Queen Mab

by Emily McBride

In this debut novel, a new mother—a scholar steeped in fairy lore—wrestles with the legacies and madness of motherhood.

There is a changeling in this story—but who is it?

Madeleine is young for motherhood, a promising grad student in Victorian and modernist literature, twenty-three and not long married. Even her mother worries about the timing. But Madeleine’s ambivalence is pushed aside by Tom’s elation and her own desire to bring new life into a world marked by loss.

Then comes Maud, perfect and fresh, despite a traumatic labor. But just a few nights into their life, something seems amiss. Maud is changed. The child never stops crying. Her hunger is insatiable. Her eyes glint with some kind of ancient mischief. Could Maud be a fairy child, swapped when Madeleine wasn’t paying attention? Is the real Maud dancing in the half-light, with the fairies and the foxes? Did the gray cat hide her behind the hedge?

Tom goes about the day-to-day, working toward a promotion and urging Madeleine to connect with other moms. Her parents come to clean out her grandmother’s house, her father newly obsessed with genealogy and DNA tests. Madeleine, interrupted by violent visions, panicked at her lack of maternal love, shut out from her old life, frantically searches for answers. The old stories end in sorrow and bloodshed, and the fairies don’t just kidnap babies—they’re also partial to young women. Is Maud the changeling, or is Madeleine? And if she’s been swapped, how will she find her way back?

Emily McBride’s Queen Mab is a riveting portrait of madness, motherhood, the myths that haunt us, and the families who keep us tethered.

Genres: Literary Fiction, Fiction, Contemporary, Historical Fiction, Historical, Fairy Tales, Adult

305 pages, Kindle Edition

Expected publication August 4, 2026

Reviews

[Paula · Rating 4 out of 5]

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (3.75–4 stars)

Queen Mab was such an interesting and unexpected reading experience. This is a very specific type of book, but I really enjoyed what Emily McBride was doing with the story.

At its core, this is a book about motherhood, identity, trauma, and losing yourself in the process. Madeleine is a graduate student studying folklore and fairy tales, and after a traumatic birth and a motherhood experience that doesn’t go the way she imagined, she starts filtering everything through the stories and literature she knows best.

I loved the way the author used folklore and academia to explore Madeleine’s state of mind. The fairy-tale elements aren’t really about magic—they’re about the way Madeleine tries to understand something she can’t easily process.

This reminded me of Country People because of the way the main character views life through literature and folklore. The difference is that Queen Mab takes that idea into a much darker and more unsettling place.

I don’t think this will work for everyone. It’s introspective, literary, and very focused on Madeleine’s internal experience. But if you enjoy dark academia, folklore, and character-driven stories about identity, this is definitely worth checking out.

I listened to the audiobook, and I thought the single narrator worked really well for keeping you close to Madeleine’s perspective.

Thank you to Brilliance Publishing and NetGalley for the opportunity to listen to this advance audiobook.

[Janereads10 · Rating 4 out of 5]

This wasn't the faerie story I expected. It was something more unsettling and more real.

The main character had a baby at 23, put her academic ambitions on pause, and slowly lost herself. Her postpartum depression and moments of psychosis were channeled through her faerie folklore studies, blurring the line between what was real and what wasn't. What struck me most was how the author mirrored her busy, fractured thoughts on the page. The writing style itself reflected her state of mind. It was disorienting in the best way.

Beyond the psychological elements, the novel explored the quieter losses that came with motherhood. Friendships that fell away. Identity that shifted. Her relationship with her adoptive family was another layer. She had her hang-ups about being adopted but fiercely chose them as her own. That felt true.

Fans of psychological dread and honest portrayals of motherhood will find a lot here.

Thank you, Farrar, Straus and Giroux and NetGalley, for my free audio copy for review. All opinions are my own.

[Jenna B. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you to NetGalley, the author, and Farrar, Straus and Giroux, a division of Macmillan Publishers for an advanced reader copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Wow! Right out of the gate, I knew this book was going to be special. The author immediately earned my trust and I knew my time would be well spent here. At times fantastical, unsettling, and experimental, this novel proves how fiction is used to convey much deeper truths. In the words of our Protagonist, “call it a madness, call it a metaphor, but that did not make it untrue.” Interspersed with poetry, songs and other quotes, we follow Madeleine “Queen Mab” Brodeur on her journey from literary studies student to reluctant expecting mother through achieving, “a woman’s greatest accomplishment, people said.” While this is being classified as literary fiction, some sections read like a fantasy horror novel to me which I loved. At one point I started envisioning scenes from The Labyrinth with David Bowie, and then a few scenes later McBride name-drops Goblin Market which the movie is based on! The signs were well placed.

