'Lou never believed in superstitions or magic--until her teenage aunt Neela is kidnapped to the goblin market. The market is a place Lou has only read about--twisted streets, offerings of sweet fruits and incredible jewels. Everything--from the food and wares, to the goblins themselves--is a haunting temptation for any human who manages to find their way in.
'Determined to save Neela, Lou learns songs and spells and tricks that will help her navigate this dangerous world and slip past a goblin's defences--but she only has three days to find Neela before the market disappears and her aunt becomes one of them forever. If she isn't careful, the market might just end up claiming her too.'
I've seen a few reviews for Not Good For Maidens that calls it a retelling of the Christina Rosetti poem Goblin Market, and I don't really see it. Other than the fact that both stories feature a market where goblins gather and that they try to temp humans in, it's completely different. The characters, the setting, the plot, everything about it stands on its own; and I think it really does Not Good For Maidens justice to call it a retelling when it's very clearly its own entity. It would be like referring to Superman as a retelling of Moses; they may share some basic similarities, but they're clearly different things.
Not Good For Maidens tells the story of Lou, a teenage girl who's grown up living with her mother, Laura, and her aunt, May, in the US. Her mother and aunt moved to America almost two decades before, fleeing something in the UK; though they won't tell her what it was. When Lou gets a frantic voicemail from her teenage aunt, Neela, who lives in York, it becomes clear that something terrible has happened to her. When Laura heads to England to try and hep Neela, Lou is left questions as to what is going on.
Convincing May to take her to York after her mother, Lou discovers a world of magic and horror that she could never have imagines. York is home to the Goblin Market, a place that exists beneath the twisting city streets, where goblins tempt humans to enter. As long as you follow the rules you're safe, but if you don't you can end up hurt, or dead. A coven of witches, which May and Laura used to be part of, protect the people of York from the goblins; but Neela, who will one day become a witch, has been taken into the goblin market and hasn't returned. Now Lou must try to find a way to help save her family from the horrors beneath, even as family secrets reveal some shocking revelations.
Not Good For Maidens is a wonderful mixture of YA fantasy, with some very dark and twisted horror. The goblin market is a dangerous, twisted place that's filled with some pretty awful things; and if you're something of a squeamish reader this might not be the best book for you. From jewellery made from human teeth, to eyeballs in jars, to rooms where the bodies of those people who didn't follow the rules are butchered to feed the goblins, there are a fair few moments that will make you pause and question how the visiting humans don't flee the market the second they see these things.
But despite the gore and body horror, this book doesn't revel in the moments that make your skin crawl. Instead, its a story about this family and the things that happen to them over two different periods. The narrative is split across two different times, with the main bulk of the book following Lou in the modern day as she tries to save her family, and the secondary narrative going back in time eighteen years to show us what happened to May, and the reason why she and Laura were banished from York.
The dual narratives work well together, and whilst we only occasionally dip in and out of May's story, it adds more flavour to the main narrative. Lou arrives in York and thinks about how overwhelming it feels, how the streets confuse her; so we get a flashback to May, who grew up there, and see how easily she navigated that life. Lou questions how anyone could possibly be tempted to go into the goblin market, especially if they knew the dangers; so we go back and see the reason why May entered it, even after growing up knowing what happens to humans there. May's story adds details that we'd otherwise lose out on in the main narrative; and it saves Tori Bovalino having to add chunks of exposition or have characters explain stuff. We get to experience it instead, and it makes the experience much more enjoyable.
The incorporation of May's narrative also means that when certain things happen in the present day we, the reader, get to understand their significance, we get to be excited, or shocked, when Lou has no idea what the things happening around her mean. There are some points in the modern timeline where you learn things that reveal some of what is going to happen in the flashbacks too, and whilst it means that you're not left wondering if a character survives, or if something terrible will happen to someone you care about, it just adds more tension because now you know what's coming, and you start to dread waiting for it to happen.
Both of the narratives have strong, young female leads, both of whom feel distinct and separate from the other. They're capable young women who both feel like there's something missing in their lives, or who want something different to what's been planned out for them, and we get to see them both grow, make mistakes, and forge a new path for themselves; even when those around them are telling them not to. It's also wonderful that both of them are queer, and that we get two LGBTQ+ leads in two different times. May is bi, and Lou is ace, and we also get other queer characters that feature around them too. There's also a queer star-crossed lovers narrative that weaves throughout the book that's a joy to read. So if you're looking for some good LGBTQ+ rep in a YA novel, this is one to certainly pay attention to.
Not Good For Maidens is very dark at ties, and isn't afraid to shock its reader with something twisted and gruesome; but it's also a wonderfully written story about very believable young women in these fantastical situations. The book has some great characters, and some super interesting world-building that happens that made it a delight to read. I hope that this isn't the last we see of these characters and this world, but if it is, it was a brilliant time all on its own.
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