#and fablehaven

[cyrankaa]

[annoyingbird22]

dragon riders are the horse girls of fantasy

[dicegremlin]

this one goes out to me and the like 3 other ppl who have read fablehaven lmao

[book--brackets]

The Scholomance by Naomi Novik (2020-2022)

A Deadly Education is set at Scholomance, a school for the magically gifted where failure means certain death (for real) — until one girl, El, begins to unlock its many secrets. There are no teachers, no holidays, and no friendships, save strategic ones. Survival is more important than any letter grade, for the school won’t allow its students to leave until they graduate… or die! The rules are deceptively simple: Don’t walk the halls alone. And beware of the monsters who lurk everywhere. El is uniquely prepared for the school’s dangers. She may be without allies, but she possesses a dark power strong enough to level mountains and wipe out millions. It would be easy enough for El to defeat the monsters that prowl the school. The problem? Her powerful dark magic might also kill all the other students.

Fablehaven by Brandon Mull (2006-2010)

For centuries, mystical creatures of all description were gathered to a hidden refuge called Fablehaven to prevent their extinction. The sanctuary is one of the last strongholds of true magic. Enchanting? Absolutely. Exciting? You bet. Safe? Well, actually, quite the opposite...

 Kendra and her brother, Seth, have no idea their grandfather is the current caretaker of Fablehaven. Inside the gated woods, ancient laws keep order among greedy trolls, mischievous satyrs, plotting witches, spiteful imps, and jealous fairies. However, when the rules get broken, powerful forces of evil are unleashed, forcing Kendra and Seth to face the greatest challenge of their lives, to save their family, Fablehaven, and perhaps even the world.

Ranger's Apprentice by John Flanagan (2004-2011)

They have always scared him in the past--the Rangers, with their dark cloaksand shadowy ways. The villagers believe the Rangers practice magic that makes them invisible to ordinary people. And now 15-year-old Will, always small for his age, has been chosen as a Ranger's apprentice. What he doesn't yet realize is that the Rangers are the protectors of the kingdom. Highly trained in the skills of battle and surveillance, they fight the battles before the battles reach the people. And as Will is about to learn, there is a large battle brewing. The exiled Morgarath, Lord of the Mountains of Rain and Night, is gathering his forces for an attack on the kingdom. This time, he will not be denied. . . . 

Ruby Red Trilogy by Kerstin Geir (2009-2010)

Sixteen-year-old Gwen lives with her extended - and rather eccentric - family in an exclusive London neighborhood. In spite of her ancestors' peculiar history, she's had a relatively normal life so far. The time-traveling gene that runs like a secret thread through the female half of the family is supposed to have skipped over Gwen, so she hasn't been introduced to "the mysteries," and can spend her time hanging out with her best friend, Lesley. It comes as an unwelcome surprise when she starts taking sudden, uncontrolled leaps into the past.

She's totally unprepared for time travel, not to mention all that comes with it: fancy clothes, archaic manners, a mysterious secret society, and Gideon, her time-traveling counterpart. He's obnoxious, a know-it-all, and possibly the best-looking guy she's seen in any century...

The Books of Bayern by Shannon Hale (2003-2009)

She was born with her eyes closed and a word on her tongue, a word she could not taste.

Her name was Anidori-Kiladra Talianna Isilee, Crown Princess of Kildenree, and she spent the first years of her life listening to her aunt’s stories and learning the language of the birds, especially the swans. And when she was older, she watched as a colt was born, and she heard the first word on his tongue, his name, Falada.

Hex Hall by Rachel Hawkins (2010-2013)

Three years ago, Sophie Mercer discovered that she was a witch. It's gotten her into a few scrapes. Her non-gifted mother has been as supportive as possible, consulting Sophie's estranged father—an elusive European warlock—only when necessary. But when Sophie attracts too much human attention for a prom-night spell gone horribly wrong, it's her dad who decides her punishment: exile to Hex Hall, an isolated reform school for wayward Prodigium, a.k.a. witches, faeries, and shapeshifters. 

By the end of her first day among fellow freak-teens, Sophie has quite a scorecard: three powerful enemies who look like supermodels, a futile crush on a gorgeous warlock, a creepy tag-along ghost, and a new roommate who happens to be the most hated person and only vampire student on campus. Worse, Sophie soon learns that a mysterious predator has been attacking students, and her only friend is the number-one suspect. 