From the outset, I immediately felt grounded in the narrator. As the story progressed, the narration/POV changes from first to third person so seamlessly that I didn’t recognize it at first. It was masterfully done!

“I rummaged in my mind through all the books I had ever read, which was always my first response in a crisis.”

“My world was still a patchwork of other people’s words. It had shape as long as I could find a quote for all the pivotal moments. But I didn’t want to be alone in the narrative.”

“(And it was her last afternoon as herself.)”

The first chapter comes out swinging with the descriptive imagery, almost hyper-saturated. The line by line writing throughout was really strong. Great variation in sentence length so everything flowed and kept it punchy. Great descriptions of how the characters looked and presented themselves.

I loved how the author introduced one character at a time and showed them in contrast to other characters so the reader can more easily distinguish them on the page. Each new character is introduced with very distinct way of speaking and the characters felt entirely unique right off the bat. Marie with her brusk and challenging demeanor. Maddie's mother putting “air quotes” in her text messages to emphasize things. Each character has a distinct voice.

I am not a fan of romance because the majority of romance writing feels cringey and fake. The romance here is not that. We quickly learn that Maddie is a romantic, a fan of the Victorian era and it's secure truths. Her Tom is a Postmodernist, not afraid of the chaos and complexity of modern life. From the beginning, you get the sense there is going to be conflict here. This is a real-world romance where love is tested and pushed to it’s limits, and every character is being tested.

“She needed an abundance of fairies, and soon.”

Without knowing anything about the author, I get the feeling she's writing what she deeply knows. The descriptions of the neighborhood are so rich I feel like I'm there with Madeleine. And the literary elements included throughout are placed with such care. The written word is clearly this author’s love language.

This story is a visceral reminder to me of why I am personally choosing not to have children. I've struggled with anxiety and depression the majority of my life and I fear I would get postpartum if I had a child (or maybe that’s just the anxiety talking). My last bought of anxiety brought on insomnia I've never experienced so bad before. I can't imagine feeling that way and having to care for another living thing that is completely reliant on me. I'm grateful for the author for shining a light on this topic in such an honest and expansive way.

“And then you had a child, and all that you were faded to irrelevance. You were no longer a shining figure who represented the sum of all evolution and progress. You were just a cog in a generational wheel, grinding on, your only importance the fact that you had kept the drama unfolding.”

I can also see this as a critique of motherhood in the postmodern world and how lonely the experience must be. Even in a bustling city, everyone is locked away into their own apartments without a support system to truly allow mothers the grace to recover or even learn fully about mothering from other women.

This book is very unique and unlike anything I’ve read so far. Because of that, I’m not exactly sure who I would recommend this book to except to say that everyone should read it. If you’re a woman, and maybe more importantly if you’re not. Though people with an academic/literary background with an interest in folklore and fairies will likely enjoy this more than others!

[this_eel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sales pitchery is going to try to sell this to you as a mirage of magical realism, and you can read magic into it, but more importantly, to me, it's a book that contends with postpartum psychosis.

I am not going to spoiler tag this impression, because I think the book needs to reach the right people. We don't talk about this enough. We might not even know about it, since on average our understanding of new motherhood is that the worst you're allowed to be is depressed. The depression is even allowed to be fairly profound, with the acknowledgement that it is a temporary experience due to childbirth that we've pretty much got sorted now. We (culturally) don't like psychotic illness to begin with but we really don't like it from a mom. Once you're a mom you're supposed to serve the needs of a fundamentally helpless smaller human, not become the person with desperate need themselves.

I can't speak for the specifics but I do know what it's like to divorce the understanding of the world that other people have, and Emily McBride is fluent in this. From what I know of babies and mothers, what a keen understanding of the exhaustion and the minutiae and the change of status from single being to--not "parent," but mother specifically. This, her capacity for character writing, and her insights born on neat turns of phrase, and her fluency in the books she and Madeleine, her protagonist, have read, make this book flow and sing.

