Last year, I finally picked up Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett. Even though I enjoyed this cozy fantasy novel, I wasn’t fully convinced by it. I was curious for Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands nonetheless and found myself having a much better time whilst reading. This instantly made me curious for the final book in this trilogy, Emily Wilde’s Compendium of Lost Tales. Was I able to enjoy this book as well? This review contains spoilers for the first two books in this series.

About the book

Emily Wilde’s Compendium of Lost Tales by Heather Fawcett
Series: Emily Wilde #3
Published by Del Rey Books on February 11, 2025
Pages: 356
ISBN: 9780593500224
Genres: Adult, Fantasy

The third installment in the heartwarming and enchanting Emily Wilde series, about a curmudgeonly scholar of folklore and the fae prince she loves

Emily Wilde has spent her life studying faeries. A renowned dryadologist, she has documented hundreds of species of Folk in her Encyclopaedia of Faeries. Now she is about to embark on her most dangerous academic project yet: studying the inner workings of a faerie realm—as its queen.

Along with her former academic rival—now fiancé—the dashing and mercurial Wendell Bambleby, Emily is immediately thrust into the deadly intrigues of Faerie as the two of them seize the throne of Wendell’s long-lost kingdom, which Emily finds a beautiful nightmare filled with scholarly treasures.

Emily has been obsessed with faerie stories her entire life, but at first she feels as ill-suited to Faerie as she did to the mortal world: How can an unassuming scholar such as herself pass for a queen? Yet there is little time to settle in, for Wendell’s murderous stepmother has placed a deadly curse upon the land before vanishing without a trace. It will take all of Wendell’s magic—and Emily’s knowledge of stories—to unravel the mystery before they lose everything they hold dear.

My review

Whereas I quite enjoyed the first book and definitely enjoyed the second one, I was not too keen on this final book in the series. I didn’t expect this though, because the stakes were pretty high at the end of the previous instalment. I was expecting Fawcett to follow through on this and even though this partially happened, it was somewhat less interesting than before.

The story picks up right where the previous book left off. Emily and Wendell are about to depart to Wendell’s kingdom so he can reclaim his birth right, the throne of his faerie realm. However, it’s undecided whether Emily successfully killed his stepmother and whether she left in peace. Soon however, they find out she has one more trick upon her sleeve. A curse is spreading through the realm and destroying everything in its wake. Are Wendell and Emily able to stop the curse or do greater sacrifices have to be made?

Unfortunately, I wasn’t too fond of the characters this time. Emily showed a lot of character growth in the first two books. She was a scholar who struggled with social interactions and lacked tact in those. Throughout her expeditions she grew a lot as a person and had a much better understanding of these social interactions. Furthermore, she learnt some tact. In this final book however, her character doesn’t seem to grow at all. She still brings her experiences into practice and she’s still obsessed with research – you can’t take the scholar out of the person –, but apart from this this growth came to a standstill. Wendell on the other hand showed more character development. He has to come to turns with his position as heir of the kingdom and this is a huge difference from what he is used to. He barely has time to adapt, but from the outside he seems to handle this well. Since we only get to see Emily’s POV, we won’t know this for sure. Alongside these main characters, we see both familiar and new faces. Everyone is playing a role in this book, no matter how big or small. It was a nice reunion and it rounds up the series pretty well. However, if character development is important to you, this book is lacking here.

This novel is your typical cozy fantasy. It was more cozy than the other books in this series, as the stakes were not too high. This was quite unexpected seen the past events. There was some tension, but it didn’t keep me on the edge of my seat this time. I was less intrigued by this story. In fact, I was a bit fed up with it in the end. Despite the adventures Emily is having here, not much interesting seems to happen. Therefore, this book feels more dragging than the other ones. I noticed Fawcett being heavy on including footnotes yet again. Personally, they distract me from the actual story. Thankfully I was listening to the audiobook narrated by Ell Potter and Michael Dodds, so these were woven into the narration. However, I didn’t care for them at all. Apart from this little obstacle, the writing was fine. The book therefore was a quick listen which is always nice.

As much as I don’t want to, I have to admit that I’m slightly disappointed by Emily Wilde’s Compendium of Lost Tales by Heather Fawcett. After the final events in the previous book, I expected to see a lot of tension and high stakes here. However, these both fell flat to me. Furthermore, the character development seems to have come to a standstill, something I regret. I value character growth in the books I choose and I’d love to see this element throughout an entire series. Apart from this, the writing is fine which makes this book an easy read and listen. It’s great to see both old and new characters who all play a role here, no matter how big or small. It’s therefore a nice conclusion to a series, but I wasn’t fully enjoying my reading experience. In fact, I was a bit fed up with this novel in the end.