Early Review: Late Eclipses by Seanan McGuire

*This title will be released on March 1, 2011*

Title: Late Eclipses Author: Seanan McGuire Series: October Daye #4 Cover Art: Chris McGrath Genre: Urban Fantasy Excerpt: No Source: Publisher Reviewed by:Julia Mass Market Paperback: 400 pages Publisher: DAW (March 1, 2011) ISBN-10: 0756406668 ISBN-13: 978-0756406660 Sexual Content: Kissing, mention of prostitution and sexual relationships. My Rating: Excellent - Loved it! Buy it now & pre-order the sequel.

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Description

Two years ago, October "Toby" Daye believed she could leave the world of Faerie behind. She was wrong. Now she finds herself in the service of Duke Sylvester Torquill, sharing an apartment with her Fetch, and maintaining an odd truce with Tybalt, the local King of Cats. It's a delicate balance—one that's shattered when she learns that an old friend is in dire trouble. Lily, Lady of the Tea Gardens, has been struck down by a mysterious, seemingly impossible illness, leaving her fiefdom undefended.

Struggling to find a way to save Lily and her subjects, Toby must confront her own past as an enemy she thought was gone forever raises her head once more: Oleander de Merelands, one of the two people responsible for her fourteen-year exile. But if Oleander's back, what's her game? Where is she hiding? And what part does Toby's mother, Amandine, have to play?

Time is growing short and the stakes are getting higher. For the Queen of the Mists has her own agenda, and there are more players in this game than Toby can guess. With everything on the line, she will have to take the ultimate risk to save herself and the people she loves most—because if she can't find the missing pieces of the puzzle in time, Toby will be forced to make the one choice she thought she'd never have to face again...

Review

From the first book, ROSEMARY AND RUE, it has felt like I jumped into the October Daye series “in media res.”  Quickly swept away by action and character development, I had for the most part forgotten Toby’s mysterious past. LATE ECLIPSES not only brings it all back, but also explodes Toby’s own preconceived ideas about herself and her heritage.  While not a cliff hanger, this book ends poised at the top of an arc, and I can’t wait to read where all of this forward momentum is going to take the series.

If book #3, AN ARTIFICIAL NIGHT, took us out of Toby’s daily life and deep into the mythos of fairy, LATE ECLIPSES stays very much on her home turf.  Unfortunately for Toby, that doesn’t mean there isn’t danger and intrigue, it just means her friends and family are in the line of fire.  Flitting about Toby’s consciousness, amidst mysterious sicknesses and political attacks, hints of Oleander de Merelands are appearing.  One of the people responsible for Toby’s fourteen year stint as a gold fish, the loss of her husband and child, and the twisted madness of her beloved liege lord's daughter, Oleander is one of the boogeymen of fairy, an evil individual and twisted assassin.  No one wants to believe that Oleander is back, and even Toby is unsure of her own sanity at the suggestion, adding a psychological twist to a story that I already found compelling.

While the action is certainly non-stop, it was the characters that held my undivided attention.  The book starts with glimpses of the home life Toby and May have built for themselves, and in the deadly cascade of events that follows, the possibility that they could lose that relationship was the one thought that really tugged at my heartstrings.  In addition to May, Tybalt and Connor both share significant page time.  I felt like I learned more about Tybalt and Toby’s past relationship, as well as saw hints of it’s future.  However, McGuire isn’t committing Toby to any one romantic path.  Connor has always been the one that got away, and despite being married, the sexual tension (and his criminally insane wife) keep things interesting.  Tybalt and Connor are two very different men, it may prove to be a Peeta and Gale moment when this tension is resolved.

Overall, Seanan McGuire has done a stellar job of developing her characters while interweaving action and suspense.  As much as I enjoyed the romantic tension in LATE ECLIPSES, it was the details about Toby’s family, both blood relation and adopted, that truly touched me.  The story as a whole has me on the edge of my seat for ONE SALT SEA in September, I am eager to find out how all this will play out.

Previous Books in Series	Also Reviewed By:
Rosemary and Rue A Local Habitation An Artificial Night	Moonfox at Foxipher Jones