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    An Artificial Night: An October Daye Novel
    An Artificial Night: An October Daye Novel
    An Artificial Night: An October Daye Novel
    Audiobook12 hours

    An Artificial Night: An October Daye Novel

    Written by Seanan McGuire

    Narrated by Mary Robinette Kowal

    4/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Changeling knight in the court of the Duke of Shadowed Hills, October “Toby” Daye has survived numerous challenges that would destroy fae and mortal alike.

    Now Toby must take on a nightmarish new assignment. Someone is stealing both fae and mortal children—and all signs point to Blind Michael. When the young son of Toby’s closest friends is snatched from their Northern California home and his sister falls into a coma-like state, the situation becomes way too personal. Toby has no choice but to track the villains down, even when there are only three magical roads by which to reach Blind Michael’s realm—home of the legendary Wild Hunt—and no road may be taken more than once. If she cannot escape with all the children before the candle that guides and protects her burns away, Toby herself will fall prey to the Wild Hunt and Blind Michael’s inescapable power.

    And it doesn’t bode well for the success of her mission that her own personal Fetch, May Daye—the harbinger of Toby’s own death—has suddenly turned up on her doorstep.…

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBrilliance Audio
    Release dateSep 12, 2010
    ISBN9781441858122
    An Artificial Night: An October Daye Novel
    Author

    Seanan McGuire

    Seanan McGuire is the author of Every Heart a Doorway, the October Daye urban fantasy series, the InCryptid series, and several other works, both standalone and in trilogies. She also writes darker fiction as Mira Grant. She was the winner of the 2010 John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer, and in 2013 she became the first person ever to appear five times on the same Hugo ballot.

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    Reviews for An Artificial Night

    4/5

    659 ratings44 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Great books! I am really enjoying the whole series! Keep them coming!
    • 5/5
      Its great, i love it because of the complexity of actions, which happen at the same time without making the book or any other book from the series feel hard to Reed <3
    • 5/5
      Really enjoying this engaging series You feel like you're drawn into story. Alot of magical adventure
    • 5/5
      This series just keeps getting better. I love the world building. I love the character development. The storyline is interesting.
    • 5/5
      Seanan McGuire’s writing has improved so much in this book. The first two dragged a bit, but are worth reading to get to this one. It’s excellent! Somehow it manages to be both creepy and heartwarming, which is quite the impressive feat.
    • 3/5
      Hero? Really? I like the premise but a lot of it was tedious unless you like a lady hero thats got zero self defense skills and has to be saved every time she goes on a quest. And she ain't too bright either.
    • 2/5
      2.5/5

      Okay, so this series is finally getting better. I was pleasantly surprised that this book was miles better than the first two.

      description

      I still think the world building is weird and there’s way too many species of fae to remember, but the plot in this one was a lot better. I liked that more of the fae world was involved and I feel like I now have more questions that I want answered, which is a good thing for me as a reader.

      The downside was that the pacing was extremely repetitive. Toby had to return to the same location four times before actually defeating the big bad. And if Toby tells us one more time that she’s not a hero, I will slap her. Toby says the same things over and over again throughout the narrative and it gets old real quick. She also repeatedly gets hurt due to her own stupidity. She always survives on pure luck. It’s a good thing she has so many friends who are willing to save her. Also, when are we actually going to get to see Tybalt more? He’s the only interesting character and he’s extremely underutilized.

      So, on the one hand, this book was much better than the last two. On the other, it still has some major issues. I’ll keep reading but I could not recommend this series to anyone and feel good about it.
    • 5/5
      Another great story in the October Daye series! This one had more intrigue and excitement and a little heartbreak. Looks like a slow burn might be developing!
    • 5/5
      This one is an awesome addition to a great series. Like its predecessor, however, once I hit a certain point in the story it was EXTREMELY HARD to put the book down to do anything else. I did, because while I can do a lot of things with a book in one hand, cooking dinner isn't one of them. But I really would have rather kept reading instead.
    • 4/5
      I really enjoy this series and this one is no exception. Interesting, fun, and definitely a page turner!
    • 4/5
      Toby is trying very hard to have a normal life, going to a friend's children's party. Only the children are all from the magical world and later they disappear; kidnapped for the Wild Hunt and Blind Michael is to blame. Also her Fetch has turned up, ready to witness her death. Chasing down Blind Michael is going to be problematic and one of the problems is that every time she goes she has to take a different path and her will may not survive the encounter with an old one.This series just keeps giving.
    • 5/5
      Good lord this woman will not stop! I mean, that's why she's a knight, but hot diggity. She's got guts, I'll tell you that much.
    • 4/5
      This review may contain spoilers for previous books in the series.

