Those sketches turned into a book because I wanted to invite more people into the Faultlines, a world I’ve always known but wasn’t quite ready for until that moment, that day when I just made peace with myself and let it flow. The book is a collection of notes and illustrations on the many fae and faeries that Compiet has encountered on her travels on the Faultline, the space where the world of the Other and our world intersect.

Faeries of the Faultlines by Iris Compiet - Kayla C. Reviews Faeries of the Faultlines by Iris Compiet - Kayla C. Reviews

Series Info/Source: This is a stand alone book. I got a copy of this book as a gift for Christmas last year. They can stay underwater for a very long time, rarely rising to the surface to breathe. When they do, only their glowing white eyes are visible, as their otherwise dark features hide them from sight. Their thin, dark, and long hair allows them to cover the water's surface, creating the illusion of solid ground. Once a child steps on this treacherous surface, they will find themselves ensnared in the dark tangle of the nykr's hair, choke, and drown." I can't tell you how many times I read Faeries, as a kid. You'd find me hunched in some little nook of the house, listening to Enya on my Walkman. Like creatures in our world, the faeries lives in different habitats. What were some of your favorite types of environments to explore? The other issue I had is with the font used for the "written" portions of the journal. The font used was a super slanted and cramped cursive font that I struggled to read, especially on some of the faerie names. It would have been nice to have these parts in a more legible font. The last complaint I have is that a lot of the drawings in here were very unfinished feeling, they were just rough sketches. I enjoy more finished drawings, but that is a personal preference.

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This is fashioned to look like a sketchbook from a naturalist wandering in search of faeries. Oh, the lengths I had to go to to get my hands on this. Sadly, it didn‘t hold up to the hype/promise. Two staple books of most 70s 'right on' households were Rien Poortvliet's Leven en Werken van de Kabouter, known as Gnomes in English, and Brian Froud and Alan Lee's Faeries. Connections such as talking about Michelangelo possibly using crushed faery pupae cement the Faultlines even more as a real place. Can you talk about developing those kind of touchpoints?

Faeries of the Faultlines - Iris Compiet Faeries of the Faultlines - Iris Compiet

I enjoyed that there were pencil sketches and full-colour illustrations for each type of faerie as well as their variations (presented as local incarnations). It gives the book that kind of field guide feel. The text is in italics, which sometimes makes it hard to decipher, but no doubt is also intended to reinforce that field guide feel. My guess is that artist Iris Compiet has a similar heartfelt connection to Froud and Lee's work (I mean, messrs Froud and Lee have written forewords for the book, so..), as she more or less has in this book made a sequel of sorts. Her art hewes close to Froud and Allen's style, but also builds on it. And the art is truly magnificent. (And it turns out she's Dutch, which is a fun coincidence.) if you’re looking for a fantastical book that will capture your imagination, Faeries of the Faultlines by Iris Iris Compiet is the rarest of artist: That who invokes a complete and cohesive reality with every image she creates. Beautiful, powerful and contemplative all at once. -- Guillermo Del Toro Let me tell you about Faeries, let me take you away on a journey, an adventure.

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The stories in the book are often very short and more like notes on particular faeries. I don’t want people to just read my stories but instead be able to add to them, to elaborate on them in their minds as they read. For me fantasy is reality, or reality is fantasy. To make fantasy real you have to root it in reality. There needs to be a link, a “what if” moment. The moment that sows a seed of doubt about the reality of the fantasy. As kids we can see a world that is magical. We look at really ordinary things with wonder and amazement. It makes sense that a certain stone just is a dragon egg. These are things we unlearn as adults. Fact and logic take over, but is it really fact and logic? Isn’t it much more fun to sometimes wonder about the possibilities that lie in the what if?