Review of The Falconer

Synopsis

Heiress. Debutant. Murderer. A new generation of heroines has arrived.

Edinburgh, Scotland, 1844

Lady Aileana Kameron, the only daughter of the Marquess of Douglas, was destined for a life carefully planned around Edinburgh’s social events – right up until a faery killed her mother.

Now it’s the 1844 winter season and Aileana slaughters faeries in secret, in between the endless round of parties, tea and balls. Armed with modified percussion pistols and explosives, she sheds her aristocratic facade every night to go hunting. She’s determined to track down the faery who murdered her mother, and to destroy any who prey on humans in the city’s many dark alleyways.

But the balance between high society and her private war is a delicate one, and as the fae infiltrate the ballroom and Aileana’s father returns home, she has decisions to make. How much is she willing to lose – and just how far will Aileana go for revenge?

Review

Aileana is a young debutante, born into a life of wealth and duty. She is expected to be genteel, marry a young suitor and have plenty of babies. But since she learnt that a whole other faery world exists alongside hers, fighting and killing dangerous faeries, with the hope of one day killing the faery that murdered her mother, has consumed her. The two completely different parts of her life didn’t sit well together – returning to a ball in a ripped and stained ball gown can cause quite a stir – and Aileana was torn between what was expected of her and what she was born to do. This dichotomy caused lots of problems for Aileana but she was the kind of girl that likes to get stuck into dirty projects, whether its slaying zombies or building a new steampunk contraption. She was ballsy, brave and a brilliant heroine.

For the past year Aileana has been training with Kiaran, a powerful and rather alluring faery. There was plenty of chemistry and sexual tension between them, thrown in with a big dollop of forbidden love. Aileana had to regularly remind herself that Kiaran wasn’t human and behaved and thought in a very different way. Despite this she (and I) couldn’t help but fall for him. There was just something about his strength, dangerousness, and surprising protectiveness over Aileana that made him so appealing. There was also a strange kind of almost love triangle between Aileana, Kiaran and Gavin, a potential suitor with a special gift. Rather than being a romantic love triangle it was much more emotional and psychological, mixed up with guilt, jealousy, and suspicion.

Whilst it might seem that all the faeries in the story were evil, Aileana managed to have a rather sweet and kind little pixie that lived in her dressing room. With his snide and witty remarks, Derrick added humour to the plot and when he was drunk was just so adorable!

I loved the steampunk elements as they played an interesting role to the story and Aileana’s fighting style, rather than just being a nice add-on. Being a tinkerer and inventor, she came up some great ways to kill more efficiently! The Edinburgh setting was also wonderful, as it made a nice change form Victorian London.

The Falconer is adventurous, witty and blood thirsty, jam-packed with fighting, sexual tension and a thirst for revenge. Elizabeth May’s debut novel is an exciting and fun read, and sets the scene for a great new series.

Try it for yourself! Goodreads | Amazon | Amazon UK

Hannah