As a series of blood-curdling mysteries starts to converge, Sophie prepares for the biggest threat of all: an ancient secret society determined to destroy all Prodigium, especially her.

Fables by Bill Willingham (2002-2015)

When a savage creature known only as the Adversary conquered the fabled lands of legends and fairy tales, all of the infamous inhabitants of folklore were forced into exile. Disguised among the ""mundys,"" their name for normal citizens of modern-day New York, these magical characters created their own secret society that they call Fabletown.

From their exclusive luxury apartment buildings on Manhattan's Upper West Side, these creatures of legend must fight for their survival in the new world.

Dragonriders of Pern by Anne McCaffrey (1968-2018)

On a beautiful world called Pern, an ancient way of life is about to come under attack from a myth that is all too real. Lessa is an outcast survivor--her parents murdered, her birthright stolen--a strong young woman who has never stopped dreaming of revenge. But when an ancient threat to Pern reemerges, Lessa will rise--upon the back of a great dragon with whom she shares a telepathic bond more intimate than any human connection. Together, dragon and rider will fly . . . and Pern will be changed forever.

Thursday Next by Jasper Fforde (2001-present)

England is a virtual police state where an aunt can get lost (literally) in a Wordsworth poem and forging Byronic verse is a punishable offense. All this is business as usual for Thursday Next, renowned Special Operative in literary detection. But when someone begins kidnapping characters from works of literature and plucks Jane Eyre from the pages of Bront 's novel, Thursday is faced with the challenge of her career.

The Locked Tomb by Tamsyn Muir (2019-present)

The Emperor needs necromancers.

The Ninth Necromancer needs a swordswoman.

Gideon has a sword, some dirty magazines, and no more time for undead nonsense.

Brought up by unfriendly, ossifying nuns, ancient retainers, and countless skeletons, Gideon is ready to abandon a life of servitude and an afterlife as a reanimated corpse. She packs up her sword, her shoes, and her dirty magazines, and prepares to launch her daring escape. But her childhood nemesis won't set her free without a service.

Harrowhark Nonagesimus, Reverend Daughter of the Ninth House and bone witch extraordinaire, has been summoned into action. The Emperor has invited the heirs to each of his loyal Houses to a deadly trial of wits and skill. If Harrowhark succeeds she will be become an immortal, all-powerful servant of the Resurrection, but no necromancer can ascend without their cavalier. Without Gideon's sword, Harrow will fail, and the Ninth House will die.

Of course, some things are better left dead.

[chameleon8]

Rereading fablehaven has reminded me that Seth canonically enjoys painting and hates jigsaw puzzles and I am very happy that I get to relearn that about him

[summercosmos]

something i really enjoy and that i don't really see anyone commenting about is how Kendra's inner monologue is so often accidentally funny. like sometimes you'll read something from a Seth chapter and you can tell it was purposely written to get a little snort out of you, but Kendra will casually hit you with the most insane train of thought. it gets me everytime when the Teenage Girl Realness seeps through the narration

DOUBLE WHAMMY!

she's so genuine about it too. not once does she get the "oh no my brain is just being silly heehee" treatment. her thought process is just like That

[aezenia]

Found these in my gallery, I think I have never posted them.

[wordslikesilver]

I’m not sure it’s a well known YA series but I think about this one character relationship in the Fablehaven series a lot. I’m gonna skim as much context as possible for brevity here. Caretaker of a mythical creature sanctuary named Patton Burgess falls in love with a Naiad named Lena and he rows his boat out to the middle of the lake every day for months, years to take time to play his violin for her. Talk to her. Ask her to step out of the water for him. If he leans over the edge, she’ll capsize his boat and drown him. If she steps on land, she’ll turn human. And he’s simply polite and persistent and kind and loving while she mocks him, but eventually becomes warm to him. After a long, long time, she finally steps onto the land for him. It’s a really massive deal, like it’s basically utter taboo for her and she can never go back to her sisters in the water. But she does so willingly, and with love in her heart for him because she decides he’s worth it. They marry, they live well and happily together for decades, he passes away and she becomes a maid to future caretakers (and is generally a huge badass in a ton of other ways, led a very exotic life before the events of the books). Literally the sweetest old woman you’ve ever met in your life. Full of love and tenderness and warmth and everything you would associate with a kindly old maid who’s secretly a badass.

