Reading Tidal Creatures felt like Seanan McGuire answered all the prayers I had after finishing Seasonal Fears. Some background information for those who haven’t read the Alchemical Journeys series (or my reviews of Middlegame and Seasonal Fears): Middlegame is one of my all-time favourite books, primarily due to the two protagonists Roger and Dodger. I never expected it would become a series. When Seasonal Fears was announced, I understood it to be more of a spiritual sucessor set in the same world of Middlegame. I prepared myself for little mention of Roger and Dodger. I was right to do so. Seasonal Fears expands the alchemical worldbuilding a bit further, but the new protagonists meant nothing to me.

So, I went into Tidal Creatures with a well-adjusted mindset, preparing for a book more in the vein of Seasonal Fears than Middlegame. But no! (This is where you should dip out of the review if you want absolutely no information about Tidal Creatures‘ plot and characters.)

Tidal Creatures features new protagonists Judy (who shares her body with an incarnation of the celestial goddess Chang’e) and Kelpie (who begins the story knowing nothing about her past and quickly learns more after she escapes from an alchemist’s lab). Tidal Creatures doesn’t try to recreate the characterization or relationship buidling that were so strongly present in Middlegame and absent (for me) in Seasonal Fears. But at least I found both Judy and Kelpie more interesting characters than Seasonal Fears‘ Melanie or Harry. Certainly it helps, for my personal preferences, that neither are framed primarily by a romantic relationship. But what truly excited me was the shift back to a focus on Roger and Dodger.

I was definitely screaming crying throwing up when Erin and Smita appeared. (Actually, I was clapping like people do on a sitcom when a famous guest start walks in lmao). I highlighted every single little reference to Roger before he’s actually named or appears himself on page. Tidal Creatures begins focused on Judy and Kelpie, but Roger and Dodger (and Erin!) play a much larger role in her story than they did in Melanie and Harry’s. Once they’re introduced, they remain part of the action. We even get a decent number of pages from Dodger’s POV, and learn a lot more about what’s next for her and Roger, and their relatiosnhip with the Impossible City.

I wondered for a minute if the structure of this series will be a bit like Wayward Children – some books focus more on Roger and Dodger, some books less? I can only continue to pray we get more like this. But, we’ve only got two books left in the series after Tidal Creatures: Inkpot Gods in 2026 and Asphodel in 2028 (source). You should have seen the look on my face when I saw the final book is titled Aphodel. I have some working theories about her, one of which is that she’s not actually dead, but I am currently revising that theory based on a few tidbits of info revealed in this book 👀

We’re working through the elements. MIDDLEGAME = Fire SEASONAL FEARS = Earth TIDAL CREATURES = Water INKPOT GODS = Air ASPHODEL = Aether

— Seanan McGuire (@seananmcguire.bsky.social) Mar 31, 2024 at 19:45
In addition to so much Roger and Dodger Erin, we get so much more worldbuilding! Look, if you’re all about the characters, then yes, they’re great, but for me there is no recreating the relationship from Roger and Dodger. So what I’m looking for with each new installment in this series is A) more of Roger/Dodger/Erin and B) more worldbuilding. Tidal Creatures offers a lot more concrete worldbuilding, including where/how Roger and Dodger fit into it all. Excellent, I was quite pleased by this. Also I think now that maybe I should reread Seasonal Fears to see if I pick up more on the worldbuilding in that volume. I do recall that reading Seasonal Fears, even if I didn’t love it, helped me better understand a few things in Middlegame, so perhaps Tidal Creatures will do the same for me and Seasonal Fears.

464 pages zipped by like nothing. I read this book in under 24 hours. I would read more chunksters if they were written like this! I adore the writing style McGuire uses in this series, which I find quite similar to the style of Wayward Children. It’s just so compelling, it never feels like a good place to pause reading so I just keep going. I don’t listen to audiobooks but I imagine the audio versions of this series would be *chef’s kiss*.

Now, I will be a little more critical and admit that yes, the plot structure feels quite familiar. The conclusion was a bit anti-climatic. But I don’t care much about that – I’m all about the characters with a good serving of worldbuilding with this series.

The Bottom Line 💭
If you loved Middlegame, or especially were a fan of Roger, Dodger, or Erin, then you need to pick up Tidal Creatures. If you didn’t care for Seasonal Fears and were thinking of dropping the series, PLEASE RECONSIDER. If you didn’t love Middlegame but you did love Seasonal Fears… 🤔 then I can’t relate and you’ll have to decided for yourself if you should read Tidal Creatures lol.

