Reviewed by Marieke

TITLE: Faerie Riddles

SERIES: Daily Dose, A Walk on the Wild Side

AUTHOR: Cassia Rose

PUBLISHER: Dreamspinner Press

LENGTH: 59 Pages

RELEASE DATE: May 31^st 2016

BLURB:
Alastar Connors’s studies of the changelings who live in the forest beyond the Great Iron Wall have been greatly aided by his friendship with the mischievous Gadhar. As a faerie creature, Gadhar’s soul takes a frightening shape, but he’s always behaved as an eager-to-please puppy around Alastar. When an intimate moment leads to an unexpected revelation, Alastar fears he may have jumped to some ill-informed conclusions about his friend. In his attempts to fix the misunderstanding, Alastar stumbles into the kind of trouble that even a quick-witted changeling might not be able to get him out of.

REVIEW:
Alastar is studying changelings not only for his work, but also because he’s truly fascinated. On his first trip into the Blighted Forrest he met Gadhar, a changeling who has taken on the shape of a big dog. They’ve become friends and Gadhar always finds him when he gets past the Great Iron Wall. He shows him all sorts of things and leads him to a changeling settling. Alastar returns frequently now, and all the changelings know he’ll ask hundreds of questions and writes them down. They indulge him in his curiosity, they also try to show him their ways and explain how their souls and bodies change shape.

Gadhar is always running around with Alastar, either as a dog or as a freckled human. He makes Alastar solve his riddles before he answers questions, mocks him a little here and there, and generally has a good time. He likes Alaster.

This time, when Gadhar escorts Alaster home, he steps into an old rusty nail. Iron is poison for changelings and Alaster rushes to help Gadhar. But a small piece of nail is stuck and Alaster smuggles Gadhar inside the Great Iron Wall, into his room to remove the piece. There he finds out something about Gadhar that freaks him and they have a fight.

When I started this book, I had to read the first page twice. I just couldn’t get the feel and meaning of it. But after that the story became enchanting. Alaster is sweet, curious and fun. Gadhar is strange and mysterious, but fun. You sense that they both like each other a lot, but it’s all from Alastar’s POV. There are a few things that bug me about Gadhar but that’s kind of the point. He’s very secretive and something’s just not right. But what?

Well, you’ll find out eventually. But even when I did, it was all still a tad fuzzy and unclear. The author probably knew exactly how this world works and who is who, and what is what, but to me it was pretty vague. I did like most of the story, even if it didn’t all make sense. What I didn’t like––at all–– was the open and unfinished ending. Not even really a happy for now, more like a cliffhanger. That sucked!

So that’s the reason I didn’t give it a higher rating; too unclear and no happy ending.

RATING: 

BUY LINKS:

Dreamspinner – Collection

Publisher – Single Story

Amazon – Single Story

ARe