schneefink

I did read Goldenhand after all, the sequel to the Abhorsen trilogy. It had a lot of elements I liked a lot, but unfortunately I thought it didn't live up to its potential.

A lot of that was the pacing. In the first two thirds of the book the chapters alternated between Ferin fleeing for her life to deliver a very important message, and Lirael and Nick awkwardly flirting. I liked both storylines but the switches didn't work for me because the stakes were so different. Why do I read about flirting now when an entire village is being destroyed?
And then the ending was extremely quick, it felt like there was very little space to actually look at what happened and then it was all over, which was a bit of a shame.

Several things happened that I'd looked forward to, like Lirael returning to the Clayr and learning about what happened to her mother and meeting the Disreputable Dog again, but because the ending was so fast they didn't really feel resolved. Also, Ferin got the Charter mark, which Sameth says requires a deep commitment to the Charter, off-screen! What does that mean for her, and her connection to her tribe and her future etc.? You can't really do that to a main character, she kinda ceased to be that once she delivered her message and was mostly seen via Sam. Not that I wasn't happy to see Sam again!
Also, Mogget :) Seeing him again was great, even if it was only for a brief moment, and Ferin provoked him beautifully.

I was wary of finding out what had happened to Clariel, but I actually liked it, unfortunately stumbling upon another powerful Free Magic creature and being unable to resist fits. And I liked Chlorr's fight with Lirael. (Is the Disreputable Dog now always going to show up when Lirael is in trouble? …whatever.)

And Lirael and Nick were cute together :)
I also enjoyed the prequel short story about Nick and the free magic creature, though I suspect it worked a lot better in combination with Goldenhand than it would have on its own.
(I started reading the other short stories in the "Across the Wall" collection, but I didn't really love the first few and I'm not sure I'll finish.)