Many Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing the digital review copy in exchange for an honest and unbiased review.
Loved, Loved, Loved! Everything about this. This has always been my dream that there was real magic in the world, and Emily Wilde is living my dream life. A self-confessed recluse, she is the happiest tramping in the wilds of the world, researching and cataloguing Faeries. Her next trip takes her to the cold and harsh town of Hrafnsvik close to the arctic circle. Close on her tail, is Wendell Bambleby, her closest rival. This book was just magical, whimsical, and full of love and self-discovery. I think for me the only thing that let it down, was the strange relationship between Emily and Wendell, as I think it could have been done better than the 360 of tolerating each other, to how it ends.

This book was wonderfully whimsical and magical. I got Howl and Sophie (from Howl’s Moving Castle) vibes from the main characters. I loved all the different types of faeries. Beautifully written and just a magical read.

This is absolutely delightful, I thoroughly enjoyed the sheer escapism and found it was the perfect icy cold winter read. A wholesome blend of grumpiness, chilling enchantment, thawing and romance.
The historical research element was perfect, and I loved the different theories about faerie. Looking forward to the next instalment.

My only complaint was the ease with which she escaped from the king.

— 𝐁𝐨𝐨𝐤 𝐑𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰 —

𝐓𝐢𝐭𝐥𝐞: Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries
𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬: Book 1 of 1 of The Emily Wilde series
𝐀𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫(𝐬): Heather Fawcett
𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞: Historical fantasy
𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐏𝐮𝐛𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐝: 19th January 2023
𝐑𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠: 4.5/5

”One doesn’t need magic if one knows enough stories.”

This story is an academic rivals to lovers historical fantasy that embodies a unique fairytale, if fairytales were typically written by fearsome scholars.

What a truly wondrous delight this book was. It was like a million stories all wrapped into one, Emily Wilde shaped present. And the shape of Emily Wilde is this: boxy and unfashionable clothes, probably covered in soil and damp from snow as she treks through the wilderness in her bid to understand all there is to know about the Folk. Inside this unbecoming shape is a mind as sharp and as valuable as diamonds, a wit that is decipherable yet subtle, and an inner monologue that is impossible not to fall in love with.

There is a tone of amusement in the narrative that amplified when Wendell arrives in the story (quite early on) and to be honest I think out of every glorious aspect of this book, the dynamic between Emily and Wendell was my utter favourite.

”I could not tell if he was terrible at drawing cats or if he simply had a terrible cat.”

The autistic representation deserves a shout-out too. Although it’s not said outright, it is quite easy to infer that Emily struggles socially and views the world through an academic lens in order to make sense of it. The cognitive processing was realistic and engaging, and although Emily struggles with the emotions of herself and especially others, it’s in a tender manner rather than sociopathic.

Heather Fawcett is clearly a brilliant storyteller. And this is the easiest encyclopedia I ever read. I cannot wait for more Emily Wilde.

🧚🏻‍♀️

Thank you so much Netgalley and Orbit for this advanced copy

Looks like this year is a trend for cozy fantasy book.
Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Fearies was such a unique book, especially the format which looks like Emily's journal. I really love everything about this book. But, the pacing is too slow. Some people may be DNF this book before they realize how good this book is.

Absolutely waiting for the next sequel

Brilliant, fun, imaginative academic fantasy set in the Nordic world of fairies and snow. Told through dairy entries. Strong romance element, I would say HFN ending.

Slow start but Wendell’s arrival on the scene shakes everything up. Beautifully written, very engaging with a dry, sarcastic sense of humour that I greatly enjoyed.

In terms of romance we get a kind of grumpy – sunshine dynamic where Emily is awkward and anti-social and Wendell is charming and friendly with everyone. They don't talk much about their feelings for each other but rather show their attraction through care and kindness and it's the most romantic thing.
Their romance never takes a central place but the reader is aware of it from early on and it's lovely. The unrequited (for a long time) pining of Wendell for Emily was just exquisite. The way they cared for each other without acknowledging their feelings for each other – it melted my heart.

We get a HFN ending of the romance arc and it fits the characters and their relationship perfectly. At the same time, I wanted more of the ending in terms of the overall adventure/quest aspect of the story. There is definitely room for more books in the series and I am already looking forward to the next episode(s) of Emily and Wendell's quest (for knowledge, for home, for a place to belong).

I find books that go meta about stories/storytelling really fascinating. Adding the Fae magic and pagan traditions/superstitions, just made it all the more enchanting for me. The writing is really good - both the 'real' world and the Fae court felt richly drawn and textured. And we get people being kind and caring, building a community and I just loved it all.

