Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for providing an eARC to me in exchange for an honest review.

This story, I found, was rather cute if only from Abbie’s point of view. This story does switch back between both her father and Abbie’s point of view and to be honest with you, the father’s perspective was really hard to sit through. There really seemed to be a lack of emotion on his part beyond the fact that his only daughter was missing and there’s a changeling in the house trying to get to his life force.

I really would like to have bonded with Dan a lot more and understand his point of view and his lackadaisy attitude towards getting close to his old Hunting buddies and many of the other side characters in the Otherworld. I get that Abbie is a child so maybe she has blended in a little too much, but I did find that Otherworld interesting and I would like to see the consequences of their actions in this first book.

As much as it seems that I ragged on this book, for the nuggets that I did like, the ideas and concepts are really solid. I wasn’t quite sure what the theme of the novel is right now but perhaps the future volumes would enlighten it more. It’s a fun little novel and even though it was pretty hard to get through, it did set up a lot for the future volumes that I am absolutely looking forward to. Definitely give this a chance and hopefully, you can connect better with the characters than I could. It’s a fun little magical adventure that I wish was allowed to ruminate a bit longer, but again, maybe in future volumes, there will be more elaboration.

A fae-inspired children book for those who want to relax and have a comforting read.

The story is about an 8 year old girl who accidentally got pulled into the Otherworld through a portal beneath the pond in the woods near her house, thanks to a stranger dressed in leaves. What happened next includes a journey to the land of Winter to return home of Abbie and a father's effort to take back his daughter from a land he couldn't step into by himself.

This was an enjoyable book. But only it and nothing more. You got to see a group of creatures roaming the land of faes and faeries, with the sole purpose is to bring the girl back home. It's a fairly quick read, which an adequate amount of crucial scenes. But I suppose I wanted the main character, Abbie, to be more challenged, than to let herself be protected by the people around her like she is a princess. In a sense, she is, but making her a princess snowflake beat the purpose of being a protagonist, which is probably why her chapters were quite boring, comparing to Wodan's.

This book no doubt was written for kids. But I can't help thinking the author's choice of words was a bit off. Some lines felt too generic, some details were poorly narrated. It is a missed opportunity, since the Otherworld holds a lot of magic elements with potential eye-watering visions.

Overall, nice quick read. Not sure if I have learned anything from this beside the fact that the main character's not .

3/5 stars!

What initially drew me to this book was the title and the cover. It's such a lovely cover, and this story delivered on the fantasy theme! However, I found the story a bit too simplistic for a YA, which is how the author meant to classify the novel (it seems like a middle-grade!).

Plot
○ Eight year old Abbie is out in the forest with her dog one day, when she gets to a pond and gets pulled through the water to another realm! She meets a boy called Foster, a Summer fairy and finds out that she has been transported to the Otherworld. This is a classic fae-folk land, with creatures such as pixies and goblins. She wants to do everything to get back home.
In the meantime, the real Abbie is replaced by a changeling. Her mother does not realise, but her father Dan knows something is wrong. He's putting everything on the line to save his daughter.
○ The story follows two points of view- Abbie and her father, trying to get back to each other. Abbie's perspective felt more like a middle grade because we see the world through an eight year old's eyes. Her father's perspective had darker themes. I found myself being more interested in the father's perspective, because I felt like it had more depth than Abbie's.
○ The plot was very fast paced in Abbie's parts too, which made me enjoy it less. Abbie and her companions had some seemingly random encounters on their journey that didn't really interest me. The plot was just too simple.

Characters
○ I can't really say a lot about the characters because we didn't get a lot of time with them. I thought Dan was a very interesting character, but in the end we didn't learn that much about him. I can't really say I cared any of the side characters.
○ I do hope that the author develops the characters more in the rest of the series, because I think there is a good foundation! I just want to know more!

Writing
○ The writing was fine and easy to follow, but I had a couple issues. First off, the author used dialogue tags a bit too often for my liking. Secondly, I was sometimes confused about the perspectives in Abbie's POV. This is because we would suddenly get a glimpse of Foster's feelings and thoughts, while I think we are supposed to be in Abbie's head. In the meantime we don't get thoughts/feelings from any of the other side characters. It's just a bit confusing. There was also a bit too much telling vs showing.

Conclusion
If you are looking for a short, simple fantasy read filled with magic and a dual POV, this will be a good novel for you. However, there isn't much depth to the story or memorable characters.

Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for this ARC in exchange of an honest review.

I can't express how much I enjoyed reading this book from the cover to the last page and even the acknowlegements were well written. I mean that it was a fantastic well- paced story and the reader finds him/herself hooked by the progress of the events and the actions until the end. Each chapter was captivating, you can't put it down because we are curious to know what is going to happen to Abbie, does her odyssey in fairyland will end well?

A little girl who finds herself in the faerie world, a world that we all as kids we dreamt about visiting but at the end home is always best.

This was an amazing discovery and what made me like it was the author writing style. J.H. Meissner is a good storyteller that I would like to read her other works.