In regards to mental illness and the absenting of mothers from focus when a baby appears, it is empathetic, stylistically thoughtful, balanced. It is resonant in the slippage of the self away from the self and the brightening of what other people can't perceive as the ultimate realness. The way that one impossible certainty slides out of view and another into focus to be understood with equal conviction, no sense of contradiction. It is clever in showing both the invisibility of a person suffering and the suffering person's tendency to force isolation into greater extremes.

The characters are fabulously realistic. Her mother, infertile and adoptive and permanently nervous with it, is a lot to swallow. I wanted to kill her husband the ENTIRE TIME. Her father is accidentally callous and forever loving. Her friends and colleagues in academia make perfect sense. Madeleine, making the worst decisions of her life and having no idea what's going on, I am constantly rooting for even when I know what's happening is not good. She is just so winning--a character you understand immediately, whom you occupy fully even as she takes you to the bottom of a lake. Often in this book I paused over a line, because the author understands people so clearly.

Her decision to make Madeleine an adopted daughter who then questions the nature of the relationship between herself and her own daughter is smart and made use of.

Her description of place, neighborhood, neighbors--all rich, all evocative, all there.

As far as the slip into faerie understandings of the world goes, I think it's successful. I am interested to see how other people take it, but it's a thoughtful continuation of Madeleine's character; she is given context at the beginning for where she goes and because both McBride and Madeleine are immersed in that context, it feels for the most part very natural.

I think I can imagine a version of this story that I loved more, but I really, really liked it--I do love Madeleine. I do love McBride's understanding of the tricky intricacies of personhood. I do like the books, the reading lists and the history and the sneaking suspicion that academia is something but not necessarily enough. I do like the well-utilized shifts in perspective.

In short, an excellent and sure-handed debut by a smart author about important things, and I recommend it very much.

[Barbara · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you to NetGalley and Brilliance Publishing for providing me with an advance listening copy of QUEEN MAB by Emily McBride, brilliantly narrated by Helen Laser. The audiobook is scheduled for publication on August 4, 2026. If early buzz is any indication, this is poised to be one of the year's standout novels.

Madeleine Brodeur is a graduate student specializing in Victorian and Modernist literature, with ambitious academic goals and a carefully envisioned future. Newly married at just twenty-three, she is devastated to discover she is unexpectedly pregnant. Rather than celebrating, Madeleine feels as though she should be wearing Nathaniel Hawthorne's scarlet letter--an "A" for accident. As an adoptee who has always been ambivalent about motherhood, she struggles to embrace the role that everyone around her assumes she should welcome. Her adoptive mother, who was unable to have children herself, is overjoyed at the prospect of a grandchild, and Madeleine's husband, Tom, eagerly anticipates becoming a father. Madeleine, however, cannot escape the realization that society will ultimately expect her to shoulder the emotional and physical burdens of motherhood.

Nothing about Madeleine's childbirth unfolds as she had envisioned. Determined to have a natural birth, she instead endures a long, exhausting labor that culminates in an emergency C-section. Rather than feeling relief, she is overwhelmed by a crushing sense of failure. One of the novel's greatest strengths is its unflinching portrayal of a birth experience far different from my own. McBride writes with such emotional honesty that she fosters profound empathy for women whose expectations of childbirth collide with painful reality.

Where QUEEN MAB truly shines is in its depiction of postpartum depression and anxiety. McBride captures the frightening, often invisible progression of mental illness with remarkable sensitivity and insight. As an academic, Madeleine instinctively turns to literature to make sense of her unraveling world. Victorian poetry, folklore, fairy tales, and literary allusions become the framework through which she interprets her thoughts, fears, and emotions. I was fascinated by the way McBride intertwines scholarship, folklore, and psychological realism, showing how depression and anxiety quietly gather momentum until they become overwhelming. The novel is enriched with poetry, songs, quotations, and references from Victorian literature that deepen Madeleine's emotional journey and elevate the reading experience.

At its heart, QUEEN MAB is a thoughtful and deeply compassionate exploration of the expectations placed on modern mothers. It reminds us how isolating early motherhood can be and how easily profound suffering can go unnoticed—even by those who love us most.

The audiobook is extraordinary. Helen Laser once again proves why she belongs among today's elite narrators. Her nuanced, emotionally intelligent performance adds another dimension to Madeleine's story, making the listening experience completely immersive. I have no doubt that the prose is just as beautiful on the page.

