighs had spread like yeasted bread, and creased over my knobbed knees. I lifted my hands, cried out at the web of blue veins, and the little gold rings embedded in the swollen flesh of my fingers."