Overall, this is a delightful academic fantasy, engaging and often tender, so much kindness and care (juxtaposed with the cruel carelessness of the Fae). I highly recommend it.

CW: dark magic, some violence, blood, child abduction

I wasn't entirely sure what to expect with this.  I was won over by Heather Fawcett's promis
e of Faeries (spelt the way I like too).  Emily Wilde is a scholar.  An expert in the Fae and her life's work has been the compiling of her Encyclopedia.  The novel takes the form of her journal with footnotes included. This, the first in what I hope will become a series details Emily's expedition to study the folk of Ljosland.  She is single-minded when it comes to her research, hyperfocusing on her studies. Her rival at Cambridge is the effortlessly successful Wendell Bambleby. Where Emily is methodical and diligent with her eyes on the prize. Bambleby gets by on his boundless wit and charm. Before I get too carried away discussing the characters let me summarise  the ideas of the plot first.

Emily has rented a hut on the island and is hoping to be the first person to document scientifically the fair folk of the island. The type of folk that she encounters on the island range from the small to the ancient and powerful. She is joined by Bambleby much to her chagrin but their chemistry allows both of them to do things that they would have struggled with alone.  And the island has a strong connection to the Hidden Ones and that power has been effecting the inhabitants.

Emily to me reads somewhat as being neurodivergent.  She is laser focused, absolutely terrible at interacting with humans and always feeling like she is at odds with the human world.  Her problem solving skills are incredible and her ability to remember bits of folklore that can save the day is almost uncanny. Her first few days on the island are so terrible because she finds interacting with other human people a distraction. She sees her hut merely as somewhere to rest her head and she almost manages to freeze to death as she is unable to keep herself warm with enough firewood and has offended everyone who might be able to help.

I loved Emily as a character, as someone who is neurodivergent myself I saw bits of me in her. Especially the awkwardness in social situations.  The rivalry and friendship between Emily and Wendell Bambleby is adorable as Emily wrestles with whether she can like him, why he is so infuriating and what is his secret.

I loved the fae that Emily meets from Poe wo lives in a tree to the scarier denizens like a changeling and an imprisoned Hidden One. Despite setting out to single mindedly catalogue the fae, Emily ends up using her knowledge for good helping the villagers and fae alike.

This is romantic fluff and on a cold January afternoon with a large mug of hot chocolate and some biscuits I would love to curl up in a nook somewhere and enjoy this novel. A definite comfort read.

***

This was a rather enjoyable read and was knowledgable, however, it was just too slow moving with little plot to keep me 100% intrigued.

I really enjoyed the scholarly aspects of this- I loved learning about the different fae and some folklore. There are some fae types I have not ever heard so I will have to look those up! I enjoyed Emily’s dedication to her work as well and the delight she gets from her doing her research. I always love a bookish hard-working character.

However, this book just moved too slowly, and I found the characters a bit too bland to properly grasp and “flesh the out”. So I did not care for them as much as I could have.

I wish this had a bit more enchantment and more doors into the fae world for the reader to explore, alongside the characters.

Thank you to NetGalley for the E-Arc!!

This was fun. A little slow starting for me, I spent around the first 40% of the book wishing the pace would speed up. There is a lot of scene setting and info being thrown at the reader, which yes, I appreciate with a title that contains 'encyclopedia' in it, this is a given. But I found it a little pedestrian. What I loved about this was the two main character's dynamic, strong grumpy/sunshine vibes, quippy back and forth banter. I would have like to have explored this more but enough was left to the imagination to make do. When the action started to ramp up a little more, the pace of this was good and I found myself not wanting to put the book down. I've put this as a 3 but it's more like a 3.5 and I'd say for my personal taste, I like a little more on the character relationships. Would love to read a sequel/prequel to this 'verse from the male MC's POV!

Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries
Earc:NetGalley
Publisher:Little, Brown Book Group UK, Orbit
Publication Date: 19 January 2033
Genre: Fantasy

Emily Wilde's Encyclopedia of Faeries enchants with its cozy atmosphere and scholarly investigation into the faerie world. This one-of-a-kind story combines fantasy, mystery, history, and romance elements, unlike anything I've read about faerie. Fawcett makes her debut with a splendid academic dream to savour and enjoy.

Finn Krystjanson is the spitting image of his dad.

