Review: To Dance in Liardon by Adrienne Clarke

When Brigid discovers the truth behind Connell's transformation she’s forced to choose between two men and two worlds. Brigid’s struggle leads her into glittering, ruthless Liradon where she must rescue her true love from a terrible sacrifice or lose him forever.

Seventeen-year old Brigid O'Flynn is an outcast. A chance encounter with the Faerie Queen left her tainted in the eyes of the villagers, who blame the Faerie for the village’s missing women and children. Desperate to win the village’s acceptance Brigid agrees to marry her childhood friend: Serious, hardworking, Connell Mackenna. But when Connell disappears before their wedding Brigid's hopes are shattered. Blamed for her fiancé’s death, Brigid fears she will suffer the same fate as the other village outcasts, the mysterious Willow Women. Lured into Liradon by their inhuman lovers, and cast out weak and broken, the Willow Women spend their lives searching for the way back into Faerie. When Connell suddenly reappears Brigid is overjoyed, but everything is not as it seems. Consumed by his desire for beauty and celebration, Connell abandons his responsibilities, and Brigid soon finds herself drawn into a passionate, dangerous world of two. 

I received this book to give an honest review.
I really enjoyed reading this book, I am not too big on fairies but this story had me hooked. I wanted to find out what Brigid was going to do, what were her choices going to be. Brigid grew up like a normal child until she met the Fairy Queen, when she met her she became an outcast.Anything to do with the faeries is a big no-no you should not even speak their name. The village believed her to be cursed. So she stays to herself, until Connell a childhood friend decides he wants to protect her and her mother from the villagers. He wants to marry her, but Brigid wants to wait for the one she loves. Brigid believes that there is a true love out there.

Then the unthinkable happens Connell disappears, and who else is to blame but Brigid, and the villagers react in not such a nice manner. When Connell does come back Brigid doesn't realize that there could be a reason for him disappearing and ends up falling in love, but with who? Brigid has to make a choice, and the choice she makes at the end I am so glad that she did. I know it was probably a hard choice to make but I am glad she thought of others before herself.

About the author:

I think I became a writer because the world inside my head was so real and vivid, sometimes more so than the outside world. In some sense I have lived parallel lives, present in my real and imaginary lives in different ways. Because much of my childhood was spent searching for faeries or reading about them, it is natural that my work would encompass faerie tale themes and other magical elements. In the words of Tennessee Williams, forget reality, give me magic!

Adrienne has previously published short stories in The Storyteller, Beginnings Magazine, New Plains Review, and in the e-zines A Fly in Amber, Grim Graffiti, Les Bonnes Fees, The Altruist, The Devilfish Review, and Rose Red Review. Her short story, Falling was awarded second place in the 2008 Alice Munro short fiction contest. To Dance in Liradon is her first published novel.

An avid reader of fairy tales and other magical stories, a thread of the mysterious or unexpected runs through all of her work. When she’s not writing Adrienne can be found searching for faeries along with her daughters Callista and Juliet.