Book Review: Spiders from Memory

Spiders from Memory

By:  Frances Pauli

Publisher:  Mundania Press

Publish Date:  January 2012

Format:  Paperback, 211pgs, 5" X 8"

Genre:  Fantasy

Series:  3rd & final book of The Changeling Trilogy; 1st Book ~ A Moth in Darkness, Book 2 ~ The Fly in Paradise

Recommendation:  If you enjoy fey and the Seelie/Unseelie world.  Yes, most definitely!

Book Synopsis:
The Seelie court is gone, and the Tower has fallen into darker hands.  Now nightmare creatures terrorize the Fey races, and the whole Fey world turns to frost and shadow.

Liz Larson holds the last remnant of the Seelie Sidhe's power.  The elves look to her for guidance, but all she has to offer them is the disturbing story of their origin, the final truth that will turn many of them against her.  With her dwindling number of allies, Liz needs to reopen the borders, to find the missing Marcus Bramble, and to avoid the sudden, terrifying attention of the new Fey ruler, the Unseelie Speaker and new master of the Sidhe Tower.

While her friends in Mundanity race to pry open the gates, and Marcus searches for the answer to a puzzle that could save or damn them all, the Unseelie Speaker marches north, bringing his army and his wrath to focus on Elizabeth.  What can one, fairy-touched human do in the face of the Unseelie court's full fury?  How can she fight when the enemy's anger is only partly blind, when she can see all too clearly the traces of justice behind it?

First Sentence:
Hoof beats rang like gunfire down the alley.

My Thoughts and Summary:
We meet one of the dark horse fey, on the cover, first.  A Kelpie, and on a deadly killing spree in the human world.  Liz, Lockland, Laurel, and others in the fey world still alive, are at the place where Lockland was held captive in the first book with a cold frosty winter coating the land, non-stop, since the Unseelie took over.  Liz has become leader of the fey, the last everyone knows of with a touch of Sidhe, and some are not to happy with it.  The Dark Fey are attacking any fey and refugees in the southern woods, gaining ground and power.  Marcus is with the glowing fey egg in the secreted room with no entrance or exit and is shocked when the egg becomes much more than he thought.

The fey and those touched by fey on mundane side of the closed gates are in just as much disarray as the fey world.  Jess and Mary have fey and dancers camping on their lawn and staying with them.  Human dancers are now committing suicide, with quitting cold turkey from the fey offerings.  Bev, one of the few embassy employees still working, is babysitting the grown gripping fey stuck in the human realm.  But a case is given to her by her boss, one the police can't handle; a string of murders with hoof prints leading away.  It now becomes a question as to if the gates can be opened, by one of the three who originally opened it, for the fey stuck here.  On the fey side, they are seeing a new deadly ruler take over the land and need help to fight him, but what Liz has to tell the Elves of their long history will change their thinking, way of life, and world forever.

Sounds like a lot going on, huh?  But really it's not that confusing.  Honest!  I'm one to easily get lost, and in NO WAY did I here.  Frances does a wonderful job of keeping the POVs separated for us, and all are going on in a same time frame, so no time jumping.  Actually, really liked having the different POV in this series.  Especially this book, with the gates closed.  I got to see both sides of the gates, how each come to the pieces of the puzzle they hold.

I couldn't wait to finish this trilogy.  I had to see what happens with the characters and in the worlds.  I needed to know for sure what was suspected in The Fly in Paradise.  I was happy with this ending, and I got all my answers here!  The author even ties up the series here for us, as well as a fey story can be tied up. ;)

This series is wonderful for Seelie/Unseelie fey lovers.  There is a wonderful twist to the thinking and I enjoyed it the whole way through the series.  And we have characters growing to be so much more then where they started.  Well done through out a three book series.

This book is another that keeps moving forward, and very little down time explaining.  There is always something coming and all works together to bring us to the conclusion.  We get an ending with bullets and arrows, but we also get something more and soothing too.  Oh and the little faeries!  I have to mention them as they play a very important role in this book.  Those pesky little things.  hee hee.

Very much enjoyed, and I look forward to reading more of Frances Pauli's books.


If you are curious about Frances Pauli and what she has to share with us book lovers (she has a little bit of everything: Fey, Science Fiction, and Romance), please visit her site: Frances Pauli: Speculative Fiction with a touch of Romance


I couldn't wait to receive a copy of this book from the Publisher for an honest review.