Changeling, by Delia Sherman

[coraa]

And now, a palate-cleanser in the form of a book I plain loved.

Changeling, by Delia Sherman

Neef is a thirteen-year-old mortal changeling, the human half of the human-for-faerie swap that happened when she was too young to remember. Though there are many changelings in New York Between (the parallel New York inhabited by supernaturals from all the cultures that make up New York City), Neef is the only Changeling of Central Park—in part because the Wild Hunt of nasty, brutish, anthropophagic faeries make Central Park their home. Neef is protected from the Wild Hunt by the word of the Green Lady, the Genius (in the sense of "spirit of a place") of Central Park. But when she runs afoul of the specific, complicated, and unforgiving rules of the supernaturals, she must embark on a nigh-impossible quest... with help only from her rather peculiar faerie changeling counterpart.

I enjoyed this book tremendously. It's YA (or perhaps middle-grade? I'm not so clear on the boundary between those) urban fantasy, where by "urban fantasy" I mean the older Charles de Lint/Bordertown/War for the Oaks school, not the newer vampire boyfriend school. Furthermore, it's one that acknowledges the multicultural nature of the USA, which means that there are not only pooka and selkies but also rusalka, tengu, hu hsien, talking animals, moss women, and kraken. And that's not even counting the Fictional Characters who have enough spiritual presence to show up. I love this type of urban fantasy, so that immediately pleased me.

The other thing that immediately pleased me was Neef herself. Neef is smart, determined, cheerful, and likable; it was a pleasure to spend a couple hundred pages with her. She screws up, but in ways that I found sympathetic, not in ways that made me roll my eyes. And when she screws up, she rolls up her sleeves and gets to work fixing it. I liked that she was a girl/young woman protagonist for whom going on a Quest was a perfectly natural option, and I liked that she was perfectly willing to take it on.

Something else I liked, but it's near the end of the book, so, spoiler cut:



I adored that she didn't have to leave New York Between at the end of the book. Too many 'human in fairyland' stories end with the conclusion that Magic Is Not For Mortal Adults and send the kid back to the mortal world at adolescence, sadder and wiser. Not so this one! Neef meets her changeling counterpart, a faerie girl living in the mortal world, and they both conclude immediately that they're happier where they are, and they get to stay there! I have a particular hate for "you belong in the place you came from" conclusions, and so I loved this ending for turning that on its head.

I also, more generally, liked the slightly unusual take on the faeries. One of the traits often attributed to supernatural creatures (not just faeries) is a kind of obsessive interest in precision and rules. The rules may not be fair (there's a folklore about a woman who accidentally rubs her own eye with faerie ointment, and ends up able to see the faeries; in the end, the faeries poke out her eye, because she's not allowed to see them: 'it was an accident' is no help), and they may be somewhat bizarre (as in the legends of vampires who can be stopped by throwing a handful of pebble sin their path: the vampire must stop to count the pebbles before he can continue), but they're rigorously followed. It's not a theme I see much in faerie fiction these days, as faeries-who-break-rules are generally seen as wild and exciting, whereas rule sticklers not so much... but I loved seeing it here, and I loved the way it both started and resolved the plot, as Neef got into trouble by breaking a rule she hadn't been told about and got out of it by exploiting a loophole in the rules set for her Quest.



Anyway. I have to make one brief caveat: Neef meets the faerie half of her changeling swap, and the faerie-girl-who-lives-among-mortals has behaviors that look like OCD or autism-spectrum to me. This is mythologically supported (many supernatural creatures are described as having compulsions or as socializing in unusual ways, and the changeling's behavior is explicitly tied to those myths), and I think it's handled very sensitively and well (the changeling is portrayed as happy and content with herself, not broken or in need of saving, and indeed she is as much responsible for saving the day as Neef is), but I know some people have issues with "magical disabilities." Still, aside from that, I'd thoroughly recommend this one. It's quick, light without being shallow, genuinely funny in places, and just plain delightful.

Comments

[ironed_orchid]

Delia Sherman read from this at Worldcon, and said she choose to make the changling swap be somewhere on the autism-spectrum because when she read about fairy behavior in folktakes, the similarities occured to her, and she wanted to draw it out in a story.

I plan to read it in the near future.

[coraa]

I definitely recommend it. "Magical disabilities" is one of those things that can be very problematic done poorly, but this is done well, and I enjoyed it very much.

[daedala]

I read this based on your rec and adored it -- thank you!

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Sounds lovely!

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

When I was younger (about the intended age range for this book) one of the things drew me to changeling myths is that the changelings sounded "like me." As an adult, of course, I realize that the changeling myths no doubt sprung from people's desire to justify their discomfort with what we now call mental disorders and disabilities, which led to ostracization and even exile and/or death in some situations, but those things didn't register as much as the behaviors did for me then. (I actually adored the changeling and her brick counting, but part of that is because it's precisely what I would have done to cope with the situation until I could process what was going on.)

Though, this book and the Percy Jackson books are the only time I don't sniff with disdain at "magical disabilities." (I roll my eyes at it in the PJ books, but unlike most writers who write characters with ADHD and dyslexia, Riordan also addresses the social and personal difficulties they cause and shows different personality types dealing with both instead of assuming that everyone with a condition is just like everyone else with it.)

[coraa.livejournal.com]

I think it's one of those tropes that can be done well or poorly, and in this case it was done well: Changeling was clearly meant to be a sympathetic character, and she did save the day not despite her oddities but because of them.

[maggiedacatt.livejournal.com]

I'm going to read this on Kindle.

Also? I should totes read more (recent) YA stuff. It's easy to spend an evening reading a nice light YA book (unlike, say, getting sucked into Stephen King's latest neverending story and spending several frantic days trying to read during every free moment I have in order to finish the damn thing).

[coraa.livejournal.com]

I totally recommend it! To be honest, the most interesting fantasy and science fiction I've read in the past year has been YA.

(If you want suggestions, let me know what you like to read, and I can give you ideas... Epic fantasy, urban fantasy, near-future sf, far-future sf, post-apocalyptic, horror, you name it.)

[maggiedacatt.livejournal.com]

I absolutely loved Changeling.

I tend to like most genre fiction, leaning most strongly toward urban fantasy and SF. I do seem to have a special liking for post-apocalyptic stories. :)

What I liked most about Changeling was that it was a YA quest book that didn't feel like a video game. I don't remember feeling this way about the book, but the Coraline movie totally does feel like a video game; ditto Percy Jackson (haven't read the books for the latter). The whole 'enter a new area, face small challenges/puzzels, bossfight, acquire item and move on!' thing is ... yeah. Boring to read / watch.

[shweta-narayan.livejournal.com]

You know there's a sequel, right? :)

[coraa.livejournal.com]

I just finished that! And enjoyed it tremendously. (I think I will need to make a hairstick called "The Magic Mirror of the Mermaid Queen.")

[shweta-narayan.livejournal.com]

Yay!

[maggiedacatt.livejournal.com]

Uh oh.