If you haven't read Middlegame in a while, I would recommend doing a quick refresher since this one depends on some knowledge from that book. Still great, but I do wish I had read the first more recently. Regardless, McGuire always treats character development with a special skill that few other authors seem to master. I love her writing and this book. Will definitely purchase for the collection!

_Tidal Creatures_ is a direct sequel to _Middlegame_, which I loved. I wish I had read it more recently before reading this one as it did rely on knowledge of the previous book to make sense. _Tidal Creatures_ is the story of Kelpie, an alchemical construct intended to help the alchemists harness the energy of the Lunars, manifestations of various lunar gods.

The story is engaging, with unexpected twists and turns. I really enjoyed it.

Thanks to Netgalley and Tor for the early copy of Tidal Creatures by Seanan McGuire. Below is my honest review.

The latest entry in the Alchemical Journeys follows manifestations of the moon goddesses from all sorts of cultures around the world. They follow the night sky over the Impossible City, shining their light over the City's residents. They also have their own special entryways into the Everything, providing paths to their Windows that let them perform their shining duties. Unfortunately, the alchemists have figured that out and are trying to find a way to use those moon goddesses to get access and claim the Impossible City.

Luckily for the rest of the world, a handful of misfits find their way to each other, including some major deals like, oh, the living embodiments of the Doctrine of Ethos.

I really enjoyed this one. It took a while to build, but once it did, we got to learn a TON about the alchemical world and met some really cool characters. I can't wait for the next one!

Definitely recommended, but please read the first two before picking this one up.

First things, first, I enjoyed this book a lot. I love this world of alchemy and the metaphysical and manifest gods/ideas that McGuire has created. I love the variety of characters, their different abilities and agencies, and that no one is truly safe. There is always a true edge of danger for the characters, which more writers need to have in their writing.

That said, this addition to this series is not as good as the first or the second book. I would say that unlike the second book, you really need to have read Middlegame in order to understand and follow this one. Also, I felt like this book spent a lot more time explaining the exposition/characters than actually showing the exposition. It really shines when it lets the characters lead, and (perhaps ironically,) the characters don't get to shine as much in this book. And while it is a lengthy book, part of why it suffers is that we don't get enough time with the villain of this particular book; the horror is there, but it's muted compared to the first two. The ending also felt rather anti-climactic, especially compared with the previous books. The beginning, though...that was a such a masterpiece of drawing you in to the story and the characters.

It's still great! Definitely earns its four stars; it is fascinating, disturbing, and creative the way I expect all of McGuire's writing to be, and she doesn't disappoint on that front. I hope she keeps returning to this world, because I'm here for it. If you liked either of the first two books, then you'll almost certainly enjoy this one.

As always, I found myself wishing the next book had already been written and ready for me to dive into.

Someone is killing off moon gods, and it's up to the remaining human incarnations of the lunar deities to find out who in Tidal Creatures by Seanan McGuire, the third of her Alchemical Journeys series.

Like the other books in the series, Tidal Creatures takes place in a world of powerful elemental forces that manifest themselves as human beings. Human beings who often find themselves hunted by the ruthless alchemists who seek to usurp their primal powers for their own. Such appears to be the case at first with the murder of the moon goddess Aske and her human host. But as other Lunars investigate Aske's killing, the truth turns out to be more complex and more sinister.

Unlike Seasonal Fears, Tidal Creatures is more of a direct follow-up to Middlegame, although it does take place after the events of both those books. Roger, Dodger, and several other prominent characters from Middlegame return, and unlike their brief cameo in Seasonal Fears, in Tidal Creatures they take a far more active role in shaping the plot.

Which I unfortunately think is to the book's detriment. Tidal Creatures introduces us to some genuinely loveable and compelling new protagonists: like Kelpie, an alchemically-created young woman with deer hooves, a tail, and bright orange skin. Or Judy, who is busy balancing the demands of being a full-time grad student and part-time moon goddess. Yet these characters and others are pushed to the side the moment the protagonists of Middlegame appear, leaving them side characters in their own narrative. Honestly, it makes me with Seanan McGuire would just go ahead and write the next story about Roger and Dodger that she so clearly wants to, instead of inserting them into what are ostensibly other peoples' stories within the same world.