What can I say... I loved the atmosphere of this story, the crazy world, and the remarkably smooth, effortless writing style. Emily is a great character, and her stubbornness and clumsiness are perfect for this story. I also loved her little jokes, or at least her interactions with Wendell, that kept me from getting tired and giving up on this read. It starts very slowly, with Emily getting to know the people of the village and slowly stumbles upon a more extensive adventure that makes for the most compelling story. It seemed rushed, so I'm not satisfied with the ending—the inconsistency in using "Wendell" and "Bumble" to refer to the same person. In the same paragraph, he once found two names, but they were a distraction. But overall good. I enjoyed it a lot—a cozy fantasy for those who love fiction dearly but need a break from the typical.

#NetGalley #Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries

As per request Review will be on my blog and insta and tiktok week before realse

Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett is a very interesting concept that drew me in immediately and kept me reading as the story unfolds.
I really like the diary style of writing, though I felt conversations may not have been written so detailed in journal entries, however it was a mild grievance and doesn't distract from the enjoyment of the book.

I am not a huge reader of books involved the Fae, although thanks to folklore books I have a small amount of knowledge about different kinds of Fae and the tricks that can be used against them and the helped when descriptions of them were woven into the story.

It's a little bit of magic mixed with historical fiction, a cold but beautiful landscape and an intriguing tale.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for the opportunity to read and review this book.

I shall post my review a week before the publish date as per request on my Goodreads and Instagram account.

Unfortunately it will be a DNF for me for now. I really liked the premise of the book but it has not hooked me in as I hoped. I love the characters and the idea, i think its just a case of right book at the wrong time for me.

A whimsical and academic take on a faerie tale! Emily is just my kind of MC, and despite it taking me a little time to adapt to her way of speaking, once I had I was hooked on her story. Wendell was a delightful addition to the story, and I loved how all the villagers came together to help Emily. I especially loved the diary format - I haven't read a book written in this format for a very long time so it was a refreshing way to tell the story. My favourite character had to be Shadow - I am a sucker for an adorable and loyal animal companion!

I started this book after a lot of enthousiast reacts of friends. Reading it I liked the writing style, as it was something written more unique, but though it had some nods to some of faeries at first it took me a bit to get in and through. BUT! everything changed once you hit the second half of the book and it all picks up. At that point I ravaged through the book. The ending though magical left me wanting more, what happens next? Absolutely would suggest this book to all and everyone willing to listen.

I didn't know a Scandinavian faerie academia story could be this delightful.

Emily Wilde was a young professor of faerie studies who dedicated her life to writing an Encyclopaedia--this book's title. She embarked on an expedition to Norway to gain data for her book. She had a rough time the first few days because she thought the villager didn't want her to be there bothering everyone. She thought it was bad enough until her academic rival, none other than Wendell Bambleby, suddenly came to "help" her.

The book's chapters are like journal entries using first person's PoV, complete with the date and location. It was hard for me to get into the story at the beginning because of the old English but once I got the hang of it, it became so much enjoyable. The story started to get interesting at the 40% mark which was quite a long way but it's totally worth it. Emily was a fascinating main character, she could remember every faerie related stuff but was very cold-hearted and bad at socializing. The faerie tales were alluring, and I love the character dynamics in general. It's soo heartfelt and warming. BUT THE BANTER WAS UNMATCHED. I never thought calling someone "dragon" could be so endearing and fun lmao.

My only complaint(?) is the inconsistency of using "Wendell" and "Bambleby" to refer to one same person. Once I spotted those two names in the same paragraph and it was kind of distracting. But overall it was good. I enjoyed it so much, the kind of cozy fantasy for those who love fantasy to the core but need a break from the typical intensity. Thankfully this didn't end in a cliffhanger so I can wait for the sequel in peace. Even so, I can't wait for the sequel!!!!!!!

Thanks to the publisher for the ARC of this!
This was really good, charming, funny, relatable, and dark at the same time! I really liked Emily and really related to her. It was so nice to see her grow and change from the person she started out as!
At first, I felt very detached from the characters because of the way this book was written, but the further I got the more they grew on me! Bambleby was a delight when we really got to know him and see a more serious side of him.
The one thing I had a hard time with was the whole academia thing. It might be because I'm finishing up my degree right now and my brain wanted to combust when they started talking about research design because I don't want to deal with this outside of school. This is probably because I'm currently studying and I believe this won't bother me in a year when I finish my degree!

I'm very excited to re-read this when the book releases and i can get a hold of the physical book so I can more easily read the footnotes cause I didn't read those because of the formatting.

Will definitely recommend this to my friends and am very excited to read the next thing Heather writes!

3.5 stars!

Utterly charming, and delightful, though wonderfully dark at places. I will pen down a detailed review once I take a few hours to get over it's charms.

A million stars to this delight that I can see myself re-reading every December. This deserves a place of pride on every shelf.