      An Artificial Night is the third part in the October Daye-series, and my personal favorite so far. The atmosphere of the previous two books still remains, but the setting is much more fantastical this time around. Children – both human and fae – goes missing and our reluctant hero Toby promises to bring them back. Unlike Rosemary & Rue and A Local Habitation, this is not a whodunit-plot. It’s made clear early on who the guilty party is, and at a first look it seems like Toby has bitten off more than she can chew. Challenging mad firstborns is not a job for changelings, unfortunately. Before the story ends Toby will have been transformed into a child, almost killed off the king of cats, met Luna’s mother and become friends with her own death. Literally. No really, Toby’s death is named May and she’s now my second favourite character (right after the Luidaeg). She’s of a much sunnier disposition than the one she was shaped after.

      In my review for A Local Habitation I said that the most interesting interactions Toby had was with the returning characters, not the new ones. The same goes for this book, though there are very few new characters here. It feels like this novel focuses much more on the overarching plot of the series, rather than just being a self-contained murder mystery like before. Toby’s relationships with Connor, Tybalt, Sylvester and Luna are explored to greater depths than what we’ve seen so far. And even more so for Toby’s maybe-friendship with the not-as-bad-as-she-makes-herself-seem Luidaeg. I especially liked seeing those two interact; a virtually eternal being and a changeling together in a room make for interesting conversation. Oh, and I absolutely adore Spike (come to think of it, maybe May is just my third favorite character…).

      Now, I still don’t think this is a perfect book. There’s a bit too much repetition for that, e.g. explaining why the fae can’t say “thank you” more times than needed, travelling into Blind Michael’s realm, travelling into Blind Michael’s realm again…and again…back and forth. But comparing it to the first two books, I do like where the series seems to be heading. Not to mention An Artificial Night gave me a sudden urge to listen to some Child Ballads. And I do love me some Child Ballads…
    • 3/5
      this series is a bit dark for my taste. I prefer the incryptid series.
    • 4/5
      I really liked this book. It's great to see the growing network of people around October and how they relate. And the villain is suitably creepy.
    • 4/5
      The third installment in this series is a definite improvement on the previous two. I literally could not put it down: while the first two books took a good number of pages before the story started to unfold, this one grabs you from the very beginning and does not let you go.
      I have the distinct impression that McGuire is working on her main character in expanding concentric circles, with each book adding more and more depth and detail - and this goes for many other recurring figures.
      One of the winning strategies of this author - besides intriguing plots - is that she makes you *care* about characters, and she does it in layers, almost without appearing to do so. She has certainly won me over!
    • 4/5
      An Artificial Night
      3.5 Stars

      Knight Errant for the Duke of Shadowed Hills, Toby Daye is taking a well-earned break after her last case when she learns that several fae as well as mortal children have been taken right from under their parents’ noses. Upon learning that the culprit is none other than Blind Michael, leader of the Wild Hunt, Toby makes it her mission in life to rescue the children and teach the malicious fiend a lesson he won’t soon forget. That is unless she first falls prey to inexorable power …

      This book has left me feeling somewhat ambivalent. On the one hand, there are numerous appealing elements such as the compelling world building, the intriguing hints at something developing between Toby and the enigmatic Tybalt and the insights into the various secondary characters.
      Unfortunately, these are undermined by the problematic aspects of the story, i.e., Toby’s innate martyr complex, her pathetic investigative skills, and her annoying connection to Connor.