This is one of my favorite literary audiobooks of the year. Highly recommended for readers who appreciate literary fiction that thoughtfully examines motherhood, identity, mental health, and the stories we tell ourselves to survive.
★★★★★

[Emily May · Rating 3 out of 5]

"It's bondage. It's slavery on a bodily level. It eradicates you mentally and reduces you to a bargaining chip in the service of evolution."

To be fair, I was always going to be difficult to please with Queen Mab because I have just read so many books on this subject.

I do it on purpose, obviously. I seek them out because I can relate to how difficult it is to be a new mother; how impossible it is to resume your previous life; how fathers rarely have it the same. I've read everything from psychological thrillers (The Push), to tales of maternal regret (Her One Regret), to surrealist transmogrification (Nightbitch), fever dreams (The Need) and eerie fairy tales (Little Darlings).

I went into Queen Mab expecting something akin to Little Darlings, which uses the Welsh fairy tale A Brewery of Eggshells to explore postnatal depression and psychosis. The most immediate difference was a complete lack of atmosphere in this book. It wasn't eerie, it wasn't unsettling. I actually never wondered if Madeleine's psychoses were paranormal.

Madeleine experiences postpartum psychosis after the birth of her daughter, Maud. Believing her to be a changeling swapped by a fairy, she seeks out a way to get her "real" daughter back.

There was an emotional connection missing for me. The exploration of the fairy psychosis felt dry and academic, based in Yeats poetry and changeling mythology. Madeleine is a grad student and so seeks advice on the mythologies from her classmates, much of it being a discussion on fairies in literature and not the heartbreaking emotional experience I would expect when reading about someone going through something so intense.

There was obvious research that went into this, and some thoughtful literary commentary, but I really expected something more atmospheric and folksy. Maybe it helps to have different expectations; readers who are interested in the academic side of fairy mythology will probably like it more.

[Patrick Collins · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rating: 3.5*

Thank you to NetGalley and publisher Farrar, Straus and Giroux for a digital ARC of Emily McBride's debut novel Queen Mab.

Queen Mab begins with the inner thoughts of a young woman, Madeleine, a promising post-graduate student of Victorian literature grappling with pending motherhood and the gnawing question of identity and how she fits, within her family and the world of academia that she aspires to. Madeleine's mental wellbeing, however, begins to unravel following the birth of her daughter Maud.

McBride invites us inside the mind of a woman who is clearly suffering from postpartum depression and psychosis, and Madeleine's sense of helplessness and the cloying claustrophobia she feels is quite visceral, forcing the reader, at times, to share in the spiralling anxiety that Madeleine suffers. The detached nature of her struggle is highlighted by the visible concern shown by her boyfriend Tom, and her parents, who don't quite know how to handle the situation. While I wasn't always enamoured with the development of the plot, the pacing kept me reading and I finished this quicker than I expected. Madeleine, as a character, is well-developed and fleshed out but is not always likeable, which perhaps makes her all the more human, while secondary characters at first feel superficial and sometimes one-dimensional, they develop personality in parallel to Madeleine's descent into madness.

Although I did enjoy this debut and I am eager to see what McBride produces next, I can only reluctantly give this 3.5 stars as I found some sections at the beginning, and towards the end, somewhat overwrought. There are also many references to Victorian literature sprinkled throughout the text which makes sense considering Madeleine is a literary studies graduate, but I couldn't help but feel that now and then I was being somehow passive aggressively berated on my lack of knowledge of classic English verse. There are some references I was certainly familiar with thanks to the English curriculum in Ireland where we had to study a lot of Yeats, and Shakespeare, so I recognised a number of Yeats' poems and also the reference to Queen Mab which I recalled from Romeo and Juliet, but there are some more obscure references that might not appeal to some readers.

Despite some misgivings, I would still recommend this to readers as an intelligent and revealing exploration of postpartum mental health and how this manifested itself in Madeleine's fascination with folklore and fairies.

[Jessica · Rating 3 out of 5]

A story of post-partum mental breakdown, but this time it’s fairies, foxes, and other spritely beings that have taken her baby and replaced her with a changeling.

Madeline and Tom are young and find themselves pregnant while he’s looking for a real job and she’s a grad student studying literature. Adopted and not knowing her birth-mother (by choice), Madeline wants to experience everything that her mother – Carol, her adoptive mother – never had an opportunity to. With a traumatic birth itself, the first day or so seems to go by without issues, but when the next day comes and Madeline, still in hospital, realizes she left the window open overnight, she fears that the foxes came in and took her baby and replaced it with a changeling.

