According to Goodreads.com:
Alysha Gale is a member of a family capable of changing the world with the charms they cast. Then she receives word that she's inherited her grandmother's junk shop in Calgary, only to discover upon arriving that she'll be serving the fey community. And when Alysha learns just how much trouble is brewing in Calgary, even calling in the family to help may not be enough to save the day.
I want to go on record that I am a Tanya Huff fan. As a lifetime reader of fantasy, science fiction, and supernatural stories (long before they were popular with the Twilight set) I have enjoyed several of Huff’s books completely. Her writing is usually fast paced, with frequent references to pop culture and a great deal of humorous dialogue (and that’s usually not limited to just the human characters of her books). As a fan of the Buffy the Vampire series on TV, I have often thought that Huff could have easily written for that show which also relied on snappy dialogue. Other books of hers have had smart, quick plots, and supernatural elements that were enjoyable and, dare I say it, believable? The Keep Series, with the talking magical cats, are some of my favorites, because I could imagine my geriatric old tom saying many of the things the cats in those books said. But having said all the reasons why I have liked other Tanya Huff books that I read, let me say that the best thing The Enchantment Emporium was the summary I found on Goodreads.com.
From the opening chapter of The Enchantment Emporium I felt like I had been dumped into a blender with lots of action, about a thousand characters, and magical elements, with the blades chop chop chopping, and no way to make sense of the combinations.
I often teach students to begin writing a story in the middle of the action as a hook to readers, then later move into narration. And Huff did the same. And then did more of it. Then a little more. She forgot the narration part. After the first 50 pages I was so frustrated that I wanted to just quit, because I had no idea what was really going on. There had been lots of action, lots of magic, and a whole passel of hints about underlying cause and effect, but truly, I was as lost as any reader could be. I kept up though, because I was sure it would get better.
I was wrong.
Another thing I found incredibly difficult about the story was the huge number of characters. The lead character, Alysha, comes from a large family of magical witches. Which is great. I come from a large family too (and while some might be witches, they’re not magical, but that’s an entirely different blog entry). But as a reader I had a terrible time sorting out who everyone was. Part of the problem was the sheer numbers, but added to that were characters who had gender opposite names (Charlie is a girl I had to keep reminding myself) and characters who had both a name and a nickname, each frequently referenced. Then there were multiple references to how these characters were related: whose aunt, whose cousin, whose sister’s brother’s ex-boyfriend’s gay boyfriend. It was overwhelming. As a reader all the relationship ins and outs just didn’t make the action or story of the book move along. It added nothing, and detracted a great deal.
A third aspect of the book that I really disliked was the magical mechanism itself. I’ve had 40+ years of experience reading supernatural/magical stories, so I know how to fall into a “wiling suspension of disbelief” with great ease. But honestly, the mechanism of this magic I just could not bear. While I understand and have no problem with the idea of magical families, this magical family was . . . incestuous. While there weren’t any graphic depictions of sex,(although there was some strong and graphic language in parts) it was clear the cousins were sexually active with each other, an idea that I find reprehensible. No matter how many times Huff wrote that the Aunties were “keeping the lines separate” to indicate that the cousins weren’t too genetically closely related to marry and procreate, I’m sorry, I just can’t believe it. I come from a large family, raised closely together like the cousins in this book, and there is no way that a family raised that closely could grow up and look at each other as potential mates. My ability to suspend my disbelief just doesn’t extend to long term, ingrained incest. Certainly I’ve read my fair share of books with depictions of intercourse, but the idea of a large incestuous family that outsiders just determine is perfectly OK, that was just too gross for me to bear.
By the end of the book I had a clear idea of the story, the magic, and the characters, but there was nothing that I enjoyed. This book will not become a Dangerous Book, because it truly had nothing redeeming to offer. There is no one for whom I can recommend this book, and I will be deleting it from my Kindle roll, posthaste!.
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