      McGuire’s world building goes from strength to strength. As in the previous installments, there is a great deal of focus on the pure-blood/changeling distinction as well as the divisions between Oberon, Maeve and Titania’s children. It can get a little confusing at times, but it is entertaining nonetheless. Moreover, the Blind Michael storyline is intense and suspenseful as he is definitely one of the more evil villains in this genre and his powers and abilities are enough to make anyone’s skin crawl.

      Toby is a likable heroine and it is interesting to learn more about her relationships with Luna, Sylvester, Quentin and the Luidaeg. That said, her tendency toward self-destructive behavior and the fact that she never seems to actually use her brain even though the clues are right in front of her gets tiresome after a while.

      Furthermore, her love life leaves a lot to be desired. Tybalt is the obvious choice, but this doesn’t seem to be going anywhere yet, and Connor is a poor substitute if one can even call him that. While one cannot help sympathizing with his marital predicament, it is one of his own making and it is selfish of him to expect Toby to feel responsible for his happiness. Moreover, he is far too beta for my tastes and definitely not hero material.

      Despite its problems, this is an entertaining series and I’ve heard that it improves with each installment so I'm willing to continue to tough it out if only to find out more about Tybalt and some of the other unanswered questions.
    • 4/5
      Third in the Toby daye series, starting to settle down now, world and characters are well developed with a good balance between the humans and the faerie. There are encouraging signs that the author has a long term goal for the series, rather than just a set of encounters one after another. In short succession a number of people contact Toby regarding missing children. But even she's not prepared for when her Fetch appears, signalling that she's in imminent danger of dying, the Fetch is there to guide her to the afterlife. When it turns out that a neat version of the Wild Hunt has been stealing the children, it's pretty apparent she's not going to need a Fetch to let her know she's in deadly peril. Again.Well plotted with some neat twists. I'm unconvinced about the apparent power of the Firstborn though, one minute they're a fraction of a step away from godhood, the next they're friends and easily fooled through simple tricks.Enjoyable and worth reading further into the series.
    • 5/5
      Note: Even tho this is Book 3 in the series, it works mostly fine as a stand alone. Several side characters were introduced in the previous books but one can get the gist of the main character’s relationship to them without having read them.In this installment of the series, changeling Toby is called upon by her friends to look into the case of several missing children. The children come from changeling households, non-fae parents, and the court of cats. She asks for info and advice from several quarters, but most sources are being quite vague. Eventually, she realizes the horror of the situation – Blind Michael has stolen the kids for the Wild Hunt! But that’s not all that Toby has to deal with – her own personal Fetch has turned up and Toby now knows she has a forthcoming expiration date.This series has been good to me, providing hours of entertainment and this book doesn’t disappoint in that quarter. This book takes the series on a darker turn. Characters are irrevocably scarred by certain events. In general, it’s just a bit more serious and I found I enjoyed the higher stakes. There are still moments of humor, such as kids tossing things out of car windows and Toby’s Fetch, May Daye, is much more lighthearted than one would expect. So it’s not all doom and gloom – it’s well balanced.The Wild Hunt and Blind Michael (who is a rather powerful First Born) are these two dark chaotic elements that really add to the tension of the tale. Blind Michael is bound by rules and Toby has to figure out what those rules are as no one is really willing to talk about the matter. There’s only so many ways to get into Blind Michael’s realm and she has to figure them out in order to rescue the children. Each path has it’s own risks.There’s a bit of odd weirdness between Toby and Tybalt that becomes apparent right off the bat, and that was something that didn’t work for me because it’s not resolved in this book. I think (but am only hoping) the author is setting us up for something later in the series concerning these two characters, but even with that in mind, it just didn’t work well for me for this book. Their friendship has been off and on for the first two books and I’m starting to feel like the story is messing with me personally on this front. In fact, I was so frustrated with not knowing what was up with Tybalt in this book that I want to throw my hands in the air and say, ‘Call it quits or come clean you idiot!’.Setting that criticism aside, Toby’s adventures in this tale had me on the edge of my seat. If I didn’t already know that this series is several more books in length, I would have truly worried for her continued existence. I was pleasantly surprised by her efforts, again and again, to rescue the kids from Blind Michael. Toby finally stops bemoaning the fact that she is a hero and accepts it. As the Wild Hunt can be unpredictable, there were plenty of little twists and turns I was not expecting in this story.We learn plenty more about Luna and I especially liked this aspect. In the first two Books, it was mostly Toby who grew, but now the side characters are taking on more depth. The Luidaeg plays a big role and I continue to be a fan, albeit a very respectful one as I like all my body parts in their current arrangement. Quentin has to do some serious growing up in this book, and once again I had to worry if he was wearing the Red Shirt. Even Connor (aka Seal Boy) gets to be a bit more than he has in the past. Over all, this book was satisfying and I look forward to reading the next in the series. The Narration: Mary Robinette Kowal has once again made a very good Toby Daye. I really liked how she pulled off this happier sounding Toby for the voice of the Fetch May. I could always tell the two apart because of how Kowal gave Toby her normal moody inflections and how she made May sound a bit bubblier. She did great with crazy Blind Michael and all the kids in his court. I continue to enjoy her harsh Luidaeg voice.
    • 3/5
      Fun read, unbelievable that she survived.
    • 5/5
      This novel is an absolutely pristine example of everything I love about Urban Fantasy. Character development, rebellion against patriarchal institutions, herosim (from the heroine, of course), love, family, the balance of nurture and career in the heroine, agency, teamwork, and the heroine overcoming all odds to face down her fears and save herself (penetrative death act!!)