Events happen in the books and the misguided benevolence of the fairy queen has her reward the heroes by “setting everything back the way it was” before all the death and destruction, but it goes too far and changes Lena back into a Naiad too, back to the lake where she dwelled, back to her old ways of caring so very little for humans and their company. Our protagonists plead with her to come back. They beg her to remember their time together and the love she felt and expressed towards them. She laughs them off. She even laughs them off when they ask her to think what her husband would’ve wanted. To think about his violin. They try to play it for her. It could never be the same but they try because they love her. She says she doesn’t care anymore and doesn’t seem the slightest like she doesn’t mean it. She’s happy with her sisters again. Happy once more to drown our protagonists if they lean just a little too far forwards, something utterly unthinkable for her character before this. More plot happens and the situation in the sanctuary becomes so dire that a failsafe triggers and a memory of her husband Patton appears as a clone of himself from when he set the failsafe, ready to fix the dire circumstances as best he can. He learns what happened to his wife, what she’s been forcibly changed back into, how her feelings have seemingly irreversibly been changed back the way they were, and doesn’t even think twice before he calmly and confidently strides forth to the lake. He takes up his violin and rows out on the boat to the middle and politely asks her sisters if he can talk to her. When they decline and tell him she doesn’t care about him, he smiles and begins to play.

The air fills with music. The sisters panic and squabble, telling each other to stop her, that he’s not really there. Seconds after he begins playing, despite all the efforts of her sisters, she leaps from the depths and lands in his arms, changing back to the way she was. No hesitation, not the slightest fleeting doubt before tossing away immortality a second time just to be with him again. It took nothing more than the sound of his playing that she never forgot no matter what to bring her back to land. The memory of the love and happiness between them was simply that powerful that it could move her that way. And reader, that destroys me. Oh it tears me asunder I tell you. Can you imagine her in that moment? Peacefully ignoring all the worries and cries of humans she no longer gives a shit about. She’ll outlive all of them. And then music. Her heart begins to hurt and sing with a song it never forgot and she looks up, up at the sunlit shadow of a boat far above her. A heartbeat passes while she listens, it can’t be him. Even as she’s asking herself is it him, is that the music of the man I loved, she’s swimming. All doubts fade away just moments after she draws the slightest bit closer, she knows the timbre of her husband’s bow against the strings. Her sisters are trying to hold her down, to stop her, to drown her in her promised and now returned immortality and she doesn’t want it. She wants to see him again. All of this happening in less than a minute, mind you. That’s how deeply she missed him, long outliving him after he passed away forever ago. They can’t hold her. Nothing could stop her from reaching him in that moment. It DESTROYS me okay, can you imagine love like that? This memory clone of him was only around for 3 days and she gave up immortality just to have him back for even that long.

My favourite relationship trope will always be “no matter what’s happened to me, no matter what I’ve become, I will always return to you. Your scent on the wind, your voice beneath the din, your eyes in the light will call me back to you forever and always. There is nothing that is mine that I wouldn’t give up for you. There is no spell or drug or threat or lie or promise or heaven in all the world that could ever make me turn from you. I could resist you no more than the apple on the branch could resist your hand. Reach for me and I will tumble into your arms again and again.”

Sometimes I imagine my lover being turned into a dryad and what song I might sing to her to bring her back to me. Gods I’m too sappy for things like this, truly.

[suremaybeiguess]

Seth was that kid who saw “take 2” and took the whole bowl

[anxiousabsurdity]

Kendra: Would you be more surprised to find a walrus or a fairy knocking at your door?

Seth: Neither would surprise me at this point, but I better not be the walrus this time.

[lizlovespace]

if I had a nickel for every time a white, male, Mormon, fantasy author named Brandon created a magical, interconnected universe of different series that I was completely obsessed with at some point in my life…I’d have two nickels which isn’t a lot but it’s weird that it happened twice

[candlemouse]

TikTok & Fablehaven

[Video begins. Seth is sitting on the couch in the living room of the main house at Fablehaven.]

