Audiobook Review: Come Tumbling Down by Seanan McGuire

Come Tumbling Down by Seanan McGuire
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

When Jack left Eleanor West’s School for Wayward Children she was carrying the body of her deliciously deranged sister–whom she had recently murdered in a fit of righteous justice–back to their home on the Moors.

But death in their adopted world isn’t always as permanent as it is here, and when Jack is herself carried back into the school, it becomes clear that something has happened to her. Something terrible. Something of which only the maddest of scientists could conceive. Something only her friends are equipped to help her overcome.

Eleanor West’s “No Quests” rule is about to be broken.

Again.

Warnings: mentions of gore and body horror, mentions of child abuse and grooming, panic attack

In Come Tumbling Down, we dive back into Jack’s and Jill’s story, in a continuation of their story arc from Down Among the Sticks and Bones and their return to the Moors in Every Heart a Doorway. Jill, determined to have her desired life at her sister’s expense, punishes her for killing and resurrecting her by trapping her in a situation that would most trouble her. So Jack and Alexis return to the school, for allies and help, which means the gang reassembles for another mission, and that means traveling to the Moors, a place that is much different from most of their own worlds, if not creepier. And yeah, this time the gang is sorta different, but there is still that chaotic teen energy there. They are friends and it comes out so well in the way they talk to each other, and how they understand that while they can’t stay together they get it. I loved Christopher’s and Jack’s conversations, and Alexis meeting them all, and Kade being the goat herder for them all.

Jack’s finality with which she treats the situation with the sister pointed to such growth in her character and also played well with the monster theme of the Moors. She is done saving her unapologetic sister, and puts her found family as a priority. Her OCD also becomes a plot point, as she is put through quite some strain in that regard. As for the others, one thing that was brought up again and again was their return to their own worlds, and the doors that would lead them there, and why they choose to stay at Eleanor West’s home and not settle in any other world that opens for them; Cora especially comes close to something like the Trenches in the Moors and has to decide if she is willing to wait for her door or not. I read this as an audiobook, but I did not enjoy the narration as much as I did in Down Among the Sticks and Bones, and this time around I was finding it confusing to keep track of the voices – some of them sounded too similar (like Christopher and Jack, despite Jack’s formal style of speaking).

Overall, though, it was another awesome quest/adventure and gives us closure on Jack’s and Jill’s story, so it was a great read.

Is it diverse? Jack is pansexual and has OCD (ownvoices); Kade is a trans boy; Alexis is fat and sapphic, Cora is fat; Christopher is Latinx, bisexual and polyam

Previous books in the Wayward Children series