The Good Fairies of New York Mass Market Paperback – June 3, 2008

I read and review a lot of Indie authors on this blog, but I also read a lot of traditionally published authors as well. I also reread my favorite books, both classics and just best-loved. On Christmas Day, I picked up my copy of The Good Fairies of New York in order to reread a book that always makes me chortle, giggle, and sometimes laugh out loud.
The copy I have now has an introduction by Neil Gaiman. I will quote from him to give you an idea of what the book is about:
The Good Fairies of New York is a story that starts when Morag and Heather, two eighteen-inch fairies with swords and green kilts and badly-dyed hair fly through the window of the worst violinist in New York, an overweight and antisocial type named Dinnie, and vomit on his carpet. Who they are, and how then came to New York, and what this has to do with the lovely Kerry, who lives across the street, and who has Crohn's Disease and is making a flower alphabet, and what this has to do with the other fairies (of all nationalities) of New York, not to mention the poor repressed fairies of Britain, is the subject of this book. It has a war in it, and a most unusual production of Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and Johnny Thunders' New York Dolls guitar solos. What more could anyone desire from a book?
This book originally came out in the early nineties and my original copy did not have the introduction from Mr. Gaimen. Martin Millar is well-known in Britain both for his Lonely Werewolf series and for the Thraxas series (under the name Martin Scott). For some reason, he is not as well known in the States and that is a shame because he belongs in the respected author grouping of Terry Pratchett, Douglas Adams, and Neil Gaiman. Maybe it's his covers, I don't know, but Martin Millar has a style all his own. Some people don't like it, but the rest love it. There seems to be no middle ground here.
There are a lot of Celtic stories and music here as well as musical references to early punk rock. The New York street scene is well-drawn as well as the Scottish countryside and people.
Here is the opening of the book to give you an idea:
Dinnie, an overweight enemy of humanity, was the worst violinist in New York, but was practicing gamely when two cute little fairies stumbled through his fourth-floor window and vomited on the carpet.
"Sorry," said one.
"Don't worry," said the other. "Fairy vomit is no doubt sweet-smelling to humans."
I highly recommend this (and all) of his books. This one is a quick read; trust me, it will make you laugh.

I ended up having a truly remarkable experience with this book that was almost spiritual. It involved a car, some pain pills, an unknown disease and my mother's voice. I have decided to revel the whole story here, even though it is quite personal so that readers may gain an understanding of exactly how special this book is.

I started reading "The Good Fairies of New York" in the car on the way to school when I had a terrible headache and my mother was running into the pharmacy to get me some pain pills. I loved the first chapter so much that on her return I read it aloud for her, intending to continue on reading by myself. But when I finished and stopped vocalizing the words she protested. "Don't stop there" she said, "this is great!"

So I read on. When we weren't in the car she would read to me. Progress was slow because our schedules conflicted, neither one of us was willing to cheat by going ahead alone and every now and then we would stop to remark on how amazing the book was. Then, sadly but truly, we forgot about the book for a while.

We forgot because I got sick, really sick. Like Kerry, the silvery-blue haired woman determined to make an ancient Celtic flower alphabet and win a community arts prize despite her crone's disease (only that's not what I have.) Confused, in a lot of pain, drugged and scared about what was happening to me we turned back to the book.

This time just my mother read. Whenever I was particularly depressed, or in so much pain I wanted to die or terrified that no one was ever going to figure out what was wrong with me, she would whip out the cheerful orange-cream sunset colored novel and read a chapter or two.

Through the adventures of Heather and Morag, two Scottish thistle fairies who landed in New York after being chased out of Scotland for desecrating sacred clan objects (among other things) and ended up with two humans-Dinny a loud, fat and mean bad fiddle player and Kerry, bent on revenge on her old boyfriend, I laughed. Tulip and Petal, prince and princess of Cornwall's fairy kingdom which their father Tala was turning into an industrial dictatorship and the friends who helped them escape living in Central Park always cheered me up. The endless coincidences surrounding Magenta, a bag lady who seems to think she's a Greek general, were something to ponder. And there's more.

For a relatively short book this has a complex plot and a huge cast of characters and somehow it all fits so well together that I can just imagine the author sitting up for days and nights making flow charts and diagrams as how to wrap it all up so perfectly.

By the time we'd reached the end (about eight months after we started) I even had a diagnosis. Call me crazy but I attribute this in part to the magic of this book. The perfect, crazy, hair die, rock and roll, inter racial, sacred, clannish, love, flower filled, whisky flowing, punk, homeless, artsy, Celtic, Italian, Chinese, Goninan and New York magic which flowed from every word in this book and out my mother's mouth.

Needless to say I recommend you read this out loud with someone you love. Failing that, try not to race through it because a book like this comes around once in a lifetime and the first reading should be savored.

Stars? This book doesn't need any stinking 1-5 star scale. It is a sky filled full of them.

This is actually the second time I have bought this book. I could not find my other copy, probably loaned it to someone. I like to reread books and this one is one of the good ones. I also want to think the bookstore I got this from because they were so prompt in sending off the book and it was in exceptional used condition at a reat price.

I absolutely loved this book, it was quirky, fun and unpredictable. I found myself laughing out loud quite a few times reading the exploits of these crazy fairies - how can a person read about a drunken fairy with a bad hair dye job picking a fight with another fairy over a fiddle and not laugh? I truly enjoy books that allow me to suspend belief and just read...not straight-out sci-fi; but a good blend of fantasy, sci-fi, humor and drama, this book delivered on all fronts. Of course this is not Neil Gaiman (duh), but I definitely agree with his forward 100% - this is a great find by an author who knows how to properly weave a story. I didn't feel like Millar was just making up a tale, but was just relating something to the reader that'd really happened. If you enjoy Tom Robbins, Neil Gaiman, Christopher Moore, Terry Pratchett, Tom Holt and the like, you'd probably enjoy this book, too!

The characters have interesting silhouettes, but never seem to quite get fleshed out enough.
The combination of the latter and the abrupt transitions between scenes (which I attribute to an attempt to convey the attention span of the faeries) mad it very difficult to get into.
My own stubbornness, and the original recommendation of a friend to read this in the first place, anre the only reaons that i finished.
A very sweet tale, otherwise.