There is a giant war in the Goblin Market and somebody dies. ❧ All the real juicy, meaty, interesting stuff happens off-screen and is summed up in random paragraphs. In this case, I really felt the loss of all those plots that are glossed over. Major character growth arcs become mere infodump paragraphs mentioned in passing to move on to the next major plot point in an attempt to control the size of the story. Novellas are fine and great, but McGuire’s world-building is much larger than the format allows, which means there’s so much that feels missing. This has sort of been a point of contention for me since I started reading the books, but I think this book felt it more than all the others. ❧ The Wayward Children series is really starting to grow out of its cute little novella binding … and it’s starting to show? The rules seem so simple, yet deceptively so, because nothing in the Goblin Market is really as easy as it seems. It was almost scary how easy it would be to lose one’s humanity, and once that was gone, it’s obviously pretty hard to get it back. No one wants for anything, and everyone can earn what they need with a little work.īut, then, what happens to those who don’t adhere to fair value? The Market punishes them, of course. As long as the parties involved agree that it’s fair value, then it is.

Everything deals with fair value, which is judged by what that means for any particular person. ❧ The Goblin’s Market is magical and welcoming, yet with a darker side waiting underneath, which makes it all the more appealing.Īt first, it sounds great, right? A world based on equality. Home always shrinks in times of absence, always bleeds away some of its majesty, because what is home, after all, apart from the place returned to when the adventure is over? Home is an end to glory, a stopping point when the tale is done.

In an absent dream seanan mcguire