TITLE: Aftermarket Afterlife (InCryptid #13)
AUTHOR: Seanan McGuire
368 pages, DAW Books, ISBN 9780756418618 (print, also available in e-book, audio)
MY RATING: 5 stars out of 5
MY THOUGHTS: One of the many things I love about Seanan McGuire’s InCryptid series is the consistent change in first person narrators. Within the context of a multigenerational family saga that just happens to also be a wonderfully original urban fantasy series, McGuire works to find the most appropriate narrator for each stage of the story. Throw-caution-to-the-wind sibling Verity Price started the series off, followed by her calm-and-cool brother Alex. When the narratorial duties shifted to youngest sibling Antimony for three books, we started to get a sense of the burdens of being a Price. Two books narrated by cousin Sarah moved the series from straight-up urban fantasy to multidimensional adventure, which set the stage for two books narrated by family matriarch Alice during her hunt for long-missing patriarch Thomas. Now, it’s family babysitter (and resident ghost) Mary Dunlavy’s turn. Mary is one of my favorite characters in the series so when she was announced as the next narrator, I was extremely excited. I was not disappointed in the story Mary had to tell, and she is the perfect narrator for this part of the family’s story.
As a ghost, Mary has guided each generation of the Price-Healy clan to adulthood successfully (if not always harm-free) starting with Alice, while at the same time juggling her responsibilities as negotiator and advocate for humans making deals with the otherworldly Crossroads. While each narrator of the series so far has mentioned the difficult position Mary was in balancing these two roles, and while the family understands how Mary’s existence has changed since the Crossroads were destroyed, we as readers have never really been fully privy to Mary’s own thoughts on the matter before now. There are a number of heartbreaking scenes where Mary comes to terms with her own trauma (including, I believe, our first real detailed look at Mary’s death and subsequent first encounter with the Crossroads), as well as scenes in which we are reminded just how much Mary loves her adopted family and how much the knowledge that she will “outlive” (for lack of a better term) her charges pains her. At the same time, Mary is exploring her new freedom from the Crossroads and learning what new limits she may have. Given that her current crop of infant and toddler charges are scattered across the country (Verity’s family is in New York City, Alex’s is in Ohio, while most of the rest of the adults in the family are in the Portland Oregon area), Mary definitely needs to know what these new limits may be, and how far she can stretch the concept of “family.” She does get answers to these questions, although they may not necessarily be the answers she wants.
Of course, the book is not just about Mary and her new existence, as important as that may be to readers like me who absolutely love the character. The war between the Prices (protectors of North America’s Cryptid population) and The Covenant of St. George (looking to purge said population out of existence) is heating up. The Covenant is on the offensive, seeking to vanquish the Prices and their allies once and for all. Which makes Mary the perfect narrator for this volume, as she is one of the few family members who can move cross-country almost instantaneously – which she is called upon to do more than once or twice, pushing up against those potential new limits.
Fair warning: this is a book about war, and Seanan McGuire is an author who understands that no one (individual or family or organization) who experiences war emerges from it unscathed. There is tragedy in this book (no, I won’t spoil exactly what that tragedy is) but I feel that long-time readers should be warned that terrible things happen. I cried. Multiple times. (New readers really should not be starting the series with this book – it’s number 13 for crying out loud and this isn’t the type of series where the characters reset to the status quo at the end of each adventure. Go read the books in order!)
As usual, there is a bonus novella included. I can’t say much about it without spoiling events of the main novel. Suffice to say, it continues the novel’s ruminations on trauma and grief and the way we process and begin healing from both, and it is both heartbreaking and beautiful.
I received an electronic advance reading copy of this book for free from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.