Literary Review: The Guardians of Childhood (Book Three) by William Joyce

It finally arrived! The audiobook to the third book in William Joyce’s series “The Guardians of Childhood“. So who is next up to bat? The wonderful Tooth Fairy also known as Toothiana in William Joyce’s world.

According to the website Toothiana is noted as:

One of the most riveting and mysterious Guardians of all time!

The Tooth Fairy can spin herself into a multitude of selves, all depending on nightly teeth-placed-under-pillow rates. And her diminutive size is not at all indicative of how fierce of a warrior she can be — Pitch has no idea what he is up against.

No kidding. Via this particular novel we are given a glimpse of her parents and what happened to them and the backstory of how she came about to gather the tooths of children. Which technically is a lot, but we are also given a secondary antagonist who apparently has a major thing against Toothiana and has found itself aligned with Pitch Black (aka Bogeyman) in hopes of regaining his former glory.

So now the battle between good and evil is coming down on a more personal level.

The protagonists from the past novels are back and are planning ahead for the future. Nicholas St North has turned his former henchmen into elves and together they were creating the blueprints for a magically realm not at all different from the city they are from… which could potentially be known as the North Pole.

E Aster Bunnymund is finding more and more delights in creating other sweet goodness outside of the traditional chocolate that he is known for… and little Catherine is finding herself coming closer and closer to a crossroads. Realizing that eventually she is going to have to grow up and leave her childhood behind…

But what she is really scaring her is Pitch Black’s final scream when the picture of his beloved daughter (prior to being taken over by darkness) causes him to take a drastic retreat. For little Catherine, she lost her parents before she even got a chance to know them… and this is where Toothiana comes in.

For Toothiana, the baby teeth of children holds a special place in her heart, for they contain the memories of childhood. When the children slowly continue to grow up over time the memories of childhood grow farther and farther away… in which case the teeth provide an outlet for the growing children to go back and remember of more innocent times in their lives.

This is where the connection between Toothiana and Catherine occurs, but never gets completed… for Toothiana could provide Catherine with the memories she so desperately desires of her parents without the need or use of the baby tooth. However, this connection is thwarted by the arrival of Toothiana’s arch-nemesis.

After a short battle and Catherine’s moment of regret and desire to not kill someone no matter how evil… this is the first book in the series that ends on a cliffhanger… ARGH!

So guess what? We are going to have to wait til the next installment in the series to find out what happens to Catherine and to learn a little more of what Toothiana could do for her and her memories of her parents….

*SIGHS* So unfair.

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