Feylin Week 2024, Day 1: Art and Music

@feylinweek

Feylin in Love: An Unofficial ACOTAR Soundtrack

Cover art by @/crimson-spine here on Tumblr.

If you want a breakdown of why I chose certain songs, you can read more below the cut. In any case, I hope you like! ❤️

I tried to keep to songs that had a more fantastical vibe than modern, in order to keep with the fairy tale nature of the first book. Therefore, there are several instrumental songs on here, but there are some notable songs with lyrics that suit Feylin very well. For example:

Without You by Ursine Vulpine, Annaca - Tamlin's thoughts the night before he sends Feyre home

If it's gonna get violent tonight Tell me you're gonna be alright You're gonna be It's an eye for an eye and I don't know if I Want you to fight, want you to fight I'm losing my mind Don't leave me behind We need a bit more time

Find You by Ruelle - Feyre goes Under the Mountain

I can hear the sound Of your barely beating heart Pieces on the ground From a world that fell apart ... I will find you Here inside the dark I will break through No matter where you are I will find you I will find you

Is Your Love Strong Enough by How to Destroy Angels - Feyre endures the Three Trials to win Tamlin back

Just one beat of your heart And stranger than fantasy I knew from the start It had to be the place for me Someone that I would die for There's no way I could ever leave

Notable instrumental songs that I like to imagine for certain scenes include:

Glittering Water by Jiří Horák, Eklipse - Entering the glen and the pool of starlight

Tam Lin (Glasgow Reel) by PeakFiddler - While it may seem obvious, this is definitely something Tamlin would play at Solstice

Edhellond by Unapologetically Melodic - The song of the will o' the wisps

Always Mine by Thomas Bergersen - Feyre defeats the Middengard Worm

Music Under the Mountain by Kelsey Woods - Composed specifically for this scene, it's canon to me, as is the idea that Tamlin is the one playing.

I still haven't found songs that fit every chapter or pro-Feylin interaction, but this is what I have so far, and I really like it. I hope you do, too! Thanks for listening. ❤️

What makes you love Feylin? Not a stan or anything I just wanna know :)

I sat on this ask and just looked at it for so long because honestly? There's so much to love that I can't even put it all in words.

I love that they're low-key a retelling of Eros and Psyche, my favorite Greek myth; I love the setting of their love story--the Spring Court is beautiful and exudes peak fantasy vibes tbh--and how ethereal and absolutely wild and fae the court is; I love that they both had to sacrifice for their love (Tamlin sacrificing his and his courts freedom to remain enslaved forever, and Feyre sacrificing her life to save him).

But the thing I love the most is how... untropey it is. Their love story blends Eros and Psyche, The Ballad of Tam Lin, and Beauty and the Beast but still manages to feel refreshingly original. A lot of the common YA and NA tropes simply do not occur in ACOTAR. Tamlin is not the most beautiful man Feyre has ever seen or found herself attracted to. And Tamlin can't even call Feyre "pretty" at first. The best he can muster is that her hair is clean. There's a strong lack of physical attraction at first, and that's very refreshing in YA--and NA, even--where everything in the romance usually goes back to how good looking both parties are. How many times have you read "he was so infuriatingly handsome" in one of those books? Additionally, Tamlin isn't the "dark haired bad boy with mystical shadow powers" that PLAGUES YA/NA fantasy, so he automatically wins points for that although I like the trope, I only like it when executed well. Which it isn't 90% of the time. And Feyre isn't an all powerful mary sue. She's just an average human trying to save her love. She also isn't wildly ~insecure~ about her looks, and honestly has a very balanced view of her appearance, so that too is refreshing because it completely avoids the whole "I thought I was ugly but this guy I like told me I wasn't so I'm a supermodel, actually" moment.

I love that Tamlin is the shy one who's reluctant when it comes to sex and that Feyre always has to instigate it. I love how soft they are with each other. I love how their romance blossoms as they get to know each other's personalities and hobbies, and it's only then that they both decide the other is beautiful. There are so many more things I could say. But their romance is just so beautiful to me :)

If you are up to it, I'm always interested in hearing about more ballads that are similar to Tam Lin (story, vibes etc) that you like!

If not I'll just say how much I love that the events in Tam Lin are tied to an actual date of Halloween/Hallows eve, and how one day I would love to have a wild hunt themed costume party/parade that happens then.

I hope your day gets better!

