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"And with Reveling"
by
Seanan McGuire
urban fantasy in a Kindle edition that was published by DAW Books on September 14, 2021 Explore it on Goodreads or Amazon
Other books by this author which I have reviewed include Rosemary and Rue, A Local Habitation, An Artificial Night, Late Eclipses, One Salt Sea, Discount Armageddon, Home Improvement: Undead Edition, “Never Shines the Sun”, Chimes at Midnight, "In Sea-Salt Tears", Indexing, The Mad Scientist’s Guide to World Domination, Half-Off Ragnarok, Midway Relics and Dying Breeds, Games Creatures Play, The Winter Long, Sparrow Hill Road, The InCryptid Prequels, Pocket Apocalypse, Black as Blood, Blocked, White as a Raven's Wing, The Ghosts of Bourbon Street, IM, "Good Girls Go to Heaven", A Red Rose Chain, "Full of Briars", Reflections, Once Broken Faith, "Dreams and Slumbers", Shadowed Souls, Chaos Choreography, Magic For Nothing, Indigo, Every Heart a Doorway, Down Among the Sticks and Bones, The Brightest Fell, "Of Things Unknown", Beneath the Sugar Sky, Night and Silence, "Suffer a Sea-change", The Girl in the Green Silk Gown, "The Recitation of the Most Holy and Harrowing Pilgrimage of Mindy and Also Mork", Tricks for Free, That Ain't Witchcraft, "The Measure of a Monster", The Unkindest Tide, "Hope is Swift", Come Tumbling Down, Imaginary Numbers, "Follow the Lady", In an Absent Dream, "The Fixed Stars", "Forbid the Sea", "No Sooner Met", Across the Green Grass Fields, A Killing Frost, "Shine in Pearl", When Sorrows Come, "Singing the Comic-Con Blues”, "Candles and Starlight", "Such Dangerous Seas", Sleep No More
A novella, 15.5, in the October Daye urban fantasy series revolving around Sir Toby Daye. The couple focus is on Toby and Tybalt and their wedding reception. This novella can be found in the back of When Sorrows Come, 15.
My Take
Toby has been worrying about what being married will do to her and to Tybalt — yep, McGuire is using first person protagonist point-of-view from Toby’s perspective. And that girl just ain’t thinkin’.
Tybalt knows exactly what he’s getting into, and if being elf shot, stabbed, slashed, burnt, betrayed, near drowned, and getting blood out of clothes, multiple times, hasn’t put him off, I don’t think anything will in the future.
Ya gotta love the Luidaeg. She’s a decent woman even if she does have to seem mean. “She’s gotten very good at coming up with the selfish reason behind everything she does.”
Lucky for Toby that Bridget and Sir Etienne are fulfilling that promise of Toby’s to the boys.
Whoa Julie promises to be an auntie to any kids Toby and Tybalt have.
Oh ho, Tybalt gives it to Sylvester in spades! Sylvester is being so self-righteous, and Tybalt takes him apart. The Luidaeg and Quentin were certainly impressed!
I love this one: “Being fae doesn’t make you immune to being a massive nerd. It just gives you time to really plumb the depths of your potential nerdery.”
The Luidaeg makes an interesting point about wine . . . and humans. Pete has her own point to make about not choosing one’s First in a divorce. She also has her own blessing for their wedding. One that Toby should definitely appreciate!
Oh, oh, Tybalt is so sweet when he explains all those roses to Toby. It makes me want to cry.
McGuire provides some of Tybalt’s back history, including the bigotry of the Divided Courts towards the shifting Sidhe as well as the story of how his pleas for aid to save his Anne were rebuffed. We also learn more about his father. And of Toby’s great desire for children. Another mindblower is Gillian who is at the wedding and actually makes a concession!
Kerry has so been looking forward to making Toby’s wedding cake . . . and Kerry has taken Tybalt’s probable preferences into account. Into 15 different cake flavors!!
Hmmm, Oberon offers Toby his knife, so she can cut the cake.
It’s a fun tale with a few differences between a human wedding, a fae wedding, and one that Toby and Tyblat would enjoy. My only quibble is why it couldn’t be part of the main story When Sorrows Come . . .
The Story
There are seven formal blessings for a newly married couple. And now that Toby and Tybalt have gotten past the ambush part of the wedding, ahem, lol . . .
The blessings shower down here and there with hope within and yet there is unhappiness afoot for some.
The Characters
Sir October Daye has just married Tybalt, the King of the Court of Dreaming Cats, a.k.a. Rand. May is Toby’s Fetch; she and Jazz, a Raven-maid, live with Toby. Stacy is the best friend who did Toby’s make-up for the wedding. Kerry, a half-Hob changeling, is another old friend who baked the wedding cake. Julie, a member of the court of cats, is coming around.
Walther Davies is a chemistry professor at Berkeley, Arden’s unofficial Royal Alchemist, and in love with Cassandra Brown, Stacy and Mitch’s oldest daughter who is also an aeromancer. August is Toby’s older sister. Simon, Count Torquil Lorden, is Toby’s legal father and August’s actual father. Gillian, a Roane now through the gift from the Luidaeg’s hand of her own youngest daughter’s, Firtha’s, skin, is Toby’s actual daughter. Cliff had been Toby’s husband and is Gillian’s father while his second wife is Janet.
Quentin “Cillian” Sollys is Toby’s squire and the future High King of the Westlands. Dean and Peter Lorden are brothers and sons to Dianda and Patrick Lorden from the Duchy of Saltmist (Dianda and Patrick recently married Simon). Raj is Tybalt’s adopted nephew and heir. Helen is Raj’s agoraphobic girlfriend.
Duke Sylvester rules Shadowed Hills and is Toby’s liege lord, although his wife, Luna, hates and despises Toby with a passion. Rayseline is Sylvester and Luna’s elf-shot daughter. Sir Etienne, a Daoine Sidhe, is Sylvester’s seneschal. Bridget “Bess” is his human wife. Chelsea is their daughter with a gift for teleportation. Jin is Sylvester’s Ellyllon healer.
High King Aethlin Sollys is the overall king of North America; Maida is his High Queen, and both are Quentin’s parents. Galen is an Ellyllon and the High King’s healer, who appears to be smitten with Poppy. Ormond.
The recently returned Oberon is the king of Faerie. The Luidaeg, a.k.a. Atigone, is his oldest daughter and a Firstborn. Poppy, a human-sized pixie, is the Luidaeg’s apprentice. Tybalt calls Maeve and Titania the static queens. Pete is actually Amphitrite, the Firstborn of the Merrow and a rebellious child of Titania. Dobrinya. Arden Windermere is the Queen in the Mists. Elizabeth “Liz” Ryan is the leader of the former Selkies in Half Moon Bay where Gillian now lives. Diva is Liz’s daughter.
Ainmire is/was Tybalt’s father and king of the Court of Fogbound Cats in London. Tybalt’s mother had to sell him and his siblings to Ainmire as possible heirs. Well, the boys, Carr and Arlis, were potential heirs; the girls, Jill, Colleen, and Cailin, were hostages.
The Shadow Roads can’t be closed to cats, but they don’t welcome anything/one else. King Shallcross used to reign over Oak and Ash and wanted more. He had made a deal with the Doppelgangers. Amandine the Liar is no longer Toby’s mother but is a Firstborn of Oberon and Janet Carter. Devin was a Fagin type who took in street kids. Oleander de Merelands was an assassin.
The Title
The title is the wedding reception, “And with Reveling” Toby, Tybalt, their friends, family, and guests are away.
