Twelve-year-old September's ordinary life in Omaha turns to adventure when a Green Wind takes her to Fairyland to retrieve a talisman the new and fickle Marquess wants from the enchanted woods. - (Baker & Taylor)

After ordinary, 12-year-old September is told her help is needed in Fairyland, she is instructed by the Marquess to retrieve a talisman from the enchanted woods, which leads her to unexpected adventure and friendship. - (Baker & Taylor)

"One of the most extraordinary works of fantasy, for adults or children, published so far this century."—Time magazine, on the Fairyland series

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER; for fans of Impossible Creatures!

Twelve-year-old September lives in Omaha, and used to have an ordinary life, until her father went to war and her mother went to work. One day, September is met at her kitchen window by a Green Wind (taking the form of a gentleman in a green jacket), who invites her on an adventure, implying that her help is needed in Fairyland. The new Marquess is unpredictable and fickle, and also not much older than September. Only September can retrieve a talisman the Marquess wants from the enchanted woods, and if she doesn't . . . then the Marquess will make life impossible for the inhabitants of Fairyland. September is already making new friends, including a book-loving Wyvern and a mysterious boy named Saturday.

With exquisite illustrations by acclaimed artist Ana Juan, Fairyland lives up to the sensation it created when author Catherynne M. Valente first posted it online. For readers of all ages who love the charm of Alice in Wonderland and the soul of The Golden Compass, here is a reading experience unto itself: unforgettable, and so very beautiful.

The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making is a Publishers Weekly Best Children's Fiction title for 2011.

CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE is the author of over a dozen books of fiction and poetry, and is best-known for her urban speculative fiction, including Palimpsest (winner of the 2010 Lambda Award), and The Orphan's Tales: In the Night Garden. This, her first novel for young readers, was posted online in 2009 and won the Andre Norton Award—the first book to ever win before traditional publication. Cat Valente lives on an island off the coast of Maine with her partner, two dogs, and an enormous cat.

ANA JUAN is a world-renowned illustrator known in this country for her wonderful covers for the New Yorker magazine, as well as the children's books The Night Eater, and Frida, written by Jonah Winter. She lives in Spain.

Booklist Reviews

*Starred Review* When the Green Wind offers to whisk young September from her dull home in Nebraska off to Fairyland, she jumps at the chance and onto his flying leopard. Once in Fairyland (a self-aware mashup of surreal otherworlds from Wonderland to Oz to Neverland), she makes fast friends with a wyverary (the offspring of a dragon and a library); runs afoul of the wicked little girl Marquess, who rules the land with tyrannical poutiness; and traipses about in a loosely plotted series of merry, harrowing, and just plain weird adventures. September herself is a standard-issue fairy-tale fish out of water, ever flummoxed and begging pardon but given to sharp outbursts of pluck in pluckworthy situations. The setting, however, fairly bursts at the seams with darkness, wonder, and oodles of imaginative quirks, while Valente's busy and at times intrusive narration is thick, thorny, and stylistically vigorous. Chapters are headed by Juan's dreamy, stubby-figured drawings and a wry look forward ("In Which September Enters the Worsted Wood, Loses All Her Hair, Meets Her Death, and Sings It to Sleep"). The rich, dense vocabulary presents some tricky footing, but for readers like September, who "read often and liked it best when words did not pretend to be simple but put on their full armor and rode out with colors flying," this book is quite simply a gold mine. Copyright 2011 Booklist Reviews.

Horn Book Guide Reviews

Twelve-year-old September, tired of her middle-class WWII-era existence in Omaha, seizes the opportunity to explore Fairyland. She loses her shadow and her heart, meets her own Death, and rides a wild velocipede. When September finally confronts the tyrannical Marquess, she learns some harsh truths. Readers will find the wonderfully bizarre world of Fairyland and September herself compelling. Copyright 2011 Horn Book Guide Reviews.

