This site uses cookies to deliver our services, improve performance, for analytics, and (if not signed in) for advertising. By using LibraryThing you acknowledge that you have read and understand our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. Your use of the site and services is subject to these policies and terms.
Seventeen-year-old Val runs away to New York City, where she falls in with a gang of squatters who live in the city's subway system and consort with faeries, trolls, and other strange creatures.
One of my first YA fantasy novels. It kind of set the standard for me (as far as urban fantasy goes). Read it once several years ago and read it again just this summer, still enjoyable. ( )
When it seems as though everyone in Val’s life has betrayed her, she simply walks away...to New York City, where she falls in with a gang of squatters who live in the subway system. But there’s something off about her new friends. And when she ends up breaking into the lair of a mysterious creature with whom they’re all involved, and owing him as a consequence, she finds her new-found affection for him will help her battle the true evil in town. I bought this series at a used bookstore, and it sat on my to-read shelf for god-only-knows how many years before I finally picked it up and read it. It was good, but YA; book 2 definitely took a weird spin into unrelated territory before turning back; story elements I expected never appeared. It was satisfying, but the books went back into the used bookstore bag without much regret. ( )
This was okay . . . Tithe was a lot better in the plot line and character development. So after reading about the 'betrayal', the song 'Stacy's mom' popped into my head. I got Val and the reasons why she did what she did, the never popping up and that this story was, sort of, a retelling of beauty and the beast. The other song 'Drag me to hell' by Lords of lost, with the lyrics 'Obsession craves respect'; I feel that was Val's song when she got mixed up with Lolli and the others. This is not my favourite Holly Black Book so far, but still a quick read. I think Ironside will quench my faerie thirst, lol. ( )
For I shall learn from flower and leaf That color every drop they hold, To change the lifeless wine of grief To living gold.
-SARA TEASDALE, "ALCHEMY"
Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!
-LEWIS CARROLL, THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS
Trying their wings once more in hopeless flight: Blind moths against the wires of window screens. Anything. Anything for a fix of light.
-X. J. KENNEDY, "STREET MOTHS," THE LORDS OF MISRULE
I have found the warm caves in the woods, filled them with skillets, carvings, shelves, closets, silks, innumerable goods; fixed the suppers for the worms and the elves.
-ANNE SEXTON, "HER KIND"
We must not look at goblin men. We must not buy their fruits: Who knows upon what soil they fed Their hungry thirsty roots?
Nothing farther then he uttered -- not a feather than he fluttered -- Till I scarcely more than muttered, "Other friends have flown before -- On the morrow he will leave me, as my Hopes have flown before." Then the bird said, "Nevermore."
-EDGAR ALLAN POE, "THE RAVEN"
Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away.
-PHILIP K. DICK
To these I turn, in these I trust - Brother Lead and Sister Steel.
-SIEGFRIED SASSOON, THE OLD HUNTSMAN AND OTHER POEMS
Black milk of daybreak we drink you at night we drink you at morning and midday we drink you at evening we drink and we drink
-PAUL CELAN, "DEATH FUGUE"
Those who restrain desire do so because theirs is weak enough to be restrained.
-WILLIAM BLAKE, "THE MARRIAGE OF HEAVEN AND HELL"
They love not poison that do poison need.
-WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, RICHARD II
Strike a glass, and it will not endure an instant; simply do not strike it, and it will endure a thousand years.
-G. K. CHESTERTON, ORTHODOXY
And her sweet red lips on these lips of mine Burned like the ruby fire set In the swinging lamp of a crimson shrine Or the bleeding wounds of the pomegranate, Or the heart of the lotus drenched and wet With the split-out blood of the rose-red wine.
-OSCAR WILDE, "IN THE GOLD ROOM: A HARMONY"
Immediately after the monsters, die the heroes.
-ROBERTO CALASSO, THE MARRIAGE OF CADMUS AND HARMONY
All human beings should try and learn before they die what they are running from, and to, and why.
-JAMES THURBER
Dedication
For my husband, Theo, because he likes angsty, angry girls
First words
The tree woman choked on poison, the slow sap of her blood burning.
Quotations
Last words
Leather-clad fingers brushed over her short hair, rested on ehr cheek. "I can hold my breath."
Seventeen-year-old Val runs away to New York City, where she falls in with a gang of squatters who live in the city's subway system and consort with faeries, trolls, and other strange creatures.
)
)
)
Google Books — Loading...
Wikipedia in English (1)
1