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Indexing (Indexing, #1)

Seanan McGuire

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May 13, 2014 Cairnraiser rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy, fiction, audiobook

Fairy Tale X-Files!

I really like new takes on old tales and this is no exception.

The reader follows the exploits of an ATI field team lead by Henrietta (Henry) Marchen (Märchen = german for fairy tale) as they try to manage so called memetic incursions where fairy tales try to enter and affect the reality as we know it.

Apparently the book started out as a serial novel, which is very obvious when reading it as a single finished work. The protagonists were (re)introduced a number of times (Jeff is ...more

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Nov 03, 2013 kvon rated it really liked it

Shelves: digital

I hadn't looked at the AT Index before, but it turns out to be a real thing. A serial novel, so the author admits things would have been different if she'd been able to revise the beginning. Apples=death, snow in the woods, wicked stepsister immortal and ambiguous, fairy tales warping right and left. Don't wait for your prince. ...more

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Aug 14, 2018 Janet rated it liked it

Shelves: fantasy, not-weird-enough

I had a chance to get this book for free, knowing nothing but the title. I really wanted to know how you could write a novel about indexing. I was raised by an indexer (thanks, Mom!), who can be quite eloquent about it. A good index combines rigorous organization and obsession with detail, but is also a act of imagination - when choosing terms, the indexer must visualize how the user will approach it, what questions this mythical reader will have, and how they will express them. A good index is ...more

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Oct 16, 2013 Debbie is on Storygraph rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2013, fairy-tales, contemporary-fantasy

Fairy tales are my crack. I love them. I will read/watch/listen to anything based off of them. So of course, Indexing spoke to me.

This is a pretty cool world Seanan's created here. Fairy tales are infecting the world, and it's up to the people in the ATI Management Bureau to stop them before they reach their inevitable bad and tragic ending.

I wish this had not been serialized though. The way the publication schedule worked out, Seanan was writing the story as she went, and it does show. The pl ...more

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Jan 10, 2020 Karen rated it it was ok

This felt disjointed, like I couldn't tell if it was meant to be one continuous story or a series of short adventures. Also because it mixed so many stories together, even different versions of each fairy tale, it was very confusing. ...more

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Apr 11, 2019 Maria Elmvang rated it really liked it

Shelves: owned-audiobook, fantasy, 4-stars, 2019, owned-ebook

I can always count on Seanan McGuire to make me uncomfortable about things I hadn't originally thought about.... first mermaids and now innocuous-looking fairytales!! I will never look at Mum's fairytale collection the same ever again, that's for sure!

That said, as a whole the book couldn't quite live up to my expectations. It was a good read and I greatly enjoyed it, but I've almost come to expect Seanan McGuire to blow me away by now, and that didn't quite happen here. At the end of the day I ...more

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Jun 12, 2022 Min rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: ku, ebook, 2022

I’d say my rating is really more 2.5 stars. I guess the whole fairy tale theme just didn’t interest me as much as I thought it might. Though, Jeff is still my favourite character. And maybe Sloane.

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