She's a stunner.
Edinburgh, 1844. Eighteen-year-old Lady Aileana Kameron, the only daughter of the Marquess of Douglas, has everything a girl could dream of: brains, charm, wealth, a title—and drop-dead beauty.
She's a liar.
But Aileana only looks the part of an aristocratic young lady. she's leading a double life: She has a rare ability to sense the sìthíchean—the faery race obsessed with slaughtering humans—and, with the aid of a mysterious mentor, has spent the year since her mother died learning how to kill them.
She's a murderer.
Now Aileana is dedicated to slaying the fae before they take innocent lives. With her knack for inventing ingenious tools and weapons—from flying machines to detonators to lightning pistols—ruthless Aileana has one goal: Destroy the faery who destroyed her mother.
She's a Falconer.
The last in a line of female warriors born with a gift for hunting and killing the fae, Aileana is the sole hope of preventing a powerful faery population from massacring all of humanity. Suddenly, her quest is a lot more complicated. She still longs to avenge her mother's murder—but she'll have to save the world first.
This book is the first in a trilogy. Combining historical fiction with steampunk and a healthy dash of fantasy and Celtic mythology, this was a great first installment. I could not read this book quickly enough. I inhaled this book in about one sitting.
The characters in this book were so well-developed and well-realized. I loved how flawed both of the protagonists (Alieana and Kiaran) were and how they were depicted as being morally grey. Usually I balk at the double-life trope that this book employs, being cliche and uninteresting, but here it works in spades and shows the great contrast that is Alieana's life - between what she is supposed to be and who she really is. One thing that I really loved was how her best friend wasn't oblivious to what was really going on, and was aware that there was more going on than what was attempted to being explained away by Alieana. Even the side characters were well-developed.
The chemistry between Alieana and Kiaran, too. Oh, my goodness. There were hints of a love triangle, but that was quickly eliminated and ended up not being the case whatsoever, which is such a relief. This book was so refreshing in that it didn't adhere to the traditional "double-life" cliches in which there is a love interest in each world. I also like how the romance parts were kind of a back-burner thing - it was there, it was important, but the two leads were more focused on saving the world than their feelings ... mostly.
The world-building in this novel was superbly done. I love how Elizabeth May combined history with fantasy and steampunk, creating an alternative history in a way. I'm partially Scottish, so I was super pleased that this takes place in Scotland in the nineteenth century. There should be more novels set in Scotland. Additionally, May's writing style is incredible, with witty dialogue, Celtic language, and slow building reveals. Nothing is ever too quickly revealed unless it's integral to the plot.
One teeny-tiny gripe I have is how certain things are not explained as well as they could be. It's a small gripe because this is only the first book in the trilogy and things need to be saved for the next two books. I found it equally refreshing and aggravating that it ended on a cliffhanger. Not many books end on cliffhangers nowadays, but if I were reading these books as they were being published, I wouldn't want to wait at least a year to find out what happens next.
All in all, I had a lot of fun with this book. It had all the right amounts of history, steampunk, fantasy, and Celtic/Scottish mythology. I found the faeries of this world to be sinister and chilling. While I did have a few minor issues with the novel, they were not major, as this is the first in a trilogy, and not everything can be revealed or resolved right off the bat. With realistic characters, sharp dialogue, unique and strong world-building, and an intriguing alternate history of mid-nineteenth century Scotland, The Falconer is a great start to a trilogy, and I'm going to give it a 4/5 - it's one of the strongest first-in-a-trilogy novels I've read in a while, and it will only get better from here.
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