I appreciated the overall theme of identity and how it’s explored through Madeline’s line – through adoption, her choice to stay with Tom, to experience childbirth (for her mother in a way), and who we as women become after bringing new life into the world. Though yes, it’s been said since the beginning of time that the bond between a mother and child isn’t always instant, and the pressure we as new mothers feel can be tremendous, this story felt way too pretentious and forced than I would have liked.

When we learn of Madeline’s struggle of seeing fairies, her belief that her daughter Maude isn’t really hers, it feels as though the reader is given explanations of why Madeline thinks this, and is validated. I wanted to see more of her mania, her complete and utter struggle, rather than filling the pages with conversations that are trying to be well versed between her and Tom or Angela (her mentor) or even her family and her peers.

As an audiobook, I wanted more in terms of inflection of tone, a change of pace between when Madeline was having delusional thoughts vs just her average day of being sleep deprived, or having a conversation with Tom or her family and friends.

Compared with other recent stories of the decent into madness after giving birth, this did not pack the punch that others have as of late. I appreciated the theme, however the execution fell flat, and the story itself could have been cut down by half and still conveyed the same message.

Thank you to Farrar, Straus and Giroux as well Brilliance Audio and Netgalley for the advanced reader and listener copy. All thoughts and opinions are my own and my review is left voluntarily.

[Ramya · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thanks to Farrar, Straus and Giroux for the ARC.


Emily McBride's debut novel has all the best qualities of debut fiction and none of the shortcomings. It's powerful, intense, fresh and at the same time, well-thought through, well-written, with a fierce and confident narrative voice.
Madeline, adopted at 10 months old, is a PhD student, who becomes a mother at 23. The bare bones of this description, however, doesn't encompass the range of difficulties she faces, from a long, dangerous labour, C-section, infection, colleague jealousy and conflict, a neglectful husband, the mental and physical torture of being a mother, the tediousness of it, loss of identity, the guilt and danger she feels over their neighbourhood, money troubles, etc etc. Without feeling overdone or contrived, McBride paints a clear picture of the difficulties of just being a woman alive in the present. As Madeline slips into psychosis, I fell into her world, her mind, her hallucinations, until by the end, I felt as estranged from myself as she did. I felt so much reading this. The book is engrossing, deeply sad, deeply infuriating, deeply real and should be read by all men who want to be fathers - and by people who want to be mothers, too, I think. I look forward to reading whatever Emily McBride writes next.




SLIGHT PLOT DETAIL SPOILERS BELOW, SKIP IF YOU WANT TO STAY COMPLETELY UNSPOILED






I had read another reviewer saying that she hated the husband, Tom. I wholeheartedly concur - many times, I wanted to hit him about the face with my tablet. The most galling, vehemently depressing parts were where Madeline is hungry, sucked empty by the breastfeeding, and yet Tom is passive aggressively commenting on the money spent on her eating out. All I could think of was that someone who purports to love her would have made her food, that there should be tupperware of meals in her fridge, that she shouldn't be spending so much of the book ravenous, while Tom goes back to work and neglects her in favour of fighting for a promotion that may or may not exist. At the same time I was exasperated by Madeline not telling Tom any of this - but it makes sense, she is 23 years. Very few 23 year olds can advocate for themselves, especially if they're exhausted new mothers.

[Kathi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review of advance copy received from NetGalley

In this book we follow 23 year old academic and soon to be mother Madeleine through her pregnancy, birth and the months after. Despite experiencing a difficult birth and having had C-section, Madeleine still falls in love with her baby Maud. But after being separated from her for a few days because of medical issues, she suddenly doesn’t recognize Maud anymore. All she can see is a mean baby with cunning eyes, always hungry and never satisfied. All her love vanished and she is sure that her little baby has been replaced by a fairy child, a changeling. We follow Madeleine as she dives deeper and deeper into her theories, totally alienated and isolated in her fear. Soon enough, the reader recognizes typical signs of psychosis in Madeleine, and we follow her as the state of her mind escalates. Madeleine’s obsession changes from trying to change the fairy child back to realizing that not her baby, but she herself has been changed by the fairies. As this realization hits her, she follows a new plan, which finally lands her in a closed mother and child ward, where her illness is being treated.
Queen Man is the debut novel of Emily McBride and spiked with literary references. The atmosphere is extremely eerie as we share Madeleine’s deepest fears and her point of view while also realizing more and more that she slowly but surely slides into a full psychosis. Despite not having had the experience myself, I think that the author accurately captures the feeling of complete alienation and paranoia as well as the feelings of postpartum depression. The struggles of a new mother with little guidance, in a precarious situation and with no help or support, are depicted in a very realistic way in this novel. Madeleine’s fairy world is beautifully displayed through yet again literary references and mostly elements of nature, primarily a cat and a fox, which embody the fairies that took away Maud or Madeleine.

