The Last Changeling

There has always been a secret history, existing alongside that which everyone knows. There have always been the fairies, wreathed in mystery and hidden from sight, dark and malevolent. Now, something has changed, and the 'metahominids' of Britain are coming in from the country, flowing like foxes into the city. What has brought this on, and where will this change of habit lead? For the man known as D and his Department, a group so secret that even their own government doesn't really know what they do, this is not merely a mystery; it is a prelude to war.

The Last Changeling is a tale of fairies, the dark and terrible sort that people used to warn their children about in the days before the otherworld became cute. It is also a kind of social satire, with D9 - the government taskforce which monitors and contains fairy activity - hampered by swingeing budget cuts, and the fae themselves cast as immigrants from the dying countryside.

The novel has an interesting set-up, but feels like too much world-building and not enough narrative. The flashbacks into the secret history tie too obscurely to the main thrust and theme of the story, and the characters are barely given room to breathe. For a narrative built around a crux of betrayal, this is a serious weakness, as it is hard to feel the necessary outrage, particularly as so many of the key characters do not even find out who the traitor is until the epilogue.

This is essentially an establishing narrative given the status of self-contained novel, and suffers from a lack of development. For my money, it could have stood to be half as long again with a lot more character building; a flashback to each main character's first encounter with the fae would have gone a long way towards illuminating their personality with more show and less tell.

Also, as a personal niggle, it felt odd that the fairies were vulnerable to silver, rather than cold iron.