Late Eclipses

I was pretty frustrated with the main character in the first few books, and I still don't especially like her. But now I think you're not really supposed to. She's recovering from trauma and working through depression and is self sabatoging, hoping for death without admitting it to herself, and generally lying to herself about a lot of her motivations.

But I'm glad I stuck with it. Watching Toby slowly slowly work through what's happened to her is worth it.

It's made me more sympathetic to my depressed friends. I get frustrated with them sometimes because I like them and know how amazing they are, but they don't believe me. Getting to read Toby's incredibly unreflective perspective is illuminating.

One of the things that annoyed me earlier in the series was how everyone thought so will of her and loved her so much when she seemed utterly reactive and useless. And perhaps, in the short time I'd been with the character, she kind of was. But Toby isn't giving us much of her past and it's easyto brush off references to her past achievements because Toby herself does. You're in Toby's brain, seeing everything through the lying filter of depression. Of course I hated Toby because she hated herself and that was the only perspective I really noticed.

Anyway, I'm enjoying the world and some of the side characters and even if I don't love Toby yet, I'm interested in finding out if she ever learns to care about herself.

The books do feel a bit drawn out - I'm always more engaged by the overarching story of the books than the smaller mystery adventure of the individual books. I'm glad I'm reading them instead of listening to them so I can go faster. Otoh I might have noticed what was going on with the mental health storyline faster if I'd been paying more attention...

I've now hit the minimum velocity for reading these books that I've copied a list of all the October Daye books and short stories and now am purchasing and borrowing from the library all the books and short stories so that I can just keep reading them. This does not bode well for all the other books I have from the library, the 30 BC books I decided I need to get through, and the books I got from Netgalley for review.

I liked Late Eclipses a lot. It engaged me from the outset, and even though there are several good "set down" points, I just did not want to put the book down. True to form for any series book like this, Toby gets a bit of a power boost in this book. (She sorta had one in book 2, and normally these seem to happen in book 3 so we could be a book late.) However, unlike the way many main characters get power boosts, this one has been hinted at from the beginning and also strips other things that made Toby really good. So now she will have to learn how to be in this new balance of powers rather than just getting purely stronger.

So much happened in this story and when thinking back, much of the groundwork has been laid since book 1. That's a lot of foresight. Knowing that there are currently 13 books in the series and a huge number of short stories that interweave, I wonder what McGuire's storyboard looks like and how many books she has predicted out. So well done!

I almost wish I'd discovered these books a decade ago - except I don't because then I wouldn't be able to binge read them like I plan to now.

Toby knows something isn’t quote right when the Queen of the Mists makes her Countess of Goldengreen. The queen has never liked her much so why this? Why now? She has little time to dwell on this new development when news reaches her that Lily, the Lady of the Tea Gardens, is ill. Desperate to save her friend and protect the subjects of the Tea Garden, who are too weak to be welcomed by other fae courts, Toby must race against time to find a cure. But when other fae start falling ill, she suspects her oldest enemy may be back in town; the woman who ripped her happy life away so many years ago.

The poisoning story is one that builds and builds, with plenty of opportunity for Toby to become embroiled even if it weren’t obvious someone wants to frame her. The reappearance of Oleander brings doubts to Toby’s sanity. Is she imagining the scent of her magic? Wanting to blame the illness of her friends on a known evil? Is Toby going to carry on walking into that trap?

When the cats are ill too, it gives Tybalt the opportunity to place a great deal of trust in Toby. I am fond of the Court of Cats, seeing them as a motley bunch rather than the nobility of the other fae, perhaps in part to their feline nature. So, along with that of Lily, I found their stories heart-breaking. I’m not convinced by Sylvester’s response; he has always seen Toby as a daughter so why would he shut himself away at the risk of losing more of his family?

It’s a shame we must wait for Lily to be critically ill before we learn so much about her. I don’t think I clicked in previous books what an Undine was. She is made from water and in this case her water is polluted in some way. So that means they have to get their very own fae forensics analyst in! Actually Walther is just a chemistry professor who also happens to be fae, but I liked his inclusion in Toby’s world, bringing the story back round to urban fantasy crime cross-over territory.

There’s also a kiss to get excited about. Honestly, it says a lot about the sexual tension that one kiss stands out. But it’s not about the romance at all and Toby had lives to save. Plus she really doesn’t want to admit some things to herself.

TOBY AND TYBALT FINALLY MADE OUT. Okay, sure. It was a ~ploy~, but at this point it is legitimately being written as her DELIBERATELY refusing to deal with the fact that he's in love with her rather than her being genuinely baffled by his ~inexplicable~ actions. UPGRADE.

Of course, now there we will have to sit through the Connor/Toby/Tybalt love triangle.

DID OTHER STUFF HAPPEN IN THIS BOOK? YEAH MAYBE. PERHAPS MUCH OF IT WAS EVEN COMPELLING AND INTERESTING. But let's be honest, I continued this series from book two on 95% out of sheer INDIGNATION at Toby's obliviousness so by god that is what I am going to report on.

Okay, fine. This was actually the best of the series, thusfar. Toby wasn't being a lolariously bad detective, the plot was compelling, the suspense was often legitimately suspenseful, and the entire deal with Amandine and Toby's heritage was a very nice reveal (while still posing more questions) of something that has been super vague up until this point.

For once, the actual PLOT makes me want to continue to the next book rather than my obsessive fixation on how long Toby can go on pretending that Tybalt doesn't care for her when he's been blatantly obviously in love with her literally since the first scene of the first chapter of the first book. Often I would be put off by the promise of a love triangle as currently exists, but #1 I don't actually care that much who Toby ends up with, and #2 lololololol I would be massively shocked if it wasn't Tybalt since the author pretty obviously cares approx. a million times more about him and his relationship with Toby than she does about anything regarding Connor ever. So that sort of takes away what usually annoys me about love triangles -- i.e. my investment in a specific outcome and wishy-washiness on the part of the narrative -- since not that pressed about it AND the books don't really try very hard to convince me that there's much chance of Toby not ultimately choosing Tybalt.

I do really hope, however, that poor, bland Connor gets some kind of characterization or something interesting in the next book. He's mostly a cipher, currently, and I say this as someone who is usually DEEPLY INCLINED towards the Good Boy.