Horn Book Magazine Reviews

When the Green Wind (a dapper gentleman clothed head to toe in green) appears at her kitchen window, twelve-year-old September, tired of her middle-class WWII-era existence in Omaha, seizes the opportunity to explore Fairyland. September and the Green Wind are soon separated, but he keeps benevolent watch over her from afar as she befriends a Wyvern and a djinni-like Marid, loses her shadow and her heart, meets her own Death, and rides a wild velocipede. When September finally confronts the tyrannical Marquess, who has severely curtailed the magic of Fairyland, she learns some harsh truths about Fairyland, home, and growing up. The plot occasionally stalls on philosophical tangents ("All children are heartless. They have not grown a heart yet, which is why they can climb tall trees and say shocking things and leap so very high that grown-up hearts flutter in terror"), but readers will find the wonderfully bizarre world of Fairyland and September herself compelling enough to persevere. Part fairy tale, part Wizard of Oz, with the narrative style of Victorian storytellers and a splash of steampunk, The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland (previously published online and winner of the 2009 Andre Norton Award) is by turns amusing, wrenching, and thought-provoking. katie bircher Copyright 2011 Horn Book Magazine Reviews.

Kirkus Reviews

In this modern fairytale, an insouciant, "somewhat heartless" 12-year-old girl from Omaha visits Fairyland and accepts a quest to rescue its inhabitants from the rule-mad Marquess. September's father's in the army, and her mother works a factory shift. When the Green Wind arrives at her kitchen window and invites her to Fairyland, the "ill-tempered and irascible" September eagerly accepts. Soon she's flying on the back of the Leopard of Little Breezes, while Green Wind warns her she may be "ticketed or executed, depending on the mood of the Marquess," if she tramples on any rules. Also, she must be prepared to make sacrifices and she must never tell her true name. After solving a puzzle, September passes into Fairyland, encounters myriad fantastical creatures and meets her soon-to-be helpers, a red dragonlike Wyvern and a blue jinnlike Marid. When the Marquess co-opts her to retrieve a magical sword from the deadly Worsted Wood and holds the Wyvern and Marid hostage, September sacrifices everything to save her friends. Told by an omniscient narrator who directly engages readers, the densely textured text deftly mixes and matches familiar fairytale elements, creating a world as bizarre and enchanting as any Wonderland or Oz and a heroine as curious, resourceful and brave as any Alice or Dorothy. Complex, rich and memorable. (Fantasy. 10-14)

Publishers Weekly Reviews

Originally published in serialized form online (where it became the first e-book to win the Andre Norton Award for Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy), this glittering confection is Valente's first work for young readers. The book's appeal is crystal clear from the outset: this is a kind of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by way of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, made vivid by Juan's Tenniel-inflected illustrations. An omniscient narrator relates the absurd Fairyland adventures of 12-year-old September from Omaha, Neb. Valente seems more interested in crafting the individual episodes, and her narrator's moral observations thereon, than in September's overall quest to retrieve a witch's spoon from the terrible marquess of Fairyland. Homages abound—an echo of Tolkien here, a cameo by Lord Dunsany there, and a nod for Hayao Miyazaki, too, all without feeling derivative. It's an allusive playground for adults, but even though young readers won't catch every reference, those who thrill to lovingly wrought tales of fantasy and adventure (think McCaughrean or DiCamillo) will be enchanted. And though the pace is lackadaisical, it's just as well—it's the sort of book one doesn't want to end. Ages 10–14. (May)

School Library Journal Reviews

Gr 4–8—Once upon a time in Omaha, NE, a child named September is visited by the Green Wind and spirited away to Fairyland on the back of the Leopard of Little Breezes. Things are not going well in Fairyland, where the evil Marquess holds sway. She asks September to retrieve an item for her from the autumn lands, where there is "always cider and pumpkin pie...and it is always Halloween." September is hesitant to aid the Marquess in her plans for Fairyland, but the offer provides her an opportunity to help friends she has met on her journey. While this book is written in a sophisticated, adult storyteller's voice, with many asides directed at (presumably adult) readers ("you must remember from your own adventuring days how harsh a task lies before her..."), there is no denying that it possesses a surfeit of imagination. Along the way September meets a bookish Wyvern, a herd of wild bicycles, and even pieces of 100-year-old household furniture that can think and act for themselves. Think The Phantom Tollbooth (Random, 1961) crossed with The Wizard of Oz infused with the absurdity of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Does this book rise to the level of a classic in the same way as these three books? Perhaps not, but the payoff, when all is revealed, will give readers an immense degree of satisfaction. Juan's black-and-white illustrations appear as headings for each chapter and nicely convey the strange and dreamlike quality of the proceedings. Having previously been published online, and having already won a couple of major awards, this book should have a built-in audience.—Tim Wadham, St. Louis County Library, MO