Khanh, first of her name, mother of bunnies's Reviews > The Falconer

Faefever lite.

This was not a bad book, but I wouldn't recommend this to anyone who has read and loved the Faefever series unless you enjoy constantly being hit on the head with dueling comparisons.



It doesn't help that Kiaran's last name is MacKay. I couldn't help but chuckle every time I saw it. Also, Aileana...so similar to Alina.

The parallels are too obvious, and I felt that the setting, characters, and conflict are overwhelmingly shadowed by the superiority of the Fever series. There's also a very forced attempt at romance, the inclusion of an eye-rolling love triangle, and a horrendous cliff hanger. One of the worst cliff hangers I've read this year. The plot itself is fine, the writing is good, it was fairly enjoyable if you don't overthink things, but knowing me, I overthink everything, hence my less-than-ideal rating for this book.

The setting is 1844, a steampunk version of Scotland; it is but a pale version of steampunk, but I'll go into that later. Lady Aileana Kameron is 18, the daughter of a Scottish Marquess; currently she is embroiled in scandal, the subject of whispers and suspicious glares at every social event she attends. Why? One year ago she was discovered hovering, bloodied and traumatized, over her mother's corpse. Her mother's heart was ripped out from her chest. The official story is that Lady Douglas died from an animal attack; Aileana knows better. Her mother was killed by fairies.

From then on, she formed a strategic alliance with Kiaran, a fae, a sithichean daione sith, to get vengeance for her mother's killer. Neither knows the others' true purpose for hunting the fae, and their alliance is strictly business---until now. To complicate things, her father has returned to town, demanding that Aileana must choose a husband, and she's got no shortage of suitors---she's still a peer's daughter, his heiress, and with a plump dowry, after all. Conveniently, Aileana's former crush also returns to town from Oxford, possibly to rekindle the sparks of a romance...but Gavin has some secrets of his own. And further still, there's danger lurking literally beneath Edinburgh. Which is pronounced Ed-in-bruh, for you ignorant Americans out there *shakes fist*.

Parallels to Faefever:
- Death of a much-beloved relative: Aileana's mother's was killed by a fae

- Desire to wreak vengeance: Aileana's made it her mission in life to track down and kill the sith that killed her mother

- A newfound ability to see fairies: in this case, brought on by the flower seilgflùr

- Endangered when she is discovered: Aileana stupidly goes out to hunt fairies on her own, fairies (which are supposed to be invisible to the average human eye) realize that she can see them. You might as well paint a target on Aileana's head

- Girly-girl debutante transforms into deadly fae-killer: "For the briefest moment, I wish I was the girl I used to be. I’d wear frivolous white dresses and attend dances and never worry about anything ever again. But I had to destroy the girl who wore white dresses because she wasn’t capable of murder"

- Asshole: Kiaran, aka Jericho Barrons' more boring half-brother, who trains her, is mean to her, kicks her ass, and keeps secrets from her.

It’s just another blasted secret of his. I’m considering keeping a tally of all the questions Kiaran evades, so that when each answer is finally revealed at some incredibly inopportune moment, I can look at the count and remember how much he hides from me.

Kiaran is also seemingly V'lane's cousin's sister's son twice removed, because he has but a shadow of V'lane's sexual glamour. It's called being "faestruck." Instead of making you want to have sex with the fae on the spot...faestruck glamour will just makes your panties slightly damp.

Catherine grasps the sleeve of Kiaran’s frock coat, twisting the fabric to pull him to her, her eyes dazed. The faestruck will rip and tear clothing for another touch of a faery’s skin. She hasn’t reached that point, not yet, but any further contact with him and she might.

- Ability to sense an particular object: ‘You feel power. And you’ve sensed the sìthichean since the first one you ever saw, haven’t you?’

- Secret lineage

I don't know if it was intentional, if this book was intended to be a homage or an alternative retelling of Faefever, but the parallels and similarities are definitely there. It was a good book, but it is just lacking in comparison.

The Setting
The setting was just not well done. I neither got a sense of Edinburgh itself or of the steampunk elements within it. Really, there was absolutely no purpose for the setting, and I really don't know why this book had to be steampunk. The steampunk-ish elements of this alternate-Edinburgh was limited to horseless carriages, cool decorations at balls and society events, ornithopters (a Leonardo Da Vinci's version of a helicopter), machines that dispense hot beverages, and conveniently designed weaponry that will blast away an army of faeries with a push of a button.

The steampunk setting seems to be in place more to suit Aileana's hobby of tinkering, building machines, and designing custom tools than anything else. This book's setting, unlike the beautifully wrought dark atmosphere of the Faefever series, is but an afterthought. I did not find myself immersed at all, I did not lose myself in the surroundings. I did not get a feel of what made Edinburgh a place where humans and fairies coexist. It might as well have been the rich/poor areas of Detroit, Michigan, for the little thought paid to the descriptions of the book's environment. There was no sense of place.

The fae were very well written. There are many types, and they are very well described, some disgustingly rotten, others terrifyingly beautiful. I just wished that we had a beautiful, dark setting fitting of them, instead of the half-hearted quasi-steampunk scene we were given.