Seth: I'm passing the phone to someone with a fake gravestone.

[Kendra appears at his side, rolling her eyes.]

Kendra: I'm passing the phone to someone who carried all his important things in a cereal box.

Seth: Well, I'm passing the phone to someone who used to be a prisoner in our dungeon.

[Camera cuts to the gardens outside with Vanessa and Seth. Vanessa wears a look of confusion.]

Vanessa: I'm supposed to say something about someone? Who?

[Camera cuts to just Vanessa]

Vanessa: I'm passing the phone to someone who reads his horoscope every month.

[Camera cuts to Warren in the living room of the main house.]

Warren: I'm passing the phone to someone with a bedazzled shotgun.

Dale [voice shouted from far distance]: That was a gift!

[Seth takes camera from Warren, the view up his nose.]

Seth: You weren't supposed to hear that!

[Camera cuts to just Dale.]

Dale: I’m passing the phone to someone who has snuck away more times than I can count.

[Camera cuts to just Seth]

Seth: I'm passing the phone to someone who spent time as a chicken.

[Kendra appears in view, wrestling the phone away.]

Kendra: Seth! Absolutely not.

Seth: What?

[Video ends]

[lunaloon4]

I don't know if anybody has done this already but I did some fablehaven fanart.

[book--brackets]

Summaries under the cut

Gallagher Girls by Ally Carter

Cammie Morgan is a student at the Gallagher Academy for Exceptional Young Women, a fairly typical all-girls school—that is, if every school taught advanced martial arts in PE and the latest in chemical warfare in science, and students received extra credit for breaking CIA codes in computer class. The Gallagher Academy might claim to be a school for geniuses, but it's really a school for spies. Even though Cammie is fluent in fourteen languages and capable of killing a man in seven different ways, she has no idea what to do when she meets an ordinary boy who thinks she's an ordinary girl. Sure, she can tap his phone, hack into his computer, or track him through town with the skill of a real "pavement artist"—but can she maneuver a relationship with someone who can never know the truth about her?

Fablehaven by Brandon Mull

Trespassers will be turned to stone

For centuries, mystical creatures of all description were gathered to a hidden refuge called Fablehaven to prevent their extinction. The sanctuary is one of the last strongholds of true magic. Enchanting? Absolutely. Exciting? You bet. Safe? Well, actually, quite the opposite . . .

Kendra and her brother, Seth, have no idea their grandfather is the current caretaker of Fablehaven. Inside the gated woods, ancient laws keep order among greedy trolls, mischievous satyrs, plotting witches, spiteful imps, and jealous fairies. However, when the rules get broken, powerful forces of evil are unleashed, forcing Kendra and Seth to face the greatest challenge of their lives, to save their family, Fablehaven, and perhaps even the world.

The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel by Michael Scott

Nicholas Flamel was born in Paris on 28 September 1330. Nearly seven hundred years later, he is acknowledged as the greatest Alchemyst of his day. It is said that he discovered the secret of eternal life. The records show that he died in 1418. But his tomb is empty and Nicholas Flamel lives. The secret of eternal life is hidden within the book he protects—the Book of Abraham the Mage. It's the most powerful book that has ever existed. In the wrong hands, it will destroy the world. And that's exactly what Dr. John Dee plans to do when he steals it. Humankind won't know what's happening until it's too late. And if the prophecy is right, Sophie and Josh Newman are the only ones with the power to save the world as we know it. Sometimes legends are true. And Sophie and Josh Newman are about to find themselves in the middle of the greatest legend of all time.

Out of My Mind by Shannon Draper

Melody is not like most people. She cannot walk or talk, but she has a photographic memory; she can remember every detail of everything she has ever experienced. She is smarter than most of the adults who try to diagnose her and smarter than her classmates in her integrated classroom - the very same classmates who dismiss her as mentally challenged because she cannot tell them otherwise. But Melody refuses to be defined by cerebral palsy. And she's determined to let everyone know it - somehow.

