I hadn't meant to read the Newford series out of order, but when I picked up this audiobook I hadn't been aware that it was a Newford book. However, once I started it, I fell in love with the story and didn't want to pause it again. I highly recommend this one, even if you haven't read the rest of the series. ( )

[Someplace to be Flying] is noted as the 8th in the Newford Series, and it was hard for me to believe I've read that many, usually just dipping in once or so a year - I want to savor these, as De Lint deserves to be though of as the true founder of the Urban Fantasy novel. This one centers on the Corvid (think crows, etc.) people who helped to establish the world we think of as real. Origin narratives play a large role in the book, weaving the mystical into a tapestry with the 'real' seamlessly. When a warring faction steals the chalice through which the 'real' world was created, the Corvids have to save the world - though it ends up being less about their own fate and more about the fate everyone else, including those who can't see. De Lint is always preaching, subtly, about making things better, holding things together, through self-realization. There are always sacrifices, but willing and noble ones. It feels that De Lint was really hitting his stride with this entry in the series.

Highly Recommended.
5 bones!!!!! ( )

I really enjoyed this book. It has all of the hallmarks of a great Charles de Lint novel. We have a disparate cast of characters who end up together by the climax to try to solve whatever problem has come up. We have fantastical elements in the form of beings from another place that is adjacent to ours, or came before ours, or exists on a separate plane from ours, who inhabit the world with us. They offer a glimpse into something more, if you can open your mind to the possibility. But these beings aren't trying to moralize, or guide humans. They have all of the same shortcomings that humans do, its just that things tend to get more interesting when you are a magical being. The climax of the book was a bit anticlimactic, but I was really more interested in the characters' journeys, and not necessarily some big end of the world event. I find that when you have all of these big epic events that happen all of the time (Doctor Who I'm looking at you), they become less affecting. I just can't summon up the energy to care every single time the world is going to end. But on that note, there was a possibility that the world could have ended in this book, or at least reverted to a time before humans. I was less interested in that part of the story than I was in the characters learning who they were and reckoning with their own histories. In that department, it fell a little short, but I still enjoyed the journey. ( )

To be honest, during the first few chapters I thought it was going to suck. (I mostly dislike the "urban fantasy" type books) but I was wrong. This was really very good, and I'll be looking for more of his books. ( )

"The best change you can make is to hold up a mirror so that people can look into it and change themselves. That's the only way a person can be changed."

Picture [b:American Gods|30165203|American Gods|Neil Gaiman|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1462924585s/30165203.jpg|1970226] if it were bird-themed, set in the nineties, and every character was obsessed with art. Voila, we have Charles de Lint’s Someplace to be Flying.

The folklore is outstanding, the shifts between voices are believable, and although I wouldn't qualify de Lint's style as page-turning, it is immersive. The slow burn of the narrative allows the reader to become engrossed in a world that feels relatable and believable, and so when magic manifests, it's surprising. We discover things with the characters, which is really exciting.

I wouldn't recommend this novel to someone who has never read de Lint before, or at least to someone who hadn't read other novels set in the Newford universe. While the Newford books are not meant to be read chronologically (their characters intersect, but not in any linear fashion), Someplace to be Flying has a large and complex cast of characters. I've read three of de Lint's other Newford books, and I was still overwhelmed.

That's my main critique. While I found many of the characters to be incredibly compelling, they felt
kind of like gems in a pile of rocks: reading through so many (and often mundane) perspectives felt like work, and the remarkable characters were muted by comparison. Jack Daw's backstory, for example, is both illuminating and heartbreaking. For that chapter alone, I would award this novel 5 stars. But with so much time spent on less-interesting characters like Rory, Hank, Lily, and Kerry, the poignant moments of the novel were weighed down. I understand that de Lint is creating an entire city, here. A community of complex characters that each have their own back stories in different novels. The problem is, while each of their perspectives can be (and were) highlighted, it doesn't mean that they should have been. Doing so is too ambitious for one novel.

But even with having too many characters to focus on, I can't give this novel less than 4 stars. I think of characters like Cody, Raven, Maida, and Zia, and I know I won't forget them for a long time. Maybe ever. Because they're vivid and complex and I wish the novel could have devoted pages and pages more for each of their perspectives. This is where this review doubles in on itself: I want more of what I'm criticizing most. I want perspectives from the characters I like. I know that other readers will find other perspectives more compelling than I did (I didn't connect with the Kerry/Katy plotline or the Hank/Lily stuff), but I can definitely see how others would. Hell, those were the main characters.

Somehow I'm always falling in love with characters on the sidelines. ( )