This was very well written, but also differently written. The pacing and structure of the chapters flouted most of the 'rules' I keep getting pounded into my head at various writing workshops, so on one hand it was very refreshing and artful and fresh-feeling, and on another it was befuddling, because I kept trying to fit the style into a box that it didn't want to go into.

Thisby feels like a very real place. Like I could call up an old timey travel agent and book a trip there to take in their frightening man-eating horse races. Even as I type that, knowing it's a made up place, and knowing that wanting to go watch a man-eating horse race is absurd, it still feels very real. For Stiefvater to have been able to accomplish that, is a feat indeed.

Adding to that feeling is how well the main characters are done. Kate (Puck) and Sean are both very reserved, private people. It fits in perfectly with their world, their small island town, the other people there (who also feel quite real), and how they would really behave and be, if they weren't mere figments of Stiefvater's imagination. I really do have the uncanny feeling that I've just listened to a documentary and I'm writing about two historical characters whose lives we happen to know a lot about.

It's fantasy, because there is magic and mythical creatures, but it doesn't feel like fantasy. If you like horses, like strong female characters and Mr. Darcy type slow burning, barely there romances, you'll love this. Though, as I write that, I realize I'm probably one of the few left on Goodreads to read this. Actually, I listened, and I ordered it from Audible because it's narrated by Fiona Hardingham, who is amazing. Steve West does Sean's parts, and he nails it. It's wonderfully well done. Even if you've read this before, the audiobook is worth a go.

Stiefvater's writing is wonderfully quotable - there were moments I rewound to listen and experience chills, or tears. I'd've been madly highlighting if I had been reading.

I'm tempted to take off a half a star because I so wanted an epilogue, but the ending is probably stronger and more artful the way she's left it. Loose ends are not left dangling, and how it ends does fit with the protagonist's personalities. Fast forwarding to a happily ever after wouldn't have felt true, even though I'd really like to have seen it.

For conservative and younger readers: It's very clean, though there is probably swearing, I didn't notice, though. No f-bombs. No sex, though there are quite a lot of rude comments and some inferences from the island dwellers. Many men are very chauvinistic, though that nicely raises the stakes for Kate/Puck to show them all.