Indexing Review

“Fairy tales want to have happy endings, and that’s fine – for fairy tales – but they do a lot of damage to the people around them in the process, the ones whose only crime was standing in the path of an onrushing story.”

Indexing is a police procedural in a world where all the fairy tales ever told can happen again at any time with disastrous effects. Originally released as a serialized novel, I found it walks the line well between the individual “episodes” feeling like regular chapters of a novel (which wouldn’t be necessarily be the best approach for that distribution) and individual short stories (which would lose some of the overarching development and tension). The deft touch in execution makes this read equally well as a complete novel (as I am) as I imagine it did in serialized format.

“There are a couple of things you’ll need to know about fairy tales before we can get properly started. Call it agent orientation or information overload, whatever makes you feel more like you’ll be able to sleep tonight.”

I call it info dumping of the highest order, even though McGuire tries to be stylish and clever about it. The odd premise I’ve described above is extremely interesting but requires a HUGE amount of information and context to be immediately unloaded on the reader in the first section. As a result it takes some time to get acclimated, but things are quite intriguing once you do and much better paced after the initial part.

“My day began with half a dozen bluebirds beating themselves to death against my window, leaving little bloody commas on the glass to mark their passing.”

In addition to being curious about the concept, Indexing caught my eye because it’s written by the author of the October Daye series, which I adore. McGuire’s exquisite gift for dialogue and descriptions is on display here as well and along with strong characters and an engaging underlying plot makes this a thoroughly captivating read once it builds momentum. My favorite character here reminds me a little of an equally amusing one from October Daye, but the wonderful thing is the cast are all unique with both strengths and flaws directly tied to the narrative. Watching everything unfold among a tense and mysterious atmosphere was a treat.

Overall this is a read that requires some patience, but really rewards the effort.