Dunkle, Clare B. - The Hollow Kingdom

[oyceter]

Kate and Emily's parents have died, leaving them in care of distant relatives. While going around the house, the sisters discover that there are legends of goblins wandering around, and that their ancestry is not what they expected. And then comes Marak the goblin king to take Kate as his bride.

This starts out feeling a lot like The Perilous Gard; it's the sense of secrets and history of the old house, even though Kate and Emily are living in the 19th century (I think) as opposed to the 15th. There's the pervasive feeling that no one is telling them the whole truth, that people are not who they seem to be. There were some parts that felt derivative, particularly the first minor villain, which very closely parallels the minor villain of The Perilous Gard.

But then, Kate ends up married to the goblin king halfway through the book, and everything changes. I wasn't all that interested in the first half because Kate seemed too good to be true -- beautiful, practical, smart. Also, I felt bad for Emily, who seems to be much younger is and not as beautiful, not at all practical, and not demonstrably smart. I think it was the beautiful that bothered me; Kate Sutton of Perilous Gard is practical and smart, but I like that about her because she's been told her whole life that it's not good, whereas Kate of this book seems to combine Kate Sutton's personality with Alicia Sutton's looks.

Thankfully, the second half is much more interesting; Kate understandably has many difficulties adapting to the goblin kingdom, and I like watching her slowly grow to treasure this land that she hated, how she grows to respect Marak and his people. Even so, Dunkle doesn't gloss over the difficulties of being the King's Wife, particularly in a culture that customarily kidnaps their king's prospective wife. I keep feeling that there's a great, dark, creepy story to be told of the past King's Wives, but this is not that story. Still, it's interesting, though sometimes a little flat.

Links:
coffeeandink's review of the trilogy
cliosfolly's review
tatterpunk's review (spoilery)

Comments

[rushthatspeaks.livejournal.com]

Agreed about liking the second half of the book better than the first. I loved the snake. And agreed that there is a great, dark, creepy story there, and this wasn't it.

[oyceter]

I'm rather interested now in the great, dark creepy story, particularly if the snake tells it!

[cliosfolly.livejournal.com]

I really liked the snake, too! But I more or less disliked the rest (http://cliosfolly.livejournal.com/187379.html), because I thought Dunkle did gloss over a lot of stuff.

Totally separate note: Thank you for posting about B. D. Tatum's Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? as part of your 2006 books round-up--I recently ordered it and found it illuminating and helpful.

[oyceter]

Thanks for the link; I just added it.

Oh, I'm really glad you liked the Tatum! It is one of my Very Important books now.