Book Review – A Local Habitation

Title: A Local Habitation

Author: Seanan McGuire

Format: Paperback

Year Published: 2010

The second of the Toby Daye series, A Local Habitation sends Toby out of San Francisco to Fremont, CA to check on her liege’s niece. Toby is sent off with Quentin, a teenaged foster at Lord Sylvester’s, as her backup.  What they discover when they get there is death – not only death, but murder, and suddenly Toby must figure out what is going on, before she’s next.

This book has a different feel than Rosemary and Rue does – while Toby is run ragged (again), she’s clawing her way out of her depression finger by finger, and therefore things seem less to happen *to* her, and more like she’s actively inciting them. (But, once again, how many times can one character get “mortally” wounded? Although in this case, that actually becomes part of a plot point.)

The murder/mystery part of the plot is hard for me to explain, as it doesn’t really follow any kind of “investigating” really on the Toby’s part – at least, not according to all the detective stories I’ve read over the years. She stumbles on the answer almost by accident – or at least, until she can’t ignore the clues anymore.

I didn’t enjoy this book necessarily as much as I’ve enjoyed others of the series, and some of that was the character of Alex, as Toby seemed to ignore all the hints about who his was until far too late – I called it early on. (Not necessarily his heritage, but the other big secret he had.) So every time there was a scene with him, I wanted to shake her.

On the flip side, I did like April – the Dryad daughter of January, who now has a tree made up of a computer and as such, has a very different outlook to everything that’s happening.

I also loved that Toby called the night-haunts – creatures that “eat” Fae bodies and leave behind human-simulations for the humans to find and see. It sets a up plot events for the future, and it also is exactly the kind of reckless action we expect her to take.

Plus it’s a great scene.

Overall, not my favorite book, but certainly an enjoyable read. 3/5 stars.