Personally, I found myself let down by Tidal Creatures for the reasons above, although to be clear I did still enjoy reading the book. If you liked Middlegame and Seasonal Fears, you'll probably like this one too. Just make sure you temper your expectations accordingly before diving in.

Seanan McGuire always does a great job in writing interesting stories and characters that I cared about. It worked well overall and thought it was everything that I was looking for in the genre. It had a great story and thought it worked with everything that I wanted. I enjoyed that this brought us back to the Alchemical Journeys world and glad it had everything that I wanted from this type of book.

Moon gods, metaphysics, and sneers

Tidal Creatures is the third novel in Seanan McGuire's Alchemical Journeys series, or the seventh if you include the Up and Under books. The unifying principle behind the series is the personification of things that are not persons, objectively or scientifically speaking, such as the Doctrine of Ethos (Middlegame), Winter and Summer (Seasonal Fears), and now the Moon. Five of the main characters are Moon goddesses (Aske, Change'e, Artemis, Diana) and a Moon god (Máni). We also meet Kelpie, who is not in fact a Kelpie, but a personification of Artemis's Hind. Each of the gods/goddesses is in fact two persons -- a god/dess and an ordinary human whose body the two share. McGuire explains the relationship at length.

Roger Zelazny began his career by writing about thirty stories, which he sent to all the Science Fiction magazines, for which purpose he had made a comprehensive list. In this way he collected 150 rejections and no acceptances. He then sat down with all his stories, read them, and tried to figure out what the problem was. He decided that he was explaining too much -- that he would be insulted if an author told him so much, rather than letting him figure it out. So he stopped doing that, and immediately his stories began to sell.

McGuire knows this lesson. As a short story writer she is beautifully economical. But she seems somehow to have unlearned it to write Tidal Creatures. Unnecessary explanations of folklorical metaphysics go on and on.

But there was another thing that bothered me even more -- the sneering. I first noticed it when Judy (that's Chang'e's human) visits Prof Roger Middleton, and thinks this

"As she watches him, she realizes she doesn’t really know much about the man; she’s read his published papers, which are meticulously researched, and precisely as petty as any other academic work..."*

This amounts to an implication that all academic works are petty, and all equally petty. Once I started noticing the sneers, I couldn't stop. They're EVERYWHERE.

For instance, one of the main characters is Isabella, an hechicera. Isabella works with a circle of would-be witches who meet at the home of Catrina, who is one of them. Isabella seldom thinks of Catrina without a sneer. There are pages and pages of this. The problem with this is not that it diminishes Catrina -- we are meant to hold Catrina in contempt. The problem is that it diminishes Isabella. There are few point-of-view characters in Tidal Creatures who don't despise someone else and reveal that contempt in sneering thoughts.

The story is essentially a murder mystery -- moon goddesses are dying. (That's not a spoiler -- the publisher's blurb tells us "someone is killing them".) I think this could have been a rather good story. But the overexplanation and sneers really drained a lot of the fun out of it for me.

Thanks to NetGalley and TorDotDom for an advance reader copy of Tidal Creatures. Release date 4-Jun-2024.

*Quotes are from an advance reader copy of Tidal Creatures and may change before publication. This review will be corrected if necessary on the release date.

Tidal Creatures by Seanan McGuire, a fun read that ties back in to previous books. Which came first the moon or the moons avatars? who can say and how do certain people want to turn it to their advantage?

This is the third book in the series, and the first one that feels tied to Middlegame versus being in the same world as Middlegame. That means things go over my head occasionally but I enjoy them anyway.

There can be a sameness to the way the characters speak (across her books too; there's a length and structure that happens a little too often to feel natural to so many characters), but I'm used to it now. I have only two criticisms of the book, of which that is the major one. The other you'll guess when you read the book, and you should read the book.

I just flat out haven't liked the continuation of this series. I loved Middlegame. It is a near perfect book. (Except for the audiobook, narrated by Amber Benson, which is actually a perfect book and performance.)

That said, Seasonal Fears didn't work for me for a variety of reasons. I decided to give this one a try, and DNFed around 40%. McGuire's writing is truly overwritten at this point, with every sentence seeming to need an aside, an observation of the nature of the universe, or some sort of metaphor. All of the characters act like metaphors (even the ones who aren't). I still am annoyed that Seasonal Fears undid several major plot points from Middlegame.

I want to like this world and the magic system but I just can't. Unfortunately I just can't recommend this series to anyone.

Please, go read Middlegame. Then pretend the other books don't exist.