The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare

Orphaned Kit Tyler knows, as she gazes for the first time at the cold, bleak shores of Connecticut Colony, that her new home will never be like the shimmering Caribbean island she left behind. In her relatives' stern Puritan community, she feels like a tropical bird that has flown to the wrong part of the world, a bird that is now caged and lonely. The only place where Kit feels completely free is in the meadows, where she enjoys the company of the old Quaker woman known as the Witch of Blackbird Pond, and on occasion, her young sailor friend Nat. But when Kit's friendship with the "witch" is discovered, Kit is faced with suspicion, fear, and anger. She herself is accused of witchcraft!

Books of Bayern by Shannon Hale

She was born with her eyes closed and a word on her tongue, a word she could not taste.

Her name was Anidori-Kiladra Talianna Isilee, Crown Princess of Kildenree, and she spent the first years of her life listening to her aunt’s stories and learning the language of the birds, especially the swans. And when she was older, she watched as a colt was born, and she heard the first word on his tongue, his name, Falada.

From the Grimm’s fairy tale of the princess who became a goose girl before she could become queen, Shannon Hale has woven an incredible, original, and magical tale of a girl who must find her own unusual talents before she can lead the people she has made her own.

Fudge by Judy Blume

Life with his little brother, Fudge, makes Peter Hatcher feel like a fourth grade nothing. Whether Fudge is throwing a temper tantrum in a shoe store, smearing mashed potatoes on the walls at Hamburger Heaven, or trying to fly, he's never far from trouble. He's an almost three-year-old terror who gets away with everything, and Peter's had it up to here! When Fudge walks off with Dribble, Peter's pet turtle, it's the last straw. Peter has put up with Fudge for too long. Way too long! How can he get his parents to pay attention to him for a change?

Bartimaeus by Jonathan Stroud

Nathaniel is a boy magician-in-training, sold to the government by his birth parents at the age of five and sent to live as an apprentice to a master. Powerful magicians rule Britain, and its empire, and Nathaniel is told his is the "ultimate sacrifice" for a "noble destiny."

If leaving his parents and erasing his past life isn't tough enough, Nathaniel's master, Arthur Underwood, is a cold, condescending, and cruel middle-ranking magician in the Ministry of Internal Affairs. The boy's only saving grace is the master's wife, Martha Underwood, who shows him genuine affection that he rewards with fierce devotion. Nathaniel gets along tolerably well over the years in the Underwood household until the summer before his eleventh birthday. Everything changes when he is publicly humiliated by the ruthless magician Simon Lovelace and betrayed by his cowardly master who does not defend him.

Nathaniel vows revenge. In a Faustian fever, he devours magical texts and hones his magic skills, all the while trying to appear subservient to his master. When he musters the strength to summon the 5,000-year-old djinni Bartimaeus to avenge Lovelace by stealing the powerful Amulet of Samarkand, the boy magician plunges into a situation more dangerous and deadly than anything he could ever imagine.

Shadow Children by Margaret Peterson Haddix

Luke has never been to school. He's never had a birthday party, or gone to a friend's house for an overnight. In fact, Luke has never had a friend.

Luke is one of the shadow children, a third child forbidden by the Population Police. He's lived his entire life in hiding, and now, with a new housing development replacing the woods next to his family's farm, he is no longer even allowed to go outside.

Then, one day Luke sees a girl's face in the window of a house where he knows two other children already live. Finally, he's met a shadow child like himself. Jen is willing to risk everything to come out of the shadows - does Luke dare to become involved in her dangerous plan? Can he afford not to?

Princess Academy by Shannon Hale

Miri lives on a mountain where, for generations, her ancestors have quarried stone and lived a simple life. Then word comes that the king's priests have divined her small village the home of the future princess. In a year's time, the prince himself will come and choose his bride from among the girls of the village. The king's ministers set up an academy on the mountain, and every teenage girl must attend and learn how to become a princess.

Miri soon finds herself confronted with a harsh academy mistress, bitter competition among the girls, and her own conflicting desires to be chosen and win the heart of her childhood best friend. But when bandits seek out the academy to kidnap the future princess, Miri must rally the girls together and use a power unique to the mountain dwellers to save herself and her classmates.

[chameleon8]

Been rereading book 3 lately

[summercosmos]

fairy!Kendra. no idea how this would work on paper but i kinda love it as a concept🤜 those are firefly wings btw....