Apparently, the faeries snuck one last gift into my bag before we left the Twilight Realm.

Rating:  4.89 out of 5 nasty, allergy-inducing sachets of marsh magic.

The newest October Daye book, Night and Silence, is so amazeballs that the faeries gave it to me in hardcover.  SO AMAZEBALLS, YOU GUYS!!!  Things happen.  THINGS.  REVELATIONS.  I thought Of Things Unknown was world-altering, but this book takes things EVEN FURTHER.

And so, I’ve decided to review it here rather than at Goodreads.  I may even make this a second Halloween Month tradition — besides my usual spooky book posts, I may also review future October Daye books here.  We’ll see.  You can still find my previous Toby reviews at Goodreads.

Anyhoo…

The non-spoilery gist is that, on top of dealing with the aftermath of Amandine’s cat-napping, Toby gets a sudden visit from her estranged ex-fiance, because, apparently, her daughter’s been kidnapped AGAIN.  And in Cliff’s eyes, Toby is the prime suspect.

Of course Toby takes the case, but it turns out this kidnapping is much more complicated, and Gillian’s step-mother seems to be hiding some important information.

And then ish really hits the fan, and in order to save Gillian, Toby and her allies have to bend the rules of Faerie even more than usual.

Ok, right, that sounds pretty standard for a Toby adventure, but YOU GUYS IT’S NOT.  IT’S AMAZEBALLS.  AND THE TAG-ALONG NOVELLA IS ABOUT SELKIES.  JUST THOUGHT I’D THROW THAT IN THERE.

But don’t read it until you read the main novel, because spoilers.

A few random, non-spoilery things I loved:

• This Toby-Tybalt moment:
  

  I sighed.  “Remind me again why I missed you?”
  “Because I am the only man who adores you as fully as you should be adored, covered in blood or no.”

  .

• This Toby-Luidaeg moment:
  

  “Stop,” she said, not unkindly.  “You’re chasing the tide again, and you’re never going to catch it.”
  “Excuse me?”
  “Your head.  It’s got its own undertow, you know, and if you swim too deep, it can suck you down.  You can’t chase the tide.  You need to stay on the shore and let it come to you.”  She shook her head.  “I’m not going to tell you that everything is going to be fine.  I wouldn’t do it even if I was still allowed to lie.  Such things are too cruel even for a sea witch.  But I will tell you that what’s on the other side of that door is never going to be as bad as the undertow in your own mind.”

• That Toby recognizes some of her own prejudices, which developed as she became more Fae.
  .
• The further major insights we get into why the Big Three left Faerie five hundred years ago.

A few non-spoilery things I didn’t love:

• I do not buy that Toby would have avoided getting Sylvester’s help, for as long as she did, in the search for Gillian.  I’m pretty sure I know Toby better than that by now.  She would have used every resource she had, grudges be damned, to get her daughter back.
  .
• I’m getting really frustrated with the Luidaeg’s ongoing grudge against Liz Ryan.  As I explained in more detail in my review of In Sea-Salt Tears, their fall-out happened on a two-way street.  Liz’s “betrayal” was based on a major lack of information.  The Luidaeg was hiding some majorly important facts, and whether that was by choice or by geas, she really shouldn’t have blamed Liz so severely for the choice she made.  Liz isn’t the real enemy here.  She’s not the one who truly betrayed the Luidaeg in the first place.  She’s not the one who should be so broken and full of self-loathing.

Overall

This book was super fast-paced, had mind-blowing revelations, and gave me much deeper insights into my favorite characters and their world.  Plus, selkies.

If you’re already a Toby devotee, and would like to see me squee over the more spoilery details, follow me to page 2.

Open roads and kind fires…