I would read this book over and over again!

[Emma-Grace · Rating 4 out of 5]

Queen Mab by Emily McBride—★★★★

Reading this felt like being subsumed completely by someone else’s psychological world. Maintaining the careful balance of restraint in scope (if you are an interiority girl you will LOVE this 😍) while simultaneously capturing the sheer expansiveness of our unbridled inner worlds, Queen Mab explores the experience of postpartum, motherhood, womanhood, and academia through a literary and mystical lens that sucks you into Madeleine’s head from the moment you start upon the first page.

This novel is short but still so dense and layered. It felt like a study. It felt like an experience. A tough experience at some points. Though this book is certainly not plot driven, it still manages to be a page turner. The writing flows and flowers but still managed to be to the point: every page has something so fascinating to say it leaves you wondering what will be said next.

If you love literature so much it makes you worry that you will lose your mind spending so much time amongst words (been there 🙋‍♀️😭). If, despite those concerns for your sanity you still willingly get down with the claustrophobic nature of a Kafka story, the stream of consciousness of Woolf, or the doom and gloom of Victorian poets and novelists. If you are interested in a raw, real, and slightly fantastical exploration of postpartum and the early days of motherhood. This book is the one for you.

Though I appreciated the concentrated and restrained nature of this book, I do wish I had gotten to know more about Madeleine. I finished the book feeling I knew just enough but I was left wanting a little more. I feel as though there could have been some more backstory to help us gain an understanding of her motivations to fully round her out as a character.

Overall a read that does both: thrilling and pensive. Also a read that reminded me how a love for language and literature will cause me to spiral.

Out August 4th 2026.

[Jen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read an eARC of this book on NetGalley so thank you to the author and the publisher.

This is an immensely clever novel blending romantic poetry with post partum depression and (a sense) of magical realism.

Our main character Madeleine is an academic, She’s studying romantic literature. She married young and now she’s having a baby. When the baby comes, she finds herself struggling to connect with it, convinced baby Maud has been swapped and is a changeling. Her world continually peppered with visions that back up her belief. Her studies of romantic literature bolstering her view.

There’s a beautiful blending of this moment of literature with Madeleine’s present. And it appears as though the author has a deep affection for the subject matter. This was cleverly done, creating a sense of blurred boundaries and a challenge to know what’s real. There’s something quite ethereal about this tale.

However, it’s also very sad. Madeleine’s family and friends aren’t giving the support she needs. Largely being dismissive. I think the husband was supposed to be portrayed quite positively. However I was enraged by him. I felt his quite callous attitude made things much worse for Madeleine and he should have been recognising that she needed help, not pushing her to do things for normalcy’s sake. Madeleine’s mother too, is challenging. Madeleine was adopted and her mother’s anxieties over not having had biological children of her own are poured onto Madeleine. I did wonder if being adopted led to Madeleine’s perception of her own daughter as a changeling. Finally… a certain academic colleague (perhaps even rival?) the lack of sympathy towards Madeleine, having just had a baby was grating.

This novel explores important themes, against a beautiful, poetic backdrop.

[Annabel Pickard · Rating 4 out of 5]

“They all wore a look of stricken recognition, and they stood around her like lock keepers, holding back the water.”

I went into this loving the idea of Madeline as a literature scholar who always has a quote for everything, chapters starting with snippets of Yeats and Keats. Throw in faeries and changelings and you can sign me up.

But rather than magical realism and a story of babies and faeries switched at birth, this was a raw and heart wrenching exploration of post-natal depression. I’m not a mother myself, but have plenty of friends who are and what struck me most about Queen Mab was how long it took anybody to truly help Madeline and recognise what was happening. My heart was literally clenching as Tom got angry and her “friends” did nothing more than look at her strangely. I think the way this was done, with its lyrical prose and Madeline’s “madness” manifesting in faeries and Greymalkin the talking cat was beautifully metaphorical.

