The Goblin Market (Into the Green Book 1) [Kindle Edition]

Jennifer Hudock (Author)

Book Description

Beyond the Goblin Market lies the remains of a lost and broken kingdom divided by war. The war has been over for centuries, but the kingdoms still stand apart, overrun by a creeping goblin darkness known as the Darknjan Wald. It has been written that only one holds the power to destroy that darkness and reunite the kingdoms, but she has no memory of her former life.

Meredith Drexler must save her sister, Christina, from the wicked goblin king, Kothar, who has kidnapped the girl in order to convince Meredith to uphold an ancient commitment Meredith doesn't remember making. Sent Upland disguised as a human child, she has no recollection of her former faerie life, or her uncle's promised marriage betrothal to Kothar.

When she ventures back Underground in search of Christina, every step Meredith takes brings memories of her forgotten past back to the surface. As the pressures of her former life entangle with her quest to save her kidnapped sister, Meredith's predetermined fate is revealed. Will she embrace it, or walk away forever from a life she barely remembers as her own?


Now contains an excerpt from the upcoming sequel: Jack in the Green--Into the Green Book 2.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"At times (like during the description of the market itself), Hudock's descriptive prose borders on poetry in that you want to eat the words themselves."--Mur Lafferty --TOR.com

The Goblin Market has been a wonderful surprise--the light at the end of a dark tunnel made of dull books... It's a captivating adventure full of original twists, with very believable characters. --Louisa Klein--Lost In Fiction

Product Details

• File Size: 325 KB
• Print Length: 241 pages
• Simultaneous Device Usage: Unlimited
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
• Language: English
• ASIN: B004L2LL1A
• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• X-Ray: Not Enabled
• Lending: Enabled
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #398,593 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 21 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Potential, but poorly packaged March 29, 2011

By W. B. Kamffer

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

Let's get this out of the way: I have nothing at all against indie/self-published writers. In fact, I praise them, and say "Go for it!"

However, when one decides to self-publish, one needs to understand that she is responsible for everything. Sadly, while the story here was solid (though not fantastic, in my opinion), the formatting and editing left much to be desired. It took me almost three weeks to read this, when a book of similar length is good for two or three days. The reason it took so long was I could only take so much of the poor grammar and spelling or funky formatting before I had to put it down again.

If, however, you can avoid judging a book by its cover (or editing, as is the case--I actually like the cover art!), then you will meet with a decent fairytale that has all the appeal of a classic Victorian/Edwardian fantasy. The romance between Him and Merry seemed to spring far too quickly, but the author does a good job of conveying Merry's complete sense of bewilderment with her surroundings. There is a nice little quest motif holding this together as well, and the progression from one event to another was logical, if not always as well-paced as it might have been.

There is a great deal of wonderful description here, with resonant, evocative language, but this was sadly interrupted all too often by poor editing, so that it felt like a real roller-coaster ride from delight to frustration and back again. If you are more forgiving than I about formatting and editing, then I would definitely say pick this up. Be forewarned, though.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Magical, exciting read! March 3, 2011

By elita daniels

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

Sweets for the sweeties! Jennifer Hudock expertly lures her readers into an eerie, mysterious world, painting vivid imagery for the imagination. She knows how to provide information about her characters and the story in a very atmospherical way.

For the most part, the text flowed smoothly. I enjoyed the rich descriptions of the characters and the love, conflict, and anguish Merry feels as the tale unwinds. The author uses minute details to enrich the experience, making sensations and emotions real, captivating. There were times where I felt the effect was marred by overuse. However, the creativity of the world, and the well-paced storyline, kept my interest strongly.

The rich fantasy tale has a delicious sense of intrigue, and with the promise of adventure yet to come, the Goblin Markets is a novel that seduces the reader into hours of pleasurable reading and propels him headlong towards the last page, while the quality of the prose invites him to linger and savour the experience.

I wish I could put into better words just how fantastic this story is. It captured my imagination immediately. I will definitely return to its pages for the sheer pleasure of being immersed in the world again. The ending has left me craving the next book in this exciting series.

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Dark Fairy Tale for Grown-Ups January 29, 2011

By K. M. Sherrod

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

With a vividly imagined opening scene inspired by Christina Rosetti's eeerie and unforgettable poem of the same name, Jennifer Hudock's THE GOBLIN MARKET immediately captured my imagination and sucked me into the world of those good old folklore-tinged Grimm's Fairy Tales -- the scary versions. The ones in which the wicked queen is forced to dance herself to death; the ones rife with cannibalism and infanticide and true dread. While THE GOBLIN MARKET doesn't go to quite those extremes, it occupies that same territory, and even during its lushly romantic and often quite sensual scenes it bears that same hint of underlying dread and danger.

Meredith is an extremely sympathetic heroine, a woman whose youth has almost slipped away as she has raised her younger sister (their mother long dead, their father a disappeared deadbeat, it's just she and pretty little Christina against the world). When that precious sister is ensnared by the luscious fruits of the Goblin Market and carried off by Kothar, the scarred but compellingly handsome King of the Goblins, it falls to Meredith to try to rescue her -- and to learn a disturbing, tragic and magical truth about herself.

Her companion in much of this adventure is the enigmatic and wonderfully archetypal Him of the Green, an antlered wood god straight out of Anglo-Celtic mythology. I'll confess that I fell in love with Him right along with Meredith, and really, he's impossible not to adore, mysterious, helpful, calm and steadying, and deeply in earnest.

Hudock has a wonderfully vivid imagination and a considerable poetic gift, so the book is as much a scenic tour of the dark and the light versions of fairyland as it is a quest narrative or romance. The Darknjan Wald is delicously creepy; Kothar's castle and its inhabitants nightmarishly decadent; and the kingdom from which the riveting Him comes is as delightful as Lothlorien. Which is to say THE GOBLIN MARKET wears its sources proudly on its sleeve (it's hard to imagine anyone but David Bowie playing Kothar in the movie) but is far from a pastiche.

Still not convinced? Go have a listen to the podcast at [...] It's a pleasure to listen to, and she has offered it freely in that format, but I bet it will just take a chapter or two to make you want to buy the book and read it for yourself.

More About the Author

Jennifer Hudock is an author, poet and podcaster from Northeast Pennsylvania. She is currently offering her dark fantasy novel, Goblin Market, as a free podcast on her official website. She's had work published in a variety of magazines and journals, including Strange Horizons, The Watershed and eMuse. She had a short story appear in Library of the Living Dead's Book of the Dead zombie anthology, and has upcoming work to appear in two Library of the Living Dead Press anthologies. Her work is now available here on Amazon.com and Smashwords.com. For more information, visit her official website at http://jennybeans.net