Be the Serpent by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This is the lowest rating I have given an October Daye book. It mostly comes down to the final chapter, but we’ll get to that in a moment.

This should have been a book I loved. It had ALL the lore. We almost (as far as I know) know the answers to all the things - what happened to Oberon and his wives. How was The Ride broken and what were the consequences. What has The Sea Witch’s plan for Toby been all along? We now know all that and more. Also at this point Toby is firing on all cylinders. She knows how to rely on her friends and family. Everything was going to well until we got to that final chapter….

When Sorrows Come by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Toby’s finally getting married. If you’ve made it this far, you know nothing is ever that simple for Toby. (And McGuire has been preparing us for that via Toby and Tybalt’s chatter about the wedding for 1-2 books now) Overall I enjoyed the book and the cast reunion that the event leads to.

I’m going to get a little more spoilery than I usually do with my reviews, but by book #15 you should know if you’re in or not with series rather than depending on a review.

A Killing Frost by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Another book that seems to tie a bow on Toby’s plotlines. I’ve said something akin to this more that once, but this time truly seems as though McGuire has finally finished up all the plotlines. (Not 100% true, there’s a certain person who is white as snow who isn’t QUITE done yet….) The climax of this book seems to finally resolve the one HUGE plot that I thought would mark the end of the series. Yet I know, here in 2025, that there are another 5 or so books (and multiple short stories). I have one theory - I think someone who was very angry at the end of this book will be teaming up with someone else who has cause to be upset with Toby. Other than that, I have no idea what could be awaiting our protagonist.

The Unkindest Tide by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The sea witch has been promising for a while now that things would be coming due soon with the Selkies. The day has arrived. But Toby’s involved, so nothing is going to go all that smoothly. We get to see a new realm and another very important fae. We get more lore dumps. We get family reunions. Of course, Toby gets stabbed.

Suffer a Sea-Change by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This novella picks up a little before the end of the previous book. It deals with the main new consequence of that book. Therefore we get to have lots of time with one of my favorite characters - The Sea Witch! McGuire does a good job alternating between the abstinence of the the main character and McGuire using the Sea Witch’s power and might to move the story along. Definitely one of my favorite novellas in this series.

Night and Silence by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book seems to answer most of the leftover questions at this point in the series. It also continues to spiral out consequences from October’s actions. If McGuire has one consistent theme for this series it’s that even the heroes trying to do their best have consequences that echo out that aren’t always positive. It’s one of those things that is much easier to do with a long-running series. There have been a few books (especially in the last five years) that explore the afterlife of being The Hero. Some of them are funny, some are more serious, and some are cozy. But with a series we get to see things spiral out from the inciting incident. And some of these consequences spiral into other consequences causing further complications.

Of Things Unknown by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

It’s been mentioned a few times, but things were left in an unfinished state at the end of the second book. This novella, from April’s point of view, finally finishes things. McGuire does a good job portraying April’s alien state of mind as the world’s only Cyber Dryad. This seems to be one of the short stories/novellas that’s definite worth reading in publication order.

The Brightest Fell by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Up until now we’ve barely seen much of Amandine the Liar. We know that she is considered spoiled by The Ludiaeg and that Winterrose looks down at her. Toby’s relationship and desires to know her have changed as Toby has learned more about who she truly is and what her mother did to her (psychologically and physically). Well, she makes an appearance here and we realize that Toby is lucky she has not been too involved before.

Once Broken Faith by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

It was pretty clear to me as soon as Toby and gang developed a cure for Elf Shot that it was going to cause a huge problem with the balance of power. I don’t know how true it is, but it’s accepted knowledge that the USA and USSR having nuclear weapons throughout the cold war prevented large scale war. (There were plenty of wars, but most of them were civil wars that the USA and/or USSR gave support to - or participated in) In the same way, removal of the ability to simply send your rivals to sleep for a while would definitely cause problems.

Heaps of Pearl by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A fun short story that shows us how Patrick and Dianda met. As far as I can tell, it’s completely optional - nothing key learned - but it’s a ton of fun.

Full of Briars by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This one’s a bit longer than most of the other short stories. It’s great to get into Quentin’s head, given what we learned in recent books. It also helps explain why, after the adventure with Arden, his parents didn’t immediately recall him. It’s also fun to see how Quentin sees the others.

