Ink Exchange

Ink Exchange by Melissa Marr

(Warning: This book is marketed as YA, but I would not recommend it to anyone under 14. Depictions of sex and violence are a little mature and offer no real reflection to help a younger reader process it.)

A companion piece to Wicked Lovely, this story sets Aislinn’s friend Leslie as the protagonist. Leslie is ignorant of the fantastical changes that have overcome her friend. Aislinn is now Queen of the Summer Fairies. In fact, Leslie is unaware of the existence of fairies at all. She is only aware of the new presence of several overwhelmingly attractive and enigmatic people whom Aislinn now calls friends. Despite some of these odd changes, Leslie is preoccupied. She is hiding many dark secrets from her friends: the deterioration of her home life, an alcoholic father, and an abusive and drug-addicted brother. In the chaos of her life, Leslie is trying to keep it together and take control. It’s a tightrope balanced walk, and one way that she tries to regain control is through the reclaiming of her body with a tattoo.

Leslie finds herself mesmerized by a particular tattoo that is special and unique. Unbeknownst to her, it is the tattoo of the King of the Dark Fairies, Irial. The Dark Fairies, who feed off of negative emotions, have been going hungry ever since Aislinn gained rule and the reigning Winter Queen, Beira, was ousted. Beira had kept the emotional pot of fairy emotions at a constant boil, and there was no end to sating the evil fairies’ appetites. Now that a kind rule has come over the fairy world, the dark fey are starving, and Irial must devise a new way for them to feed.

Leslie’s tattoo is more than mere mortal body art. It is an ink exchange, which will link Irial and her together, allowing Irial to filter all of humanity’s emotions through her. While she detests having been used, Irial’s magnetic power is overwhelming. Leslie at turns fights being used as such a tool, and at other moments prefers her tethered state to her previous sad life.

Irial’s court is truly a dark one. Humans are used and abused in the foulest ways so the fairies may extract the fullest range and depth of negative emotions: lust, greed, pain, gluttony, rage, and insanity...

The character development of the main characters, Leslie, and Irial, is good. Most spectacular is the descriptive and emotional language that shows up regularly. However, I still feel as though the background story is not fleshed out enough. Readers are left asking too many questions about side characters and practical questions about fairies. What exactly happens to a fairy that starves? What exactly do fairies do? What is their purpose? The holes in this book caused me to put this book down several times and ask, “What is the point? Do I really even care to know the end?” I persevered, and I can’t really say I felt a sense of satisfaction at completing it.

GRADE: C