I would like to say a huge thank you for sending me a copy of this fantastic book for review. I was so drawn to the gorgeous cover of this book, and the inside didnt disappoint either. I was a little unsure of reading from such a young protagnsists perspective, but all the characters were written so beautifully and i look forward to reading more books by Jane!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for the free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. My opinion was not affected by the free copy.

I requested this even after seeing a lot of people complaining that this read more like a middle-grade book than something for YA. I don't entirely agree. I personally don't think that a character needs to be a teenager in order to appeal to a teenage audience, nor do I think any other YA clichés (especially the romance) need to be present. While this book does feel a bit more whimsical in places than some modern YA, it also has some darker moments too. The older readers will probably be more engaged in the B plot following the father, and maybe they'll also enjoy the A plot following Abbie through the fairy world. The younger readers might not find the B plot interesting enough and skip over it to focus on Abbie.

Since I'm older than both those demographics, I can only say how I felt about reading it. I admit I disengaged fairly early on once the father's plot started, though mostly because it felt like it lacked emotion. Certainly he had emotion for his daughter but it felt very dead when concerning his wife. That made it harder for me to want to invest in his story since it felt to me that he wasn't even that invested. I guess I was wanting to see more of a moral dilemma with him, agonizing over saving his daughter versus the threat of the changeling in his home. I can appreciate the darker tone and what the father was willing to do; I just wanted more. It could be that the intention was to make him detached and a bit more morally skewed, but I still would've liked more thought process than him instantly going along with what was needed to help his daughter.

I'm not entirely sure why this book needs a sequel. While I feel like everything was maybe a little too neatly wrapped up, I don't think anything needs to be added to the story. Would I like to know more about the world, especially the father's past? Maybe, but there are lots of books that leave questions unanswered and that's perfectly fine. I do feel like stuff is missing, but that's more to do with character emotion and motivation.

The debate on whether this book is middle grade or YA doesn't matter to me. I think either group could enjoy it because the book seems to ride the line between them, providing something for both. I liked the stuff with Abbie and her father, but I only lost interest because I didn't feel the emotions coming through strongly enough to invest in the whole story.

This was a really delightful book that had me smiling many times throughout Abbie's journey. I worried for a moment that we might get stuck with a cliffhanger, but the plot resolves in a way I felt was both a satisfying and rewarding conclusion. The characters were wonderful. This is a lovely world brimming with magic that draws on various mythology, which makes it very easy to identify with - but that also includes little twists to standard lore that makes it new and special.

I would personally be very hesitant to classify this book as YA because doing so could create false expectations that might lead to readers giving this really sweet story less stars that they normally would just because the book was potentially marketed to the wrong audience. The disclaimer on NetGalley that this book was classified as YA but has an 8 year old protagonist is actually one of the reasons I was curious to read it because I recently wrote another review for The Golden Compass (which has an 11 year old protagonist / also very young for YA). The age rating for TGC was originally 12+ up but it was lowered to 10 which is, in my opinion, way too low because of the graphic violence and mature themes in that book. (See my review on Goodreads @CandiceJarrett for specifics)

However, the comparatively mild violence combined with themes popular in MG that are in Fae Child, especially the themes of friendship, a child discovering magic is real, and the longing to reunite with one's parents, are much more similar to Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone - both of which are middle grade. In the case of the latter, the Harry Potter series started out MG but evolved into YA. I know that the author plans to continue this series as Abbie grows up, and my suggestion would be to allow Abbie to grow with her readers. (ie. start out MG with this book and evolve into YA for the later books) Because when you contrast this ultimately sweet fantasy story about an 8 year old who wants to reunite with her parents with popular YA books like The Hunger Games, Caraval, Scythe, Twilight, etc., there's just way too big a gap. I feel that marketing toward the wrong audience could hurt this book's success. Obviously, I'm not an expert. Disclaimer. Disclaimer. Yada Yada. This is just my opinion. But it's food for thought.

The last bit I wanted to include in this review is that the eARC I received for kindle had some formatting issues. Line breaks were missing from some paragraphs and between lines of dialogue that made it confusing to tell who was speaking when, and I caught a few typos like "Her the gold of her eyes intensified..." Obviously the first "her" shouldn't be there. Also "On the wedding day, the pledge between Alpha and Oberon truly broken, the wolves..." it should probably say "when the pledge... was broken" or "the pledge ... being truly broken" or something like that. It tripped me up because I felt like a word was missing there.

Again, I received an eARC (YAY Thanks NetGalley and InkShares/Quill for the eARC in exchange for an honest review <3) ) so perhaps these issues with formatting and minor edits will be fixed before official publication.

Ok, I know this was a SUPER long review. Thanks for staying with it if you read this far. To sum it up, I thought this was a very heartfelt story, exciting plot, and I really loved the world building. Looking forward to the next book in this series.

This book was not my thing. I had high expectations for it and really like the premise of the books evolving with the MC age. But, I just didn't connect with it.

