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Well this is a very enjoyable tale well told. YA is not my favourite genre however there are always exceptions and this is one of them. This is compared a lot to the Hunger games (which is another YA I enjoyed) and the story really does have a lot in common with these books. What I really enjoyed though was the author taking the sanitised stories of the little people and fairies and bringing them back to the truly scary legends that there were of the Sidhe (or the old pagan gods of Ireland). They make a very interesting foe for a teenager to survive.
“Listen,’ he says, ‘we don’t need the Sidhe to teach us evil. We were the ones who put them in the Grey Land, remember? And not just for a day or however long it is the Call lasts. We Irish… we trapped an entire race of people in hell for all eternity, just so we could take their homes for ourselves.”
At any time between 10 and 17 a teenager on the Island of Ireland will be called back to the Grey Land to try and survive the hunt of the Sidhe. It takes about 24 hours in the Grey Land and 3 minutes 4 seconds in Ireland. As a teenager you never know when you will be called and watch your friends being called around you. As with all things in life this seems to be always when you least expect it and is definitely the most tense element of the story. Teenagers naturally joke around having fun but these ones have to deal with this constant threat. I think Peader deals with this rather well and uses his fourteen year old protagonist, Nessa (who isn’t wasn't whiny about being in love - Yes!) well to tell his story.
The true impacts of war are not ignored as in:
"'How long must I wait?' she asks the mirror in Sidhe.’ As a survivor, she doesn't need to speak the language anymore. But many like her are more comfortable in it than English, and since they have no choice but to marry each other, the primary schools of the country are filling with tiny tots whose innocent mouths spout the long-dead language of their distant ancestors, which also happens to be the living, never-changing tongue of the enemy. Some day, she thinks, we will be them, a greater victory for the Sidhe than if they kill us all."
I also note that one of my GR friends could not work out the genders of the characters without pronouns. Maybe the sequel (which is a well know secret) should include a list of characters as Irish names are sort of difficult to get a handle on for the non-Irish.
Overall a fun read.
“Listen,’ he says, ‘we don’t need the Sidhe to teach us evil. We were the ones who put them in the Grey Land, remember? And not just for a day or however long it is the Call lasts. We Irish… we trapped an entire race of people in hell for all eternity, just so we could take their homes for ourselves.”
At any time between 10 and 17 a teenager on the Island of Ireland will be called back to the Grey Land to try and survive the hunt of the Sidhe. It takes about 24 hours in the Grey Land and 3 minutes 4 seconds in Ireland. As a teenager you never know when you will be called and watch your friends being called around you. As with all things in life this seems to be always when you least expect it and is definitely the most tense element of the story. Teenagers naturally joke around having fun but these ones have to deal with this constant threat. I think Peader deals with this rather well and uses his fourteen year old protagonist, Nessa (who isn’t wasn't whiny about being in love - Yes!) well to tell his story.
The true impacts of war are not ignored as in:
"'How long must I wait?' she asks the mirror in Sidhe.’ As a survivor, she doesn't need to speak the language anymore. But many like her are more comfortable in it than English, and since they have no choice but to marry each other, the primary schools of the country are filling with tiny tots whose innocent mouths spout the long-dead language of their distant ancestors, which also happens to be the living, never-changing tongue of the enemy. Some day, she thinks, we will be them, a greater victory for the Sidhe than if they kill us all."
I also note that one of my GR friends could not work out the genders of the characters without pronouns. Maybe the sequel (which is a well know secret) should include a list of characters as Irish names are sort of difficult to get a handle on for the non-Irish.
Overall a fun read.