Bad Luck Girl

Half-fairy, half-human Callie (Golden Girl; Dust Girl) has reunited with her family, thus starting a war between the two fairy kingdoms. Fleeing Los Angeles for Chicago, Callie realizes that to end the war she must stand and fight. Zettel brings the street life, locales, and culture of jazz-age Chicago into the imagery of her fantasy, packing the story with incident and adventure.

Half-fairy, half-human Callie LeRoux (Golden Girl, rev. 7/13; Dust Girl, rev. 6/12) has reunited with her family but in doing so has started a war between the two fairy kingdoms, the "midnight Unseelies and the shining Seelies." Callie, her friend Jack, and her parents manage to flee Los Angeles, but by the time they've arrived in Chicago, Callie realizes that the only way to resolve the war is to stand and fight. This is also when she discovers the downside of having an authoritarian Unseelie fairy prince for a father, not to mention an aptitude for calamitous decision-making herself. It's not until she has (deservedly) earned the name Bad Luck Girl that she can see her way to cooperating with a plan that ends in triumph. Zettel brings the street life, locales, and culture of jazz-age Chicago into the imagery of her fantasy, packing the story with incident, adventure, and even, on the sidelines, information. Of her fantastical creations, the Halfers are particularly memorable -- "half anything and everything and half magic all shook together and coming up alive." The plot, with its various conflicts, loyalties, and parties, is an intricate, overly busy tangle, but the story maintains momentum through Callie's consistent obstinacy and the author's enthusiasm for her setting. deirdre f. baker