      Interestingly, this novel deals with the theme of growing up, maturing, accepting responsibility, and learning to live in one's own skin with the adult choices one is forced by circumstance to make.

      Beautiful. THIS is what urban fantasy is about. Since I'm clear to write my thesis on the stuff, this series just worked its way to the top few that I would like to include.
    • 5/5
      This novel is an absolutely pristine example of everything I love about Urban Fantasy. Character development, rebellion against patriarchal institutions, herosim (from the heroine, of course), love, family, the balance of nurture and career in the heroine, agency, teamwork, and the heroine overcoming all odds to face down her fears and save herself (penetrative death act!!)

      Interestingly, this novel deals with the theme of growing up, maturing, accepting responsibility, and learning to live in one's own skin with the adult choices one is forced by circumstance to make.

      Beautiful. THIS is what urban fantasy is about. Since I'm clear to write my thesis on the stuff, this series just worked its way to the top few that I would like to include.
    • 5/5
      Very definitely the book where this series became worth reading to me. I might even suggest that people new to the series skip straight to it.

      Toby is a somewhat shopworn changeling knight, stubbornly making a living as a private PI for the faerie and human worlds alike. But when one of her oldest friends' children is kidnapped by one of Faerie's oldest - and most powerful - bogeymen, she has to find new depths to herself to defeat him.

      And the new depths is really one of the two things that made this book so utterly awesome to me. I had honestly started to dislike Toby from the first two books for being too stupid to live and having the self-preservation instincts of your average goth lemming writing bad poetry about the loveliness of cliffs. In this book, Toby still makes that goth lemming look like a sparkling princess of well-adjustedness, but at least it's acknowledged, addressed, and shown to exasperate the people around her as much as it does me. I will deal with a hell of a lot of stupidity when it's acknowledged as such in universe, and I have some hopes of the character growing a little past it.

      The other thing that made it awesome? I just really like stories about stories.
    • 5/5
      Brilliant new author, keeps getting better. I'm eagerly awaiting the next book. A well done take on Faerie, with enough of the weird in the best way.
    • 4/5
      Exceedingly better than the previous one, like bitter and sweet. Toby is actually a real hero in this one. At the end of the last book, Sykvester wasn't happy and Toby had really let him down but there's no mention of that here. I wish that the author had carried that over to this book so Toby could redeem herself but it all worked out. I was worried that all the action would take place in the fae lands which isn't as interesting to me (it's almost cheating when you don't have to worry about the laws of physics) but there was plenty of modern world as well.

