More than halfway up the hill to brilliance.

I think Tchaikovsky did this on purpose. Weave a story using jamais vu to elicit a feeling of presque vu and then bake it into a story laced in deja vu and voila - you have a very ethereal haunting.  I swear this all seems familiar and unfamiliar; It's made my head spin.  Unless of course that whole collective unconscious theory means we've all been taking up residence within the folds of the writer's hippocampus and feel echoes of these and other stories in our subconscious hence the deja vu.  Whatever it is - it's pretty nostalgic

I just want to bloody stumble  upon a garden full of Fae. Dangerous - yes. Deadly - for sure. But still.  Is that too much to ask?

Using familiarity by anchoring the character Harry into IPs that have already been in existence like Eastenders or the BBC then fictionalizing the rest of the story with enough callbacks to fictional works like El Laberinto Del Fauno, Secret Garden, that story of the photograph of fairies that turned out to be a hoax and other fantastical tales we wished were real in our childhood. But it's not that one, the one with the wardrobe and the nice lion - Harry will remind you of that.

I came away from this feeling utter despair for Underhill and a burning desire for an otherworld (not alien) encounter.

Plot/Storyline: How very Tchaikovsky.  Seriously, who uses words like lugubriouslyand still manages to be relatable.  Okay so I might be a bit biased but there was that one book I hated.  This is not that and this whole plot was right up there with the best of them.  Also, the phrase "clutching pearls" was thrown in for good measure and it worked.
Characters:   Harry/Felix is so damn relatable in his totally wasted life.  Either you know someone like Harry, you've loved someone like Harry, You've hated someone like Harry or you've been Harry. Like many of the author's characters in other books, he stumbles between likeable and annoying so well he ends up in the sweet spot.
Favorite scene:  Harry/Felix's dream sequences of kids cartoon characters trying to live a normal life and everyone just going about their business not noticing that a bunny or rose plant is manning the cash register - this dream was trippy.
Favorite Quote/Concept: Thistlesham, in that moment, looked like the sort of man who’d bathe in the blood of virgins every Tuesday if only you could source it from Waitrose. (Harry, realizing the ritual done in an attempt to reach Underhill would be all kinds of no bueno for him)
StoryGraph Challenge: 1800 Books by 2025/TOP 22 Male Authors (Fantasy/Scifi/Horror)
Challenge Prompt: 150 Fantasy Books / Adrian Tchaikovsky Terrible Worlds series