Briar Queen: A Night and Nothing Novel

by Katherine Harbour

Overview

The dark, moody, and mystical fantasy begun in Thorn Jack, the first novel in the Night and Nothing series, continues in this bewitching follow up—an intriguing blend of Twilight, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Alice in Wonderland, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream—in which Finn Sullivan discovers that her town, Fair Hollow, borders a dangerous otherworld . . .

Serafina Sullivan and her father left San Francisco to escape the painful memory of her older sister Lily Rose’s suicide. But soon after she arrived in bohemian Fair Hollow, New York, Finn discovered a terrifying secret connected to Lily Rose. The placid surface of this picture-perfect town concealed an eerie supernatural world—and at its center, the wealthy, beautiful, and terrifying Fata family.

Though the striking and mysterious Jack Fata tried to push Finn away to protect her, their attraction was too powerful to resist. To save him, Finn—a girl named for the angels and a brave Irish prince—banished a cabal of malevolent enemies to shadows, freeing him from their diabolical grip.

Now, the rhythm of life in Fair Hollow is beginning to feel a little closer to ordinary. But Finn knows better than to be lulled by this comfortable sense of normalcy. It’s just the calm before the storm. For soon, a chance encounter outside the magical Brambleberry Books will lead her down a rabbit hole, into a fairy world of secrets and legacies . . . straight towards the shocking truth about her sister’s death.

Lush and gorgeously written, featuring star-crossed lovers and the collision of the magical and the mundane, Briar Queen will appeal to the fans of Cassandra Clare’s bestselling Mortal Instruments series and Melissa Marr’s Wicked Lovely.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780062286772
Publisher:	HarperCollins Publishers
Publication date:	06/02/2015
Series:	Night and Nothing Novels
Sold by:	HARPERCOLLINS
Format:	NOOK Book
Pages:	368
Sales rank:	231,632
File size:	737 KB

About the Author

Katherine Harbour was born in Albany, New York, and has been writing since she was seventeen. She is the author of Thorn Jack and Briar Queen, the first two books in the Night and Nothing series, and is a bookseller in Sarasota, Florida.

Editorial Reviews

03/23/2015
In Thorn Jack, Harbour’s first Night and Nothing contemporary fantasy, Serafina “Finn” Sullivan lost her sister, Lily, to suicide; fell in love with a dark and immortal fae known as a Fata, who became the mortal Jack Hawthorn; and survived nearly being sacrificed before she and Jack killed the ancient Fata queen, Reiko. Finn just wants to live a normal life with Jack, but Seth Lot, another evil being, wants revenge for Reiko’s death. He lures Finn to the Ghostlands, a place of horrors worse than death, using a secret about Lily as bait. Armed with a few arcane items, Finn and Jack find dubious allies among Seth’s old enemies and gain the help of the mysterious Moth, who cannot remember what he is or why Lily told him to protect Finn. After a quiet beginning, the threats hammer at an unrelenting pace once the Ghostlands are crossed. Harbour makes love, suffering, and sacrifice the most poignant parts of her worlds, and readers with even the barest knowledge of fairy lore and legends will be pulled deep into this tale of sharp magic and its ruthless children. Agent: Thao Le, Sandra Dijkstra Literary. (June)

Publishers Weekly

The lilting, whimsical new adult fantasy, balanced by impressively detailed and dark vignettes, is fueled by a goth-emo-scenester aesthetic...The magic is mysterious, the drama is aching, and the people are beautiful.

Booklist

You might...think of Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight a time or two, as a few of the story’s bones are similar, but I never once felt like I was reading Twilight...which goes to show you tropes need not be poiston if woven into a good tale.

Fantasy Literature

An intriguing story filled with mystery, enchantment and darkness.

A Bookish Escape

Combining the sorcery of The Night Circus with the malefic suspense of A Secret History...a beguiling fusion of love, fantasy, and myth that echoes the imaginative artistry of the works of Neil Gaiman, Cassandra Clare, and Melissa Marr.

Good Books and Good Wine

The lilting, whimsical new adult fantasy, balanced by impressively detailed and dark vignettes, is fueled by a goth-emo-scenester aesthetic...The magic is mysterious, the drama is aching, and the people are beautiful.

Booklist

Combining the sorcery of The Night Circus with the malefic suspense of A Secret History...a beguiling fusion of love, fantasy, and myth that echoes the imaginative artistry of the works of Neil Gaiman, Cassandra Clare, and Melissa Marr.” %COMM_CONTRIB%Good Books and Good Wine

05/15/2015
Seraphina "Finn" Sullivan's life hasn't been the same since she came to Fair Hollow, seeking the truth about her sister Lily Rose's death. In the series opener, Thorn Jack, Finn found a college town full of dangerous fairy creatures known as fata, hiding in plain sight and playing with the lives and souls of mortals like herself. She also discovered love with Jack, a man she fought to free from the fata. But when Finn realizes Lily Rose might still be alive and in the clutches of the fata, she plunges even deeper into their shadowy world. VERDICT Steeped in well-researched Celtic lore, this book is stylish, with lush descriptions of the beautiful fata and their dangerous worlds; however, it is style without much substance. Finn hasn't broken her habit of rushing headlong into danger and needing to be rescued, and the fata and their allies continue to be tricksters. The angst-filled young love between Finn and her otherworldly Jack, who watches her sleep and tries to protect her from the grim beings of his world, will remind readers of a Celtic-flavored Twilight.

Library Journal

2015-03-19
A gothic story of faerie-tale romance, rescue, and revenge. Finn Sullivan is just hoping things will go back to normal now that her ex-changeling boyfriend, Jack, has grown a real heart. Or at least as close to normal as things get in Fair Hollow, where the supernatural world tends to bleed through. But normal isn't in the cards, not when the creature known as the Wolf has come to town looking for revenge for the death of his erstwhile wife, Reiko, the faerie queen Finn and Jack killed—and not when there's a chance that Finn's sister, Lily, might not really be dead. Finn and Jack are going to have to enter the Ghostlands, "the betwixt and between," to confront the monsters there, with help from Finn's best friends, Christie and Sylvie, and a stranger with a moth-wing tattoo who almost certainly isn't what he seems. There's plenty of danger and mystery here, and Harbour (Thorn Jack, 2014) has created an alluring world that oozes with atmosphere. But there are so many characters, each with his or her own agenda, that the plot gets muddled. Still, the emotional core of the story is strong, and the beautiful, crumbling, poisonous world of the Ghostlands presents more than enough weird and wonderful images to satisfy fans of the gothic and strange. Readers drawn to faerie lore will enjoy this lush, romantic tale even if the plot does wander in the gothic wilderness a bit too long.

Kirkus Reviews