A Red-Rose Chain by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Since the previous book ended the first cycle, this one doesn’t move to answer a few of the remaining mysteries - what will the night haunts want in return? Where is August? Where is Amy? Will October and Sylvester reconcile? But this book does tie off one loose end from the last cycle as things move to Portland, OR for this book.

No Sooner Met by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I think the Tybalt-based short stories are my favorites. I love when McGuire writes from his point of view. In fact, for all the short stories, while it’s nice to get more backstory on the October Daye universe, what I love most is getting to be in the headspace of different characters.

The Fixed Stars by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This short story takes place before anything else in the timeline (at least so far). It explains a lot, but should definitely not be read until this point in the narrative (that is, don’t read it until after October Daye #8).

If it sets up any new plot points, I couldn’t see them, but it does provide backstories for a few of the histories we’ve heard until now. SO FAR, of all the short stories this one seems the most skippable. We’ll see if time proves me wrong.

The Winter Long by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Seanan McGuire mentions that this book is what all the previous books have been working towards. I believe McGuire. This book truly does feel like the end of an era for Toby. Almost every single plot from the first book to the last one is touched upon as we finally (FINALLY) start getting answers about Toby’s life and why all the fae in her life act the way they do towards her. Of course, it’s an October Daye book so triumph comes with tragedy, pain, and sadness.

Never Shines The Sun by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

We saw bits of this in the last full book and now we get to see the whole scene. This is much shorter than other short stories so far, definitely worth reading, because I think it’s probably going to be important for the setup going forward.

Forbid the Sea by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Another short story about Tybalt’s past. It picks up a while after the last short story. We learn yet another bit about what things were like for him and why he acts the way he does with October Daye. It also builds on what we’ve learned about Selkies in both mainline book One Salt Sea and short story In Sea-Salt Tears. So, definitely read those first if you want to get the most out of this short story.

Chimes at Midnight by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The previous entry in the series introduced us to the dangers of Goblin Fruit. It’s an intoxicant that blisses out purebloods, but leaves changelings and humans dangerously addicted (even after only one taste) until they die. This book is about October dealing with that threat to the non-pureblooded community in the San Francisco area. It quickly spirals out from there because, of course it does when October Daye is involved.

Ashes of Honor by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

McGuire makes use of all we’ve learned about the fae and all the characters we’ve met to produce a great bit of detective fiction here. We also get some character growth for October. That’s always a great thing in a long-running series to keep it from getting boring.

I don’t want to ruin the plot so I’ll keep this short, but a couple little random notes:

In Sea-Salt Tears by by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

There’s a reason Seanan McGuire has stated that their preference for the reading order is published order. This story takes place before any of the other mainline books thus far, but it would be a spoiler for book 5 to read it before then.

McGuire knows how to write tragedy - it’s evident in the October Daye books and the Wayward children series. The world is an unforgiving place and the same is true in her books. They aren’t good books to escape the brutality of the world. But they ARE good books to empathize and sympathize with others who may be going through similar problems as you are. She writes universal themes through a fantasy lens and really brings the emotional response out of the reader.

Adrift in Currents Clean and Clear by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The latest Wayward Children book gives us Nadya’s backstory. She was mostly a secondary character in the main series, but since she did get an ending in a prior book, it was nice to see her backstory. Well, I say “nice”, but as usual these stories are emotional roller coasters. Most kids don’t find a door if everything is perfectly awesome in their lives. As usual McGuire has cutting insight into the ways that adults can be cruel to children, often without realizing it.

It’s been a while since I posted a book review on here and rather than have a whole bunch of book review posts, I thought I’d collect the most recent ones into this post.

Iron Flame by Rebecca Yarros

I listened to the audiobook, so, in all likelihood, I’m going to mispell everyone’s names

As I said with the first entry in this series, Yarros does a great job writing a compelling fantasy story. The romance is there, but it’s not what brings me into the story. We’ll get back to that momentarily. The best thing I could say about novel is that when I got to the end, I was upset that I have to wait until some time next year to continue the story. Yarros gives us a complete story (well, 2 of them - more on that as well) and does leave us with quite a compelling reason to come back, but even without the events of the last chapter, I would be there for the aftermath of the macro events of this book. If you need another reason to get into this book before I get to the details - there were multiple moments where Yarros had me reacting strongly to events in the book - like the precursor feeling to crying. Usually this involved Violet’s squad mates, but the penultimate chapter (not including Xaden’s epilogue) with the Sorengale family - I almost had to pull off the road for a moment.