WING

by Beau Van Dalen

She is lunar, he is light.


In a world where faeries are descended from insects, Lunar Moth Larissa falls for a royal of the butterfly kingdom—Prince Baer.

Born with only one wing and the inability to fly, Larissa dreams of a life where she is free.

On the eve of her people’s Summer Festival, Larissa sneaks out late at she slips, then falls to her doom from atop the highest tree in her village, only to be saved by Prince Baer.

After their first fated meeting, the two quickly become inseparable—but fate is set on keeping them apart, for Prince Baer must return to his kingdom once the Summer Festival ends, and Larissa cannot follow him without a wing.


A Short Story.

FOR MATURE AUDIENCES ONLY.

39 pages, Kindle Edition

Published September 7, 2023

About the author

Beau Van Dalen is a best-selling author of adult speculative fiction. Wattpad Stars Alumnus and Winner of Tapas Media’s 2018 Summer Writing Competition—Beau’s stories have amassed over two million reads online. Whether it be through books, poetry, comics or games, Beau is always enchanting words and creating worlds; he is currently on a journey to write one-hundred novels.

Reviews

[Eel]

Read in one sitting.
I couldn’t tell if the characters were people with wings or actual bugs with little tiny hands until they started doing the dirty—But I didn’t notice a continuing theme of loneliness and colors as emotion seen in Van Dalen’s White & Star God books.

After reading the blurb, I now know that are not bugs but fairies. Probably should have done that first.

[K.C. Norton]

This jumped around in ways I found a little confusing, but there were elements I quite liked. It’s fairy tale in both the literal sense (the characters are fairies, though as another reader mentioned, I kind if thought they were bugs for the first few pages) and the overall narrative, which is a magical origin story of sorts.

[J. A. Jumphol]

This story is reminiscent of a fairytale with its magical atmosphere and storytelling style and if you want a short little fairytale to read on a day when you want to feel like a forgotten royal curled up on the bed, this is for you.

I personally didn't enjoy this short story very much but I honestly didn't know what to expect coming into it. I just knew that it was some sort of love story and the issue is that the love part of the love story isn't something that I was invested in. I didn't like the love interest at all as he didn't seem to actually be interested in the love interest aside from sex and ended up moping around for a good chunk of the story before dying. I think if the story was extended and the characters spent more time actually building a relationship instead of it being just instalove. Though I can see why it was an instalove situation due to the fairytale nature.

I would love to know how more of the world works though, just with other characters.

(Thank you to the author for providing me with a free copy of the book for review purposes. All thoughts in the review are mine and mine alone.)

#indigoemployee