Opening Sentence : '...Henry got up early on the day that changed his life ...'

Henry is having a really bad day - he finds out his mum and dad are getting a divorce because his mum is having a lesbian affair with his father's pretty secretary!!!!! Prince Pyrgus Malvae, heir to the Purple Emperor, leader of the faerie realm is having a bad day as well. He rescues some kittens in a glue factory and almost ends up being sacrificed to a demon by a dark faerie. To get him out of the way while diplomatic discussions go on - Pyrgus is sent to safety through a portal. The portal has been sabotaged and Pyrgus ends up in Mr Fogharty's shed and rescued from being eaten by the cat by Henry. The bad day the two boys are having is about to change.

A really great start to a 'new for me' series. The plot is complex involving an evil demon, two avaricious glue factory owners, and Lord Hairstreak, leader of the Faeries of the Night, each with a personal agenda that will lead to taking over the realm. Pyrgus needs to be rescued on more than one occassion to try and stop the plot to overthrow his kingdom. His sister Holly Blue is the only one with the resources to track her brother down - she just needs a bit of help - and that is where Henry and Mr Fogharty comes in.

It is not a cutesie YA book - it is quite dark in places - and some pretty gruesome things happen. The ending of the book is complete enough to read as a stand alone, but there are one or two open ends that made me realise that there may be another book to follow. Imagine my joy when I found out there are at least four in the series. ( )

Richie's Picks: FAERIE WARS by Herbie Brennan, Bloomsbury, March 2003

I had never been one to willingly read about wizards and magic, yet that
first chapter of HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER'S STONE sure got my attention.
(Four books later, Harry's still got my attention.) But despite being the
most exciting Advance Reading Copy I have ever pulled out of my mailbox,
Harry Potter did not convert me into being a reader of wizard books. I felt,
and still feel, that those other publishers who suddenly hoped to reap large
profits from their authors who write fantasy novels about wizards and those
librarians who expected HARRY lovers to immerse themselves in long reading
lists of such books didn't really get what our love for HARRY was all about.
Like David Lubar's WIZARDS OF THE GAME, which I just finished reading to an
incredibly enthusiastic lunchtime crowd of middle schoolers, HARRY has just
the right touch of magic balanced with real "being a kid" issues.

I have never been one to willingly read about faeries. The high-tech hijinx
and scatological humor of ARTEMIS FOWL made it an amusing exception. In
fact, I was reminded of Holly Short just last week when I encountered
Thursday Next, the gutsy, no-nonsense female in THE EYRE AFFAIR, an
incredible book which does for English Lit majors what ARTEMIS does for the
post-Pilkey crowd. And while I doubt that many true-blooded fantasy readers
found much in ARTEMIS to write home about, again you have a blend of reality
and magic that captivates a large group of young readers.

Such is the case with FAERIE WARS by Herbie Brennan. This book will be a big
one for young readers waiting around for HARRY V (which means damned near
everyone). In the same way that we can all imagine being the kid stuck
living under the staircase, we can imagine being Henry Atherton, a typical
kid whose family is crumbling. He's just found out that--in an unusual
twist--his parents have begun sleeping in separate bedrooms because his mom
has become involved with his dad's beautiful (female) secretary. That's the
foot set in reality (referred to as the Analogue World). Our other foot is
set in the Faerie World. And our focus in that faerie world is on a kid
named Pyrgus Malvae who steps in deep manure when, trying to elude the guards
who saw him stealing Lord Hairstreak's golden phoenix (because Hairstreak's
an abusive owner), Pyrgus ends up in Brimstone and Chalkhill's Miracle Glue
Factory. And when he then discovers that the secret ingredient for the
miracle glue is a live kitten a day, he spontaneously risks all by snatching
the cage with the doomed mama and kitties. The bottom line is that Pyrgus is
in mortal danger and has to make himself scarce by way of a portal. Entering
the Analogue World, he fortunately meets Henry and crotchety old Mr Fogarty
(an octogenarian for whom Henry does odd jobs) after falling victim to Mr
Fogarty's cat Hodge:

"For a moment Henry Atherton just stood there, mouth open, eyes blinking
furiously, as he tried to decide what he was looking at. Hodge had caught a
butterfly, of course, but it wasn't a butterfly Henry was seeing. He was
seeing a tiny winged figure. The wings were like butterfly wings, but the
figure...
"Henry shook his head. He was looking at a fairy!
"The trouble was he didn't believe in fairies. He didn't even know anybody
who believed in fairies. Except, a voice said in his head, Mr Fogarty. Mr
Fogarty believes in fairies! For some reason it brought him up short. Mr
Fogarty believed in fairies. Along with ghosts and flying saucers. Mr
Fogarty believed the world was run by a secret conspiracy of bankers based in
Zurich, Switzerland. Just because Mr Fogarty believed in something didn't
make it real.
"But Henry was looking at a fairy. In a lunatic moment he wondered if Mr
Fogarty had somehow created it. Then his paralysis broke.
" 'Hodge, you idiot!' he screamed. He threw himself on the tomcat and
grabbed him by the scruff of the neck, the way mother cats do with kittens.
Hodge howled in protest and dropped the...dropped the...Hodge dropped
whatever it was he'd had in his mouth. Then Henry dropped him. He glared at
Henry accusingly and stalked off no more than a yard or two before stopping
to sit down."

How Henry and Mr Fogarty eventually become involved in Pyrgus' Faerie World
and in the coming Faerie Wars makes for a great read (and a sleepless night).
Mr Fogarty is an especially complex character. And by the end of this
wonderful tale Henry has become a young man who is ready to navigate his own
route through the waters of his parents' marital discord.

Thus, THE FAERIE WARS will delight both fantasy readers as well as the kids
who never thought they'd be caught dead reading about faeries.

Richie Partington
http://richiespicks.com
BudNotBuddy at aol.com ( )

I bought this book by mistake - normally I don't read fiction written for adolescents - but it turned out to be a decent story. For the most part, you can't tell that it wasn't written for adults.

Apparently this is part one in a series of books but it definitely stands alone - the story and characters are wrapped up in the end so you're not left hanging.

Over all, I enjoyed it and will probably at some point read more in the series, but it's not a high priority. ( )

Herbie Brennan wrote a wonderful young adult fantasy. I enjoyed his take on time travel (albeit, parallel worlds) and faeries (fairies). His characters are well-developed. ( )

Faerie Wars was a book set in modern time with a small twist of fantasy. The story starts with a young man whose mother cheated on his father with his own father’s secretary. That’s why poor Henry needs a way to escape. The old man Foghart whom Henry works for is just cooky for all Henry knows but he soon finds out differently when his world is turned upside with the flick of a switch. This book was a fun read and is well written. I liked the choice of words especially. Andrew