Lady Isabelle and the Elf Knight/The Seventh Girl have very strong Tam Lin-ish vibes, in my opinion. A willful maiden runs off with a Knight who may or may not be human and suddenly finds herself in paranormal danger only she can defeat. The Lady Janet vibes are tangible. I also like Willy of Winsburry. There's a moment where Lady Jane's father is asking her who the father of her child is and she replies that it isn't any of her father's Knights or Lords. That just screams "there's ne'er a Lord about your hall shall give the babe his name" to me. And in King Willy's Lady the Queen has been bespelled by her husband's mother and must use her wits to break the curse. This one isn't super close to The Ballad of Tam Lin. But there's something about the dynamic between two powerful ladies and a man whose caught between them that reminds me of it.

I also love that Tam Lin is fixed to a particular day! And your idea of a Wilde Hunt themed event is brilliant! If it ever happens, be sure to send me pictures. I've often thought about throwing a Tam Lin-ish/Faery-ish event around that time, myself.

Thank you so much for your ask and kind words. It means a lot.

Book Review

Echo North. By Joanna Ruth Meyer. Salem: Page Street Publishing, 2019.

Rating: 3/5 stars

Genre: YA fantasy

Part of a Series? No

Summary: Echo Alkaev’s safe and carefully structured world falls apart when her father leaves for the city and mysteriously disappears. Believing he is lost forever, Echo is shocked to find him half-frozen in the winter forest six months later, guarded by a strange talking wolf—the same creature who attacked her as a child. The wolf presents Echo with an ultimatum: If she lives with him for one year, he will ensure her father makes it home safely. But there is more to the wolf than Echo realizes. In his enchanted house beneath a mountain, each room must be sewn together to keep the home from unraveling, and something new and dark and strange lies behind every door. When centuries-old secrets unfold, Echo discovers a magical library full of books-turned-mirrors, and a young man named Hal who is trapped inside of them. As the year ticks by, the rooms begin to disappear, and Echo must solve the mystery of the wolf’s enchantment before her time is up, otherwise Echo, the wolf, and Hal will be lost forever.

***Full review under the cut.***

Content Warnings: blood, violence

Overview: I picked up this book on recommendation from a friend, who also recommended Rosamund Hodge’s Cruel Beauty. I’m always looking for a fun fairy tale retelling, and there were parts of this book that I found clever and enchanting. What prompted me to give this book a middling rating was not the book’s concept or the author’s imagination, but the writing. I felt like Meyer didn’t take advantage of the opportunities for rich descriptions - either of her magical settings or character emotions - and as a result, I think the prose prevented me from fully engaging with the characters or the fantasy world.

Writing: As I said above, the descriptions in this book are rather sparse. While I’m not advocating for lengthy paragraphs that pile detail upon detail, I do think that Meyer could have offered more to make her story feel more vivid. She has some nice turns of phrases and metaphors here and there, but on the whole, I didn’t feel like her prose brought her world to life. For example, when Echo (our protagonist) arrives at the magical house and has her first meal, she describes the banquet: “I sampled little bits of everything: the meat was tender, the fruit summer-sweet, the soup hot and rich with flavor. The glass of pink liquid tasted lightly of honey and berries, and fizzled pleasingly on my tongue.” While I don’t need a catalog of all the food, I did find this description lacking - it doesn’t exactly impart any feeling of richness to me. The same is true for descriptions of the house. Descriptions are given matter-of-factly, without taking advantage of language to impart a sense of otherworldly or magical beauty. Doors are simply red, blue, green, or some other color, stairs are made of dragon scales or paper, some doors are carved with birds or trees. I wanted to be dazzled by this house, but in the end, nothing really popped for me.

The lack of rich descriptions also made for problems in portraying character emotions. While characters would sometimes act in ways that indicated how they were feeling, I felt like a lot of emotions were simply told to us. It felt like Echo (who narrates the story using a first person perspective) had very little interiority, and that her narration was keeping her at a distance from the reader. Meyer attempts to make up for this, I think, with a quirk of hers, which is to repeat something two or three times or to put something in italics. For example, when Echo and Ivan (a guide she hires to take her through the wilderness) slip through some ice, Echo describes rescuing Ivan as “I wrap my other hand tight around Ivan’s arm, and pull” or, when describing emotion, Meyer writes “he wept and wept.” It wasn’t overly irritating, but it happened enough for me to notice as a pattern.

I also thought that the prose was lacking in terms of pace. The entire book seemed to progress at roughly the same pace, which made some parts feel rushed and others feel slow. While it may not be a problem for readers who like their stories to move along, I found that it rushed through events that I would have liked to see explored more or given more emotional weight. It gets a bit better in Part 2, but I still would argue that with all the travel scenes, the pace might not suit some readers.

Plot: The plot of this book follows your typical “Beauty and the Beast” or “Cupid and Psyche” structure. A girl is taken to the home of a prince (or lord, or what have you), the latter cursed by a witch to appear monstrous by day. The prince makes clear that the girl must not look at him at night (which is when he changes back to his true form), lest he be taken by the witch forever. You can probably guess the rest.

