Today is week one of our Rosemary and Rue readalong arranged by Lisa from Over the Effing Rainbow.  I’ve been looking forward to reading this and I’m hoping it’s going to become one of my new favourite urban fantasy series.

The schedule is as follows and it’s definitely not too late to join in so go and grab a copy – or if you’re already read it dive in with the comments:

Week 1: Saturday 9th January, Chapters 1-6, hosted by Lisa at Over the Effing Rainbow
Week 2: Saturday 16th January, Chapters 7-14, hosted by moi at Lynn’s Books
Week 3: Saturday 23rd January, Chapters 15-20, hosted by Anya at On Starships and Dragonwings
Week 4: Saturday 30th January, Chapters 21-End, hosted by Over the Effing Rainbow (still me!)

All are welcome to join in and there’s a discussion page over on Goodreads if that makes it easier to join.  Without further ado here are the questions and answers with a word of warning that spoilers will be lurking below:

1. So, first impressions time! What do you think of the book setup, first of all? Setting, magic system, Faerie in general?

I’m really enjoying it so far.  There’s no messing about but straight in with that very interesting prologue and then fairly quickly into the fray.  I’m not new to urban fantasy so it’s pretty easy to fall into this world which has a lot of characters and magic that already feel familiar and yet also seem to stand on it’s own two feet.  This is my first Seanan McGuire book and I’m finding her writing very easy to get on with and the pages are turning with great ease.  I do enjoy reading books with fae and so it feels like a welcome revisit.  I’m particularly fascinated by  Tybalt, King of the Cats and his sparkly emerald eyes!  Not sure he’s entirely trustworthy – maybe that’s the appeal huh!  The whole fae world here feels full of hierarchy, politics and prejudices, which isn’t necessarily a new theme but is nonetheless interesting to fall into again and I must say that Toby’s narration is very compelling.

2. Now let’s take Toby Daye herself. We get to see some of how she’s grown up and how she fits in, or doesn’t, in the modern world as it is post-fish. What are your initial thoughts on her?

What an opening!  I was totally dismayed – I mean of all things – turned into a fish!  She missed so much, lost her family, her job, her home.  It was so cruel.  I was thinking about her family and in particular her daughter.  I wonder why Toby opted for this human existence in the first place and I’m hoping that’s going to be explored further.  Plus, I wonder how she thought she would keep up the facade for ever anyway?  She’s not a pureblood but she does still live longer than regular humans doesn’t she?  Now, presumably her daughter is a changeling – I wonder if she had a visitation from the fae at a certain time/age?  It opens up a lot of train of thoughts along a similar vein and I’m hoping to discover more.

3. We have yet to properly meet certain characters (Devin and Sylvester), though we’ve gotten brief intros to others (Tybalt and the Queen of the Mists)… Who stands out for you among these secondary characters, and why?

Well, I think Tybalt is very interesting in a sort of mysteriously sexy and dangerous type of way.  He feels like he’s going to be one of these characters who pops up and tries to woo Toby – or maybe he’ll pop out of thin air when she’s in need and assist her after which she’ll owe him.  I don’t really know but I strongly suspect we’ll see more.

The Queen of the Mists was sort of how I would expect a fae queen – all imposing and almost horribly beautiful.  I was very curious as to why she wouldn’t help Toby.  It seemed that she shared a special connection with Evening after all.  I found that puzzling and was trying to think what was going on in her head at that particular point.  Maybe she’s too full of grief and not helping or talking about it is like denial – but I doubt it and it makes me a little bit suspicious.  Not that she had a hand in the murder but maybe that there’s more going on here – and clearly I haven’t a clue what!  And what is this key??

Evening is also a puzzle to me – I couldn’t help thinking that in her hour of need she seemed to sit in her home making calls to a changling who supposedly has less power than her?  That was a bit of a mystery.  I wonder how much help she thought Toby could be exactly or whether she wanted to share some information with her.  Curiouser and curiouser.

I definitely think Toby is going to be one of the characters with a lot of development throughout the series and a lot of revealed secrets maybe.

4. Toby has a murder mystery to solve. Any initial thoughts on the whodunit?

Like I said above – I have no clue and it just feels too early for even me to start making wild guesses.  Although I do wonder if the two critters from the prologue will enter the story again – they both seemed like rather nasty pieces of work.  Plus I wonder what they had to gain by tricking and transforming Toby?  They didn’t kill her – so maybe they had instruction not to do so and this was the best way of taking her out of the picture for a while.  Surely she’s missed quite a lot in the world of fae over the past 14 years.

Looking forward to next week already!