The Characters
Aileana: She didn't feel real to me, unlike MacKayla in Faefever and her amazing character development, Aileana just doesn't compare. Aileana was supposed to have turned from a gentle, happy society girl into a rage-filled, vengeance-minded cold-hearted fighter...but I didn't get any sense of her transformation. She was just too perfect, her transformation was told rather than shown. I understood her rage, her helplessness, her anger at witnessing her mother's death, but we were never clearly told how she has changed so much in that little time. We are given Aileana 2.0, we are never shown how she got there. We see from the beginning of the book that she is an ass-kicking heroine, but it feels like that's all she is.

Don't get me wrong, I loved the fact that she is unflinching in her quest for vengeance. She never, ever shies from killing an evil fae. Unlike some books featuring so-called "female assassins" who are scared to draw blood (which shall remain unnamed), Aileana is a determined killer. And I loved it, I loved seeing her kick, punch, stab, shoot. I loved seeing her as she slashes, disembowels, electrocutes. I just wished we saw more of her vulnerabilities as she became what she currently is. Her grief is also well-portrayed, to the point that at times, I said to myself: enough already. Yes, I am cold-hearted, but her extreme grief seems a little bit of an exaggeration.

Also, drinking game! Take a drink every time you read the phrase: "Crimson suits you best." Or not. You might get alcohol poisoning. Maybe take a sip of a beer instead.

Kiaran: Generic YA love interest. Really, I made a comparison to Jericho and V'lane, but the truth is, there is no comparison. Kiaran has no personality than that of the standard mysterious, ice-cold, unfeeling bad boy with a secret heart and a soft spot in his soul that only the main character can see. The alliance between Aileana (he calls her Kam) and Kiaran seemed...odd. There was very little about their history together in that very short year, we are not given much at all about their past besides the fact that Kiaran trains Aileana to be a fighter, a killer. Too little detail was given about their past to make their current relationship seem like anything but an alliance, and that is why their developing feelings seem so strange. I think Gavin says it best:

‘Is that right? The fellow teaches you to slaughter his own kind and you don’t believe that’s a wee bit worthy of suspicion?’

Gavin: The perfect love rival, with a twist. A really, really convenient and unbelievable twist. Gavin is perfect. He is a student at Oxford, he is Aileana's beloved best friend's brother. He is an earl. He is wealthy. He is understanding. Aileana has also been nursing aspirations of being the future Mrs. for a long time before she changed into a cold-hearted killer. Aileana needs a husband, Gavin is oh-so-very eligible. What's a girl to do? Why, love triangle, of course!

Side characters: Well-written enough to keep me interested. I wish there had been more written about Aileana's relationship with her father; they are so distant from each other, they have such a strained relationship, and it was painful to read at times. I felt very badly for Aileana for her father's continued disinterest in her, he is the very picture of an absentee father. Not uncommon, given the time, and given his status as nobility, who are expected to ignore their children, but I truly felt bad for Aileana for her father's neglect. I wish their relationship had been developed further.

I loved her best friend, Catherine. Catherine is beautiful, and unlike the trapfalls of having a beautiful best friend who exists to highlight the heroine's flaws, Catherine is absolutely lovely in character as well as appearance. I wish I had a best friend like her. She is so utterly supportive, such a calming influence on Aileana: a truly enjoyable character that I wish had been more involved in her life.

There is a little sidekick pixie named Derrick in this book. He exists to mend Aileana's clothes and to be an annoying little shit, it seems. I know Derrick is there for insertion of humor and lightness into an overall dark book, but personally, I wanted to snatch him out of the air and pluck out his wings. He is a nuisance more often than not, and he truly grates on my nerves. And he has a habit of getting drunk on honey that would put Winnie the Pooh to shame.

‘But your friend offered it,’ Derrick complains. ‘So she might not have explicitly said, “Derrick, please eat all of the honey in my kitchen,” but it was implied by the mere fact that she has a kitchen.’

Shall I mention the fact that that little phrase was uttered after his neglect almost got Aileana killed that night? Now do you understand why I want to commit pixie-cide?

The Romance : Not plausible. Why? I needed more background on them. Right off the bat, after a year of fighting together and little else, we see glimpses of Aileana's thoughts that signalled that she might fall for him. Inexplicable. Why now? Why all of a sudden? Aileana is not irrational, she knows that he's a killer, she knows that he's cold-hearted, for fuck's sakes, Kiaran kills his fellow fae without telling her why. They have never confided in one another as to why they're committed to their quest, their relationship has been strictly business-like, strictly student-mentor, so why does she start developing feelings now? Their conversations in the book are largely impersonal, more fraught with conflict than romance, there's not much bonding, so their feelings feel...forced. And really? In the middle of all this mess? Is it really a good time to start a romance?

He turns to look at me, and our faces are a mere breath away. Everything around me fades and blurs and my gaze drops to his lips.
Gavin’s voice sounds so very far away. ‘Get back, faery. Now.’
Bloody hell. I recoil from Kiaran, suddenly aware of what I almost did. My cheeks flush and my heart speeds up in embarrassment. I swear, I was tempted to kiss Kiaran, and in front of Derrick and Gavin, no less. What is wrong with me?

Yeah, Aileana. I don't know what's wrong with you, either.

Recommended to younger readers who want a fast-paced, action-packed fantasy, a brain-candy type of book. Not recommended for fans of adult fantasy, or those seeking more complexity out of their reading experience.