Tws: mild violence
*Thank you to the publisher for giving me an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

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3.5 Stars (rounded up) -
This was an absolute delight to read! The magical world of the Fae was so vividly described and explored in such detail that I felt like I'd been transported along with Abbie. It was so easy to become immersed in the world-building and swept up in it's many mysteries, the sense of awe and wonder even more pronounced as the reader viewed it through the lenses of an eight year old girl.
Abbie and Dan were both interesting characters to follow, though I found myself enjoying the story from Dan's perspective a bit more simply because I was desperate to know more about his connection to the Otherworld. I also really appreciated seeing things from the parent's point of view for once, especially since it feels like fantasy books rarely allow the parents themselves to participate in the adventure. The blending of parental worry and nostalgia for his former glory made Dan a fascinating character to follow and a prequel about his glory days is something I would not mind reading. Just saying.
All that isn't to say Abbie herself wasn't great too! I loved how, despite being curious and brave, she still felt very much like a child. She was bold, but still appropriately frightened and hesitant. She threw tantrums and was sometimes unreasonable.
That being said, however, I felt a bit underwhelmed by some of the other characters. Gwyn, Charles, Foster, and Nadiene were all characters that I loved the concept of, but ultimately felt like weren't fleshed out enough to feel as invested in as I would have liked. Although I think there are advantages to keeping a story short and concise, I think this book would have benefitted from another 100-150 pages in order to accommodate having so many main characters. I felt especially disappointed in Foster since he went from feeling like a secondary main character to just one of the crew by the end, barely participating.
I also do feel that, if this is going to be marketed as a YA book instead of middle grade, the writing was a bit too juvenile - which isn't too say it wasn't well-written, but it did not feel like it was adjusted to a teenager's reading level (regardless of the darker themes, which I think children can handle as long as it's not excessively bleak and violent.)

Overall, this was a very charming book that l thoroughly enjoyed, even if I did want a bit more from the characters. I'm really excited to read the sequels and to see Abbie all grown up!

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for a review copy of this novel.

So....this one was a miss for me. HOWEVER. I do not think it was a bad novel. Both perspectives were pretty jnteresting (Though I felt more interested in the Father's POV).

This would be really good beginner fantasy, it reads really young and is simple to follow.

This was a really lovely tale. I enjoyed the chapters alternating point of views between 8-year-old Abbie in the Otherworld, and her father back at home. I found myself wanting to know more about the father's history and the politics of the world. I could see this translating to the screen very easily, as the land of the Fae sounded beautiful and alluring. I'm giving it a slightly lower rating because I think I would have enjoyed it more as a younger reader, but I am still curious what will happen to all the characters in the next book.

I DNF'd this book. Saying that, I think it's important to remember that consuming any form of art is a subjective experience and what one person doesn't vibe with someone else may love. I just wasn't giving with this one. I think maybe formatting had a little bit to do with my trouble, but mostly I just wasn't able to get into the story. Thank you for the opportunity to review.

To be honest, I was disappointed. I was drawn into this book because of the title and that gorgeous cover art. And when I read the description, I was preparing myself for a magical fantasy adventure. What I got instead was more like a rushed children's novel. I acknowledge that I might not be the target audience as a 20-something (and I am not gonna get into the whole YA discussion about this book) but I can tell that this novel was something caught in-between. I mean, I was the most intrigued by the father’s part of the story (which I had an issue with his name: Dan Brown. really?) For the rest of it, it just didn’t click.

I can tell that this book has a wonderful premise and the “idea” behind the story is marvellous. I guess the construction of it just didn’t work for me.

This was an intriguing premise, but I really wouldn't classify this as YA. I understand that the protagonist is going to age through the series, but the narration still sounds like something aimed towards children most of the time. I wasn't too bothered by that as I read books for younger readers somewhat frequently, but if I were an actual YA reader I think I'd be thrown off by a book claiming to be YA that focuses on a young girl and a grown man with such a strong, almost didactic at times, narratorial voice.

What a delightful, magical read! > < This is the first time I've ever read a book by the author, and that beautiful cover and my love for any story related to fae wouldn't let me miss the book Xp.

Fae Child is an imaginative story inspired by folklore and classics, with some fairytale touch that enrich the world-building. It also reminds me of fantasy series I read when I was a teenager like Iron Fey seires and Wings series, which both feature faeries in those books.

However, there is still room for improvement. Probably bc of the length of the book (it's only 200+ pages), I feel that it could add at least 100 pages or more to provide more informations about the story setting and further characters' depth. The characters are likeable (surprisingly, I was more intrigued by Dan's chapters than Abbie's, despite she's the one missing and having adventures in fairyland Xp), but sometimes during my reading they felt a bit flat as the plot going.

I wish I could care more about what will happen to these characters and get to know them more. Hopefully I will have my satisfaction in the next book and its sequel. Precise rating would be 3.5 stars.

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.

Lovely mashup of magic and traditional folklore.
Absolutely loved this.👍
Looking forward to more books by this author.
Thanks to Inkshares publishers for the e-ARC.

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