I think the theme of identity was really important here too. After the “Great Undiscovery“ Madeline felt disconnected from her mother and father, particularly when her father’s latest hobby became genealogy. But the fact that he finds out that her adoptive great-grandmother went through something so similar after her second baby was born brought them touchingly back together again - blood doesn’t make family and post natal depression touches far more people than we realise.

Queen Mab was far from what I expected, but I think it will stay with me for a very long time.

[Victoria H · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for giving me this e-ARC for free with the expectation that I leave an honest review.

I loved loved loved this book. Oh my god. I've never read anything like it. Emily McBride's prose is strikingly literary (which makes sense for the character as a - remarkably young - PhD student main character) and gorgeous. The audiobook narrator is a true voice actress, as well, using pleasantly different voices for each character that are immediately recognizable.

The story is beautiful and anxious and touching and frightening. There is a touch of the feminine horror, which isn't normally my genre, but was absolutely enthralling. I was strikingly drawn into their world, which was lovingly and anxiously described through the main character's perspective. The strained relationships between the main character and her family and friends were still punctuated by love and deep care. I'm not even sure I can put correctly into words how much I loved this book. The quotes at the beginning of chapters were also on point thematically.

Besides the prose and the story, though---I think that I picked this book up because I wanted fairies. Yes, I saw that this book's genres were General Fiction (Adult) and Women's Fiction, and not fantasy, and so I shouldn't have expected true magical elements, but wow, this book delivered in terms of magical mood, if not in literal magic. I kept wondering if perhaps there would be magical elements after all. It also has a pinch of "dark academia" in my opinion, even if it isn't typical of the genre.

[Julia (Shakespeare and Such) · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.4/5 stars -- (if i had a nickel for every beautifully written lit fic book i read this year that would scare a woman off of having a baby, i would have two nickels. which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it's happened twice.) HOLY SMOKES what a stunningly beautiful debut. i left my copy with 108 highlights and some of them were big ole swaths of text, because it was truly that hard to cut the quotes off. what started off as a young woman's journey into motherhood take a quick swan dive into madness, and queen mab truly had me right there in the trenches with maddie, questioning my own sanity and trying to make meaning of the signs she was seeing. it's actually really interesting that i happened to watch this book review earlier today, before finishing queen mab, because dr. ana's discussion points at the end were eerily pertinent to the conclusion. i loved the many literary allusions (those i caught, and the many i got to learn about!), and having the academic angle to the faerie lore was a beautifully original twist to the changeling myth. overall, i highly recommend queen mab and i look forward to picking up more emily mcbride in the future someday!

Plot: 4/5
Characters: 5/5
Pacing: 4/5
Writing: 5/5
Enjoyment: 4/5

thank you to netgalley and farrar, straus and giroux for an advance copy in exchange for an honest review!

[ava elise · Rating 3 out of 5]

This review is based on an advanced reader's copy provided from NetGalley.

Transported into the dream-like narrative of a young mother who, after giving birth, finds herself convinced her baby has been replaced by a faerie, something she is uniquely familiar with as a Victorian scholar, this book is a beautifully written meditation on post-partum psychosis.

It is truly interesting to live in our main character, Madeleine's, head. She is wonderfully smart, and as someone with a matching interest in literature, I loved to listen to her thought process and her ideas. Obviously, as the book went on, it became more and more difficult to be in her head, and I found myself really despairing for her. I hated the way she was treated in the depths of her illness, especially by her husband. This book made me feel a lot.

As I stated earlier, I really enjoyed the writing style. It felt extremely immersive and fit the narrative very well. I applaud McBride for this. I really love all the knowledge she put into this, even including sources at the end. I could feel her passion for this project oozing through the pages.

I thought how this book touched on adoption and family dynamics and ties was very interesting. The generational aspect nearing the end of the novel was really well done and I felt it tied everything together. I loved learning about the three generations of mothers that came before Madeleine, and how they were mirrored through her.

I can't wait to see what fever dream of a book McBride creates next.

 Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

[Janine · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is story about motherhood and the impact of postpartum depression told through a young academic struggling for understanding of the possibilities her daughter is a changeling.

Madeleine “Maddie” Brodeur is a raising academic who answers to the name Mads, Queen Mab or Queenie. When she becomes pregnant, she is watched during pregnancy, has a horrific labor followed by an unscheduled C-Section before her daughter, Maud, is born. At first Maddie delights in her daughter but soon she believes something is wrong as she becomes obsessed with the belief her daughter is a changing.

