Thanks to the publisher for providing an eARC of Fae Child in exchange for an honest review.

I know other reviewers have mentioned it, but Fae Child has been appearing on the Teen/YA sections of a handful of review sites when I'd honestly categorize it not even as middle grade, but as a children's novel. I still finished it, but I feel a lot less equipped to talk about it since I don't read a lot of kids lit.

Basically, our 8 year old protagonist Addie is out with her dog one day when she's pulled through a lake portal and into Fairy Land (think more Mab, Oberon, and Tatiana than Tinkerbelle). The book switches between focusing on her trying to get home and her secret elf father realizing she's been replaced with a changeling.

While the book was technically alright, I'm not sure how well the father's sections would play on the child audience I'm assuming this was meant for. Most readers who want to follow 8 year old protagonists as they explore a magical world don't also want to focus on a grown man navigating Fairy politics and debating whether he should let his wife get murdered by a changeling for a chance to get his daughter back.

Therein lies my second issue with Fae Child. I was obsessed with fairies when I was in what I consider to be this book's actual target audience and researched them at any given opportunity and the whole concept of changelings absolutely terrified me. I don't think writing a creature who the narrative makes very clear may kill Addie's mum who does so through shows of affection is a particularly good thing to expose kids to. I get magical monsters are needed in books like these, but making that monster one who could look like anyone in your life who will slowly kill you if you show them affection doesn't seem like the smartest thing to teach kids about.

This book was such fun. I love all the characters. The magic system was really interesting. I enjoyed how the author combined traditional folklore with elemental magic. I'm really excited to read the next book in the series.

This is a lovely story for kids and adults alike: a eight-years-old girl goes on an adventure when she goes through a portal to a Fae land, befriends a Summer elf and many other characters that we'll get to know and that will help her (or not) to go back to her real home.

The characters were really good and their voices are really distinguishable, the narration is beautiful, the descriptions are very visual. It presents us with known and unknown elements, but that we'll get to know while reading the book. For example, inside the story there's a scene (that I loved!) with a Peter Pan retelling; I didn't know almost anything about Fae mythology, yet the author gives us little details that are in no way an info dump introducing us little by little and until the very end.

The only thing I didn't like (but it's minimal) it's the repetition of a couple of scenes. For example,. Abbie's father watching the changeling sleeping next to his wife, thinking about separating them yet not doing so and going to the kitchen to make food, or the two times the Fae land group had to be careful to not make themselves known yet Abbie started a snowball fight with Foster to automatically be told to stop since it wasn't a good time to play.

Anyway, this book is beautiful and I can't wait for its sequel. That ending 😱 it automatically got into my physical wishlist.

The story is beautiful, I love reading about magical worlds and it is something that I would have loved to read as a child. The only bad thing I found was that I felt that the plot progressed very fast or was abrupt with certain scenes, but it is a fabulous book, entertaining, with interesting characters and with an adventure that has you immersed in every page.

I highly recommend it for any age and for anyone who likes to read fantasy

I requested this book because it was labelled as YA but I don't think I'm the target audience for it. When I'm reading a book that is labelled as YA I'm expecting certain things, like:
- a teen main character
- character growth
- romance, usually
- some kind of intrigue, especially in fantasy settings

This book does none of these things, and I honestly think it's a middle grade book instead of YA.

Eight-year-old Abbie Brown suddenly finds herself in the land of the fae when the reflection of a boy that she sees in the pond yanks her through to the other side. The portal closes behind her, leaving her stuck in the Otherworld while a changeling takes her place by her parents' side. Dan, Abbie's father, notices the change in Abbie and finds himself calling on long ignored friends and mythical creatures to find his daughter. Meanwhile, Abbie must make her way through the lands of Summer and Winter to find one of the portals that will take her home.

So as a middle grade, I think this will probably appeal. It doesn't change my rating because I personally didn't enjoy it much as much as I thought I would, but that has more to do with wrong expectations to begin with and then a general lack of maturity in the story itself. Dan's parts were slightly more interesting and have a bit of that intrigue I usually enjoy, but the very young age of our protagonist makes the story itself pretty tame. But for kids who are looking for adventure and excitement with a bit of magic, I think this is a fine read. It has a few nods to other, well-known fantasy stories which I definitely would've enjoyed at that age.

i really enjoyed this read, it had a great fairy tale element going through the book. The characters were great and I really had a fun time reading this.

Many thanks to NetGalley for providing an ARC in exchange for an honest, unbiased opinion.

We begin our tale with Addie and his dog Sam prancing aroung the woods of her house. Soon after Addie is pulled into the land of Fairy by a strange child, a soon-to-be forest guardian, and so our journey/adevnture to return home begins.

Along with Addie and a band of misfits that soon become her allies on this journey through the land of fairy, we get to experience Dan's POV. Dan, as Addie's dad, is in the works of figuring out how to get her girl back home while having a few secrets of his own.

I felt this was a really fast paced, cute read, suited for a middle grade audience. It was a really interesting world to dive into, with a lot of Shakespearean influence to the world of fairy, a little bit of whimsy and many familiar elements of the fairy realm we so adore.

However due to the shortness of this book , I feel there was a lot of telling and explaining the world in a tale kind of way instead of actually discovering it through our main characters eyes. This do not affect the enjoyment or cutness of the book is just a point that I wanted to bring forward.

Unfortunately I couldnt quite connect with either of our main or side charaters, although I did find Dan's background really interesting and wished to have known more (maybe in future books?) I do belive it had to do with the voice of this novel, in my opinion, being more suited for midlegrade than an adult.



Overall I would say I do recommend this book if you want a fun, fast paced story about faery, and if you where thinking this book might be the perfect book to introduce someone, specially a kid, to this kind of fantasy stories I would say you are totally correct.