Spoilery Discussion for Night and Silence and the October Daye Series as a whole.

If you couldn't tell from the name of this post, this is a post where I'm going to vent my thoughts about the October Daye series as a whole, and my speculations as to where things are going.  I'll also be talking about spoilers in Night and Silence that I tiptoed around in my review post.  So if you're interested in the series, and haven't read all 12 books, don't read any further.

For my non-spoiler review of Night and Silence, see THIS post.

You have been warned.


Spoilery Talk about Night and Silence

As I mentioned in the review post, Night and Silence feels very much like running through the same motions as the fifth book in the series, A Salt Sea.  To run down the parallels:
1.  Gillian is kidnapped by forces of Faerie with a bone to pick with October, threatening Gillian's life even if she gets back alive.
2.  The Kidnapping is masterminded at least in part by the SAME VILLAIN, Dugan Harrow, who we haven't even seen since Book 5.
3.  The Final Confrontation takes place in a deserted knowe - in A Salt Sea, that's Muir Woods (the true Queen's knowe), while in this book it's in the False Queen's knowe.
4.  Gillian is Elf-Shot and is saved with help from the Luidaeg in a way that will change her life, and her ability to interact with October, forever.

Even much of the book that doesn't follow the same formula often feels reminiscent of older books: for example, our enemy is for the third time the False Queen, and her motivation of wanting October to give back her Siren heritage is the exact same motiviation behind Book 9 - A Red Rose Chain.

So we have a plot that features basically the same exact villains (the only new villain essentially is the thin-blooded changeling Jocelyn, and she's basically a lackie, albeit one who does pose some questions that might change how Toby does things going forward) and a plot to get at October which has already exactly been done before.  It can't help but feel kind of like a placeholder novel, setting up some reveals and pieces for the next book....well, more on that in a second.

The big reveal of this book is the reveal of "Miranda" as Janet and Janet as Amandine's Mother.  Janet being Amandine's mother was a rather predictable reveal - I see from some sites on the internet that not everyone guessed that, but I did and clearly others did as well (again based upon quick internet browsing) - The Luidaeg's occasional declarations that Amandine's mother was responsible for the loss of the Kings and Queens (see Book 11) and Amandine's use of the Ballad of Tam Lin as a nursery song (see Book 3/4) were pretty damn blatant hints.  Now MIRANDA being Janet was a surprise - it actually fits with Miranda's tiny role in A Salt Sea ("How do we know you didn't have some of your freak friends grab her so you could pay detective and ride in to save the day?" are Miranda's words back then, which in retrospect sound very clearly like Miranda is aware of Toby's connection to Faerie.

This reveal now raises some serious questions - what will Gillian's reaction to it be when she hears (Janet avoids the Luidaeg spilling the beans, but it's going to be hard for Toby not to, or for Gillian to not push Janet to spill all eventually), will Janet come to be a greater part of Toby's life (probably not), will Janet reunite with Amandine and her other granddaughter August (Neither of whom are positively disposed towards humans), etc. etc. These questions are interesting, but they're left for tomorrow here with the back half of this plot returning to the same line as A Salt Sea.

And that's yet another way this book feels like a placeholder novel, moving pieces around the board for bigger events to come: Tybalt needs to be partially cured - so he comes back to October at the exact perfect moment, and his faults are temporarily dealt with by getting Joe's daughter to serve as regent (bonus: this will allow Raj to come to Tybalt and Toby's wedding, if that actually happens!).  Gillian is now a Selkie just in time for a book titled "The Unkindest Tide" and hints about the bargain between the Luidaeg and the Selkies coming due being made ever more blatant.  Because if October was going to have a problem with whatever plans the Luidaeg had for her and the Selkies before? Now with Gillian's life likely in the balance, she's definitely going to have a stake in the outcome like never before. And it feels very much like this whole book was meant to set that up.

Spoilery Talk about Suffer a Sea-Change

Okay, Suffer a Sea-Change is the third novella included in a main novel to be a direct response to that novel, but it's by far the most directly connected novella of the three.  Dreams and Slumbers featured the aftermath of Book 10 as Arden found waking Nolan up a bit more difficult, but was quite clearly an aftermath and could've been removed with little loss (though I like it a lot).  Of Things Unknown is a contrast to The Brightest Fell, featuring another "lost" character (actually a whole bunch from way back from Book 2) being brought back to life, and featured October being used by April to reunite happily a family (in contrast to her depressing rescue from the novel itself).

Suffer a Sea-Change literally starts before Book 12 is over, and features Gillian's perspective as she is introduced once again to the Fae world now as a Selkie, including her perspective on her conversation in the book with October.  Gillian is the most abnormally created Selkie in centuries and is our first point of view Selkie character since Liz in an earlier novella, and Liz's role in that last story was mainly before she got her skin.  It's fascinating to see how the Selkies are connected to the sea and how Gillian experiences it, and of course how she now relates to her two mothers.

It makes me curious, assuming Gillian has the time and isn't uprooted again by the Luidaeg's deadline too quickly, whether Gillian will attempt to reconcile with Toby when she finally gets a little of her bearings in her new life as a Selkie.  She thinks about hiding with Toby during the story, and undoubtedly her training at half-moon bay will include stories of Toby getting back to Gillian....will they make her curious and interested in talk or angry that her real mother was doing all these things away from her?  I really hope such a scene would happen in the next book....Toby could use something good to add to her life, and Gillian would be it for once (and Gillian deserves a fuller relationship with her mother as well....Janet kinda fucked her over in that regards).

On the Series as a Whole:

The other reason this feels like a placeholder is that well, the threats of this book are rather lower scale opponents already previously vanquished and who obviously weren't going to be part of the endgame of the series....and the series' major antagonists - Eira, Simon, Amandine - don't appear.  We're no closer to finding out where Oberon went (although now we know for sure why Maeve disappeared) or why Oberon and Titania left.  Mind you, from what we know about Titania, I suspect our heroes would probably not want to encounter her if they can't find Oberon or Maeve first.

So where do we go from here?  Well, there's the Selkie's bargain which I would bet is next "The Unkindest Tide" is a very strong hint of a title.  I'd next expect August to cause problems for October in her desire to return her father - if you expect her to be happy forever alone with her mother while Simon is lost, well I'd be really surprised.  And of course, with Simon loose, and some of Eira's older minions having access to the Elf-Shot Cure (Dugan used it on the False Queen to free her in this book), the idea that Eira is gone for long seems very mistaken as well.  We still don't know what the piece was on the board that Eira was looking for when she came back in The Winter Long, and the odds she wouldn't make another attempt......

Or maybe October will just have a happy wedding in Toronto!  I'm kind of skeptical.  Just well, really curious about where this goes next, with speculations flooding my mind at the moment damnit.  Why do we have to wait a whole year between books at this point (okay, given that I get an InCryptid Book in the interim, this is NOT a real complaint so don't you dare perceive me as saying McGuire isn't producing these fast enough lol).