In terms of remaking or subverting this plot structure, Meyer doesn’t do anything I’d call revolutionary. It proceeds as one might expect. Where this book shines, however, is in the details that make it unique. For example, the magical house that Echo must routinely “rebind” (something akin to stabilizing) using her magical needle and thread was a lovely image, and the threat of its “unbinding” was intriguing. The library of mirror-books, too, was a wonderful addition, and was an interesting way to think about how we “experience” stories. I also really liked the transformation scene (which readers might be familiar with if they know the story of Tam Lin, for example). The transformations really hammered home how scary and dangerous it might be to hold on to someone as they change form, and I think Meyer handled it well. I also think the stuff she does with time was clever (though I won’t spoil it for you).

But by far the biggest flaw in the plot is the lack of shape. While I got the sense that Echo wanted to help the Wolf, there were so many scenes of her wandering (the house, the mirror-books, the frozen wilderness) that I couldn’t see how scenes built upon one another to progress towards some kind of end; scenes simply happened. I also would have liked to see a recurring theme wound into the plot. While there are some (self-acceptance, the power of stories, etc.), they aren’t really integral to the unfolding of the plot. They’re just kind of there.

Characters: This story is told from the first person perspective of Echo, a sixteen year old girl who was disfigured as a child by the very wolf who pressures her to live with him years later (this isn’t a spoiler - it happens right away). Echo was a refreshing protagonist in that she wasn’t always confident in herself and didn’t have that “pretty but thinks she’s plain” vibe. However, I also found her to be a little too perfect. She reads so much about anatomy that she has basic healing skills, she teaches herself piano, and learns to fence so she can be somewhat competent in any given battle situation. Her only real faults are that she tries to help others too much - she tries to please her stepmother, but ends up angering her by being better at piano; she tries to rescue the Wolf, but accidentally angers him, etc. I wanted a little more nuance from her, some real flaw that she could grow from. I think her scars suggested that her character growth was one of self-acceptance, but I don’t think it was strong enough or woven into the plot other than the moments when she expresses some angst.

The Wolf (our “beast” in this “Beauty and the Beast” tale) is likewise a little void of flaws or interesting personality. He’s mostly there to teach Echo how to care for the house and to be mopey about his impending fate, dropping bits of lore or information when needed. I honestly didn’t get a real sense of why Echo ended up feeling affection for him, other than he was kind. Even when we learn of his connection with the mirror-books (and that’s all I’ll say about that), I didn’t quite understand the appeal. I did like the reveal towards the end of his true motives, but I do wish there was more to him so that we could see why Echo feels things for him.

Supporting characters were likewise a little flat for me. Echo’s stepmother was a bit too stereotypically nasty, the Wolf Queen lacking motivation or nuance, and Mokosh (a fellow reader) a bit too convenient. I never got the sense that they were characters, mostly just archetypes.

Other: This book doesn’t have a lot of proper worldbuilding, which may please some readers, but annoy others. Echo’s village is never really named and we don’t know how magic really works or how it fits in with the non-magical world. I was a bit bothered by the lack of worldbuilding because it meant that I wasn’t fully aware of the limits or rules of the magic, nor did I get a strong Slavic “flavor” to the story.

Recommendations: I would recommend this book if you’re interested in

fairy tale retellings (especially “Beauty and the Beast” or “Cupid and Psyche”)

enchanted houses

Slavic folklore

Coffee Shop AU and It’s Not You, It’s My Enemies ?

I have basically written this one in Merlin fandom! Also, the latter is a popular trope tonight, three of you asked me for it without ships attached and with different tropes. So I think, my friends, that the question becomes ... how do I write a coffee shop AU that is also a fairy tale AU and has an almost kiss as well as the “it’s not you, it’s my enemies” element?

*rolls up sleeves*

House rules these days are that people who don’t ask for ships get D&D ships by default, and I have been in a Quil/Phi/Terry mood!

So, I’m getting strong Janet and Tam Lin modern AU vibes here (and never mind that I have also written THAT fic for Daredevil fandom!).

Phi and Terry run a coffee shop, and there is a very pretty patron who comes in and they are trying to subtly woo her with baked goods, but clearly some shit is going on with her life and she plays the “it’s not you, it’s my enemies” thing so straight it’s a little painful. And she lets them get close, and one of them tries a kiss at some point (Terry Windrose, the master of shooting his shot) but she is out of there SO FAST.

Anyway, eventually she breaks down and says she’s going to be taken by demons or something (because backstory!) in place of her sister and when they ask her how to fix it, she gives the traditional Janet and Tam Lin answer after a major Self-Sacrifice Dance, and the rest of the story proceeds from there!