Review: Rosemary and Rue by Seanan McGuire

Title: Rosemary and Rue
Author: Seanan McGuire
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Published: 09/01/09
Summary:

October "Toby" Daye, a changeling who is half human and half fae, has been an outsider from birth. After getting burned by both sides of her heritage, Toby has denied the Faerie world, retreating to a "normal" life. Unfortunately for her, the Faerie world has other ideas...

The murder of Countess Evening Winterrose pulls Toby back into the fae world. Unable to resist Evening's dying curse, which binds her to investigate, Toby must resume her former position as knight errant and renew old alliances. As she steps back into fae society, dealing with a cast of characters not entirely good or evil, she realizes that more than her own life will be forfeited if she cannot find Evening's killer.

Plot:
The plot had a lot of promise, but was really bogged down by the details. I read 199 pages (15 chapters), and maybe 75 pages worth of action had happened. The rest was just unneeded details and dialogue. I also found that for all of Toby's talk about wanting to be strong or take action, she never really did anything. While I would have liked to know what happened to Evening, I just couldn't force myself to keep going.

Pace:
The pace was too slow, mostly because the reader is bogged down in details. Plus, for all the places Toby ventured to in 199 pages trying to figure out why Evening was killed, some of it didn't feel relevant. Maybe it comes around full circle in the end, but it just seemed like useless wandering.

Characters:
The thing that really bothered me was that for all the details and dialogue, I didn't really learn much about anyone but Toby. I would have liked to have a little more information about some of the characters Toby came in contact with because it seemed like they were important, but I couldn't always figure out why.

Cover:
I actually loved the cover of this books. The bright orange text is a real eye catcher. Even if I hadn't already known I wanted to buy this book, I would've been intrigued had I seen the neon orange title while browsing. I also liked how subtle the cover model's pointed ears were. I didn't realize there was any point to them for a couple days.

Overall: DNF

Disclosure: I bought this book for my own enjoyment.