I'm really happy I got this e-arc from Netgalley ☺ Very enjoyable, even though it took me 20/25% to be hooked. But from the moment Wendell Bambleby arrived, I was really into it, and didn't want to stop reading the book. I really enjoyed the characters, Wendell in particular; I love his humor, his wit. Also like Emily as a character, overall. Their rivalry/friendship/slight romance is also something I really enjoyed.
I loved the writing style which felt like a dream, and somewhat 'crazy', in a way I can't explain.
I loved how this wasn't a fantasy fairy book like I've read before, as it was more academic, learning, trying to find fairies, talk to them. I also really liked the Scandinavian setting, I felt the cold of that little town.

We follow Emily who is an academic studying the faeries and travels to a village called Ljosland where she hopes to further study first hand more about a species of fae called ‘The Hidden ones,’ upon her arrival she settles down and is soon joined by her academic rival, Wendell bambleby thus setting up the story following Emily and Wendell as they encounter odd villagers, helpful and frightening fae, dangerous enchantments, mysteries and find themselves becoming more than just friends.

Firstly my thoughts after reading the synopsis was that I was expecting something more rival focused that would turn into an enemies to lover book but I didn’t find that to be the case very much. Whilst our characters are labelled as rivals I didn’t get that impression entirety, it was more of a mutual partnership where they were working together to both accomplish separate goals within the same field.

I loved the setting of the book set in a wintery village with a close knitted community near the mountainous wilderness that is home to the fae we don’t quite meet a whole lot but know of their presence which creates an atmospheric read full of life - perfect read for a chilly night in my opinion!

Our main characters are Emily and Wendell who are accompanied by Emily’s’ dog Shadow, I found the main characters to be somewhat lacklustre throughout the first half of the book as it felt like the romance was quite stagnant for the first third of the book and not much else of this world was being engaged with at this point other than a few interactions between the side characters and Emily.
Throughout their conversations Emily would mention through side remarks or jesting towards Wendell about her belief that Wendell was hiding a secret about his motives for travelling to this village, and I enjoyed this and thought it would have been great to see Wendell jest back or give an answer and then we could see how this affected Emily wether or not she believed him but instead most of her comments were simply ignored and we saw no response from Wendell acknowledging that Emily was questioning him despite her mentioning it, I simply think more conversations through the characters directly in the beginning half of the book would have made this part of the story more engaging and beneficial for both characters development in the long run.

Emily’s time at this village she meets some great side characters who I found more amusing and entertaining than our main characters themselves, I was always eager to get to more chapters involving the towns people but more particularly Poe, a fae creature that Emily befriends and through bargains they appear to have grown fond of one another helping each other out for what they needed.

The book overall is well written and really enjoyable with great cast of characters in a magical setting involving a unique magical world of fae.

I really loved that in the book we got to read a few fairytales that would explain how aspects of the worlds mythology was described through stories and I found this to be really fun and engaging to read.

Around the early mid way point I was starting to lose my interest but am glad I stuck through with it because the second half took quite an explosive turn and the whole story grew to a much larger extreme than what we had in the first half, however the days during this part were much shorter so unfortunately we didn’t get to spend a whole lot of time exploring how the deeper world of fae works and meeting more unique characters; I really hope a sequel explores this part more and we get to spend more time in this setting!

My main gripe with the book is that I felt the pacing was a slight issue and at parts felt clunky to read to the point I became confused and felt like I was missing parts out, for example this note below I feel has not be edited properly as it appears words are missing and it just stops to then move onto a new chapter.

“Yes,” he said, examining the monstrous spectacle before us. “Yes, it’s a start, I suppose.” His voice seemed far away; my hearing had been deadened by the tumult of

The chapter just ends like that and I believe words throughout may have been cut out which made it clunky to read at parts.
I believe these issues may just be in the early version so upon receiving my hardback I’m sure these bumps will have been fixed.

Definitely recommend to read this book during a chilly night and would suggest everyone even those not into magic to give it a go.
Loved the book and would absolutely check out any follow ups.

This book is so atmospheric with an excellent wintery setup and a plot which is steeped in such interesting lore and myth of the fae.

I also really enjoyed the various characters and especially Emily's ( MC) development was done really well. It was great to see her come out of her shell and make friends. The relationship dynamic between Emily and Wendel was also really great and I enjoyed their banter throughout the book. However, their romance development felt quite a bit rushed and left a lot to be desired. Same goes for the ending which seemed a tad bit easy given the high stakes of the story.

Overall, this was definitely a unique take on the fae lore and made a perfect winter read.