Julia Kagawa’s Iron Daughter is the second book in the Iron Fey series.
After rescuing her brother from the Iron Fey and defeating the Iron King Machina, Meghan must venture to the Winter Court in order to fulfill her contract with Ash. The book picks up a sometime after Ash left her to the mercy of Queen Mab of the Winter Court. Isolated in the frozen court, Meghan tries to inform others about the danger of the Iron Fey, her warnings fall on deaf ears. When the powerful Scepter of Seasons is stolen by the Iron Fey, the Winter Court immediately accuses the Summer Court and prepares for war. Meghan must find and return the scepter to prevent a war that will destroy them all.
While slightly more aware, Meghan has not changed much from The Iron King. She is still extremely stubborn and often rushes into things without thinking about their consequences. She is also extremely caring to a point where she puts herself at risk. While this isn’t an uncommon attribute for a protagonist, Meghan is surrounded by fey that have a strong self-preservation instinct and a tendency to be quite egocentric. Their behavior makes Meghan’s kindness stand out. What differentiates the Meghan of The Iron King and the Meghan of The Iron Daughter is romance. In The Iron King, Meghan was too preoccupied with her kidnapped younger brother to worry about romance. In The Iron Daughter, Meghan has fallen deeply in love with Ash despites Ash’s intelligent attempts to push her away. Much of her confidence disappears along with her powers. The only characteristic that seems to grow in this book is Meghan’s love for Ash.
The Iron Daughter was a great read. This book was better than its predecessor. By replacing Meghan’s annoying insistence on rescuing her brother with a mission to prevent a war, the book became much more urgent. Meghan’s inability to use her newfound powers made the story even more interesting as she had to face danger without them. Sadly, she was, once again, dependent on her faerie friends to save her, but the higher stakes made the story was more interesting. A problem many may have with this book is its love triangle. Both Ash and Puck are vying for Meghan’s affection. Like many books, the love triangle follows the simple formula of having one boy that the girl loves, but can’t have and one that the girl can have, but doesn’t love. The boy she can’t have tries to push her away so they both can avoid the repercussions. The girl whines over the boy she can’t have, yet barely considers the one she can. This romance is beginning to sound a lot like Twilight. Whether this is a pro or con is dependent on the reader. Despite the romance, the plot moved at a fast pace and had many twists and turns to keep you on your feet. Light humor and mischief kept the story from feeling dreary or dragging.
I give this 359 page book 4 stars.
The Iron Fey
Like most faeries, these faeries are known for the half-truths and deceptions. Their lands are divided into the Seelie and Unseelie courts and then further divided by individual rulers. What marks these fey as different is that their powers are fueled by emotions and life. The faeries were brought into existence thanks to human imagination and humanities recent neglect of faeries is affected their world.