Across the Green Grass Fields
-
-
4.4 • 59 Ratings
-
-
- $11.99
-
- $11.99
Publisher Description
Winner: 2022 Hugo Award for Best Series
A young girl discovers a portal to a land filled with centaurs and unicorns in Seanan McGuire's Across the Green Grass Fields, a standalone tale in the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning Wayward Children series.
“Welcome to the Hooflands. We’re happy to have you, even if you being here means something’s coming.”
Regan loves, and is loved, though her school-friend situation has become complicated, of late.
When she suddenly finds herself thrust through a doorway that asks her to "Be Sure" before swallowing her whole, Regan must learn to live in a world filled with centaurs, kelpies, and other magical equines—a world that expects its human visitors to step up and be heroes.
But after embracing her time with the herd, Regan discovers that not all forms of heroism are equal, and not all quests are as they seem…
A standalone Wayward Children story containing all-new characters, and a great jumping-on point for new readers.
At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Hugo and Nebula award winner McGuire pulls off another hit with her sixth Wayward Children fantasy (after Come Tumbling Down). Horse-obsessed Regan Lewis spends her childhood struggling to "thread the needle of normalcy" after her best friend shames her for being intersex. At age 11, she discovers an unusual doorway in the woods that warns her to "be sure" before entering. On the other side, she finds the Hooflands, a world of magical equines, where she is met by a centaur and adopted into a herd. She learns that her arrival heralds enormous change in this world, as has the arrival of every human who's stumbled upon the Hooflands before her. Though at first Regan is eager to return home to her parents, years pass swiftly in the Hooflands, and Regan loses her desire to leave as she finds new confidence and widens her worldview. When the time comes for her to step away from the herd to fulfill her destiny, she is joined by others who surprise her with their humanity, and she learns the truth of the Hooflands' history. McGuire conjures a distinctive, remarkable world to nurture Regan's moving coming-of-age. Series devotees will not want to miss this standalone addition, and anyone who appreciates off-the-beaten-path adventures will be swept away.
Customer Reviews
Love this book
Fairy tale and adventure as they should be told
An Adventure in the Hooflands
“Across the Green Grass Fields” is the sixth novella in Seanan McQuire’s Wayward Children Series. These are really the ultimate portal fantasy series for modern readers. In these novellas, certain children and or young adults find impossible doorways to places they need, or that need them. Sometimes they return to our world, sometimes they go back. Unlike the other novellas in this series, this one does not directly feature Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children.
This novella features Regan, who is a young girl trying desperately to fit in with an unsuitable friend who does not respect her for who she really is. When she learns a secret about herself, she turns to that friend to share this secret. She quickly realizes this was a terrible mistake. She runs away from school in tears, and on her way home through the woods, she finds an impossible door made of trees which seem to have grown together. Curious, she goes through this door…
Regan then finds herself in the Hooflands, a magical world that seems to be everything a horse-loving girl could want. Every kind of hoofed creature from myth seems to be represented there, and it is their mythology that when humans appear, they are to perform some heroic task and thereby save the Hooflands. Regan isn’t ready for heroism yet, she just wants to be herself and be accepted for who she is. She happily finds this simple life for a time, but destiny seems to have a way of catching up to her…
These stories are modern and inclusive fairy tales, with which readers from the 21st century can relate. I’m now looking forward to the next installment in the series, which looks like it will be somewhat different from the rest. It’s titled “Where the Drowned Girls Go” and it’s expected to be released in January of 2022.