Maria Moloney

The Changeling Quest is a very good story. The characters are three-dimensional and entwined enough to make things mysterious. All believe Niamh to be royalty and have magical abilities. From the beginning, I thought Jared would be a problem. He was simply tagging along and guarding his sister from trouble. Jared becomes central to their fights with odd creatures, which are all doing Queen Marvaanagh’s evil bidding.

The narration is from Tara’s point of view, which is solid. Throughout the journey, Tara steps up most of the time. Lucy becomes more of a liability as she nearly drowns, poisoned by a gigantic worm’s spitball, and requires the care of several people, sometimes slowing down the group.

The Otherworld is visible thanks to all the vivid descriptions and feels very real midway through the story. Once I thought I had read enough clues to know what would happen. Most of the time I was wrong, but only the next book in the series will tell if I have been very wrong. I think kids will enjoy the various . . . um, “people.” There are so many different magical beings throughout the story. Knowing each one is critical to the character’s safety, but the land can change in an instant. Even inanimate objects such as trees and scarecrows can be a hazard if approached incorrectly.

The Changeling Quest does contain a few frustrations for the reader. The author has made numerous errors of grammar, mostly omitting conjunctions; several words are misspelled or a typo; and she mixed up the names of two characters, causing confusion to this reader.

That aside, The Changeling Quest is an adventurous story that will engage its audience, causing rapidly turning pages and open books until the last page has been read. There would seem to be much violence in this story but the author has wisely chosen her words making those scenes less violent than they probably should be. No one is going to suffer nightmares from reading this imaginative fantasy of two divided families getting a chance to reunite their members and understand their history.

(received from the author)
Originally reviewed at Kid Lit Reviews: http://kid-lit-reviews.com/2013/04/23/review-children-of-the-fae-book-1-the-chan...… (més)