      Small things:
      ~ her obsession with house cats is getting annoying but at least now there're are some dog like monsters that may make cameos. I like the rose goblin but he is really too cutesy for being features in the whole story.
      ~ her track record hasnt been so great recently so why does everyone trust her so easily?
      ~ why would parents let her take one of their kids who's sick when they already have two missing? One of the parents would at least try to insist on going with her and they certainly would watch as she left
      ~ what the hell is going in with Tybalt? Is he bipolar or something? He's been so unexplainably hot and cold the last few books. Oh, and yes, I know that unexplainably isn't really a word but the author used it on page 14 so I figure I can use it in a review.
    • 2/5
      Sigh. I shouldn’t have bought this book. After A LOCAL HABITATION disappointed me, I stopped reading the October Daye books. But the more recent installments have been getting rave reviews, and I wondered if I’d made a mistake. So I bought AN ARTIFICAL NIGHT and it irritated me every bit as much as A LOCAL HABITATION.

      The theme for AN ARTIFICIAL NIGHT appears to be heroism – October is a hero and does that make her foolish or admirable? Does she take risks for good reasons or because she has a death wish? This would be a great theme if October weren’t so passive. I mean, yes, she’s willing to go out and save the day but only after she gets really, really specific instructions about how to do it.

      In AN ARTIFICIAL NIGHT, some kids are kidnapped by Blind Michael, leader of the Hunt. October agrees to try to get the kids back. She then pays visits to almost all the characters who have played important roles in past books, collecting a set of instructions: here’s how to find Blind Michael, here’s how to stay safe, here’s the appropriate strategy to use against him. Then she sets about following the instructions. The end.

      The whole thing was infuriating. I wanted to see October have just one real thought of her own, fabricate some kind of plan…but she doesn’t. The few times she stops to plan she doesn’t really think much past, “choose the most obvious, straightforward route towards my goal,” and while she gets credit for “tricking” Blind Michael on one occasion, I really didn’t see it.

      I still admire Seanan McGuire’s imagination and settings. I still like her strange creatures and magical San Francisco. And I’m more convinced than ever that this series is not for me.
    • 5/5
      Toby's finally beginning to adjust to life as not-a-fish when the unthinkable happens: her best friends' children go missing. Toby has no desire to be a hero, but getting the kids back won't happen if someone doesn't step up to the plate.Grim, bloody, and painful - for Toby that is. The pages just kept turning.
    • 4/5
      I am fully in love with the October Daye series. They're dark, but also funny and that makes them extra awesome. This book deals with someone who's stealing children. The twist here is darker, in many ways, than the others -- especially when children Toby cares about end up getting involved, but Toby handles it well -- as well as Toby can. I love these books and the characters and the feelings I have for them grow from book to book.
    • 2/5
      Sympathetic characters, interesting world, meandering plot and ultimately a heroine whose main characteristic is her tendency to continuously throw herself into hopeless situations where death is certain unless she gets lucky. Which she does.
    • 3/5
      This is the third book in the October Daye series. I felt that it wasn't as strong as the first two books, but it did have a lot going for it, and I will continue to read this series.The strongest part of this book, as of the previous ones, is the world building. McGuire has created a very well-realized fairy world in San Francisco. The parts hang together, and make sense.There are some major revelations in this book, and they have a sense of being planned before hand. There isn't a feeling of "well, I have to do something, why not?" On the other hand, the ending didn't do it for me. Toby goes after a Firstborn who is stealing children, and has to be rescued by her friends. It wasn't clear that this was set up in advance. I would have liked it if she had sat down and plotted Plan B, even if it wasn't revealed until the end. I would also have preferred the rescuers to be the barghests she helped to rescue, for symetry. (I see someone else mentioned that as well.)I also thought that should have been the ending. The next section felt tacked on and pointless. "Ooh, Toby is tired, overworked, underfed, stressed, and going toe-to-toe with a Big Bad." It wasn't needed. (Having started the next book, I see why the Big Bad had to die, but that could have been during the scuffle with her friends/rescuers.)