Wondrous Strange, Lesley Livingston

Kelley Winslow is a shy, off, off, off-Broadway actress who is an understudy in the magical Shakespearean play, A Midsummer's Night's Dream, when the lead actress breaks her leg (HAHAHAHAHA!), it is up to Kelley to pull it together and play Titania. But what Kelley doesn't know, is that she is about to live the life of the craziness in the play. Central Park has been home to Faeries since time began, but when a human when into the faery realm to steal a Faery baby, King Auberon had to close the realms. It was okay for the Faery to steal human babies, but not the other way around. Sonny Flannery is a Janus Guard, who is sent to the mortal realm every Samhain to guard against the opening of the gates because of a flaw in King Auberon's closing. Sonny is also a changeling. Every nine years the exposure of several Faery Gates in Central Park are exposed to opening for nine nights leading to Samhain (October 31). On one of those nights, after Kelley has been berated by her director for not remembering her lines, she walks through the park and and crumples in on park bench in despair. Sonny, who is granted gifts from King Auberon, can sense Kelley. From there on, Kelley's world is not what it seems. Lesley Livingston creates a world within a world, a play within a play and pulls it together marvelously. Puck, Robin Goodfellow, he's there, a Roan Horse, he's there, a beautiful love story, yep, it's there. Queen Mabh, yep, she's there too! I absolutely ADORED this story, when I first read about it, I thought it would be too much like Wicked Lovely, I was so wrong. It couldn't be any different. I'm salivating for the second book and the third one too (yep, it's a tril!); Lesley's Shakespearean background gives her great fodder for a 'real' Faery Tale. The writing is tight and it doesn't slow down one bit, I was on the edge (of my couch, bed, chair, car, etc) reading this book. Kelley is a heroine who is special, but normal as well. Sonny is a protector who finds himself drawn to the 'firecracker' that is Kelley. And revelation after revelation keep this story going strong. I highly recommend it for EVERYONE. Some bad language, lots of laughs and lots of sighs... I'm such a romantic at heart! 5 Bookmarks! :) Wondrous Strange is published by HarperCollins, CA and is out in stores now!!!! (I'm keeping this copy!)