The book is an exploration of madness and imagination. Maddie’s postpartum depression- something I never experienced - is filled with fairy tale illusions and literary quotations (don’t miss the Source section at the end, it’s impressive). I really felt sorry for Maddie - what an awful postpartum experience! And her husband, Tom, was a douche (what every woman doesn’t need at any time). The use of fairy tales and literary quotes as part of the premise of the book was interesting. But I also felt the craziness associated with postpartum in the fairy tale trope being offered was overstated and a bit too much.

My thanks to NetGalley and Farrer, Straus, and Giroux for allowing me access to this ARC.

[Niahm · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book progressively breathtaking. I personally find it hard to read continuous stream of consciousness when there isn’t anything physically happening in the time line (such as pages of someone’s inner monologue and in the storyline, no time has passed so you’ve just invested this time reading, only to be in the same spot with no change in the plot line.) BUT I loved this.

Initially I felt that this book was a great representation of PPD but then as the story continued and psychosis and everything else came into play, I still felt like it was helpful to see such representation despite the extremes that Madeleine was going through. It gave such a serious insight to the changes that people go through when becoming parents and certainly opened my eyes.

The writing was just so thorough. The concept was reasonably simple but the execution was unbelievable. The sheer amount of research that would’ve gone into this work, referencing works upon works of stories, poetry, history - I am in awe. The effort is immense and you can feel it from the first few pages that this is going to be a thoughtful and considered piece of work. As the story progresses, I am continuously impressed.

[Lucille · Rating 5 out of 5]

A descent-into-madness novel that feels like reading a Victorian text, but with a modern twist.

I’ve read many novels lately about motherhood and madness, but none have been as strong or compelling as this one. Without giving too much away, the postpartum psychosis captured in this book is so real and gritty and raw, that, as a reader, you have no choice but to go along for the ride. You’re inside Madeleine’s head, you’re inside her thoughts (despite the psychosis section switching to third person), and her reality is your reality. Her world makes sense. Until, all of a sudden, things get fragmented, and other dark moments from her family’s past come to light.

Beautifully written, ladened with literature references from Brontë to Yeats to Woolf, this is a powerful debut. Like most good books, it’s about many things: motherhood and madness, sure, but also family lineage. Family stories. Love - chosen or not. Belonging. Gentrification. The wilderness, the wild, the animal in all of us. Fables.

Ultimately, Queen Mab is, in part, about trying to make sense of that which doesn't make sense. And doing so through what we know best: stories. In Madeleine’s case: stories of fairies.

[Marlana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Under the guise of magical realism & fairytales, this novel drops the reader into the life of a woman just as she's welcoming a baby into the the world and very quickly dives headfirst into the belief that her life is full of faeries, changelings, spirited animals, etc. - when in reality she's struggling with postpartum psychosis.

I'll be honest, I saw myself as a mirror with Madeleine's birth trauma (I too went through a similar natural-turned-emergency-c-section event & became a NICU mom for a brief time) so my empathy for her runs deep. This story felt like a well mixed concoction of thriller, litfic, fairytale and academia... and above all a love letter to the mothers out there who have felt a complete loss of self in motherhood.

I found McBride's writing style quick & enjoyable, Helen Laser's narration was perfectly done, and I'll be looking forward to future works from the both of them.

Thank you to NetGalley, Brilliance Publishing (audiobook) & Farrar, Straus and Giroux (ebook) for giving me the opportunity to listen/read to this book early and share my honest review. All reviews will be posted to my socials (Netgalley, Goodreads, Fable, Pagebound, IG).

[Anna Gromer · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was really captured by the premise of this book and the writing was beautiful. But I was quickly lost by the large number of Victorian literary references. The secondhand anxiety that this novel caused is both a pro and a con. While the author did a wonderful job of illustrating the FMC's fall into further psychosis, it was physically palpable for me which almost had me abandoning the novel. So while I did not *love* it, I liked it enough to stick around to see how the story ended.

While this not a horror novel by any means, I feel that readers that enjoy novels that toe the line of psychological horror would enjoy this.

Thank you to NetGalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux for the Digital ARC of this novel.

[Ellie Moon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you to NetGalley and Pushkin Press for providing me with an ARC of this book. All opinions are my own.

I was absolutely transfixed by this novel. Incredibly well written and deeply haunting, “Queen Mab” details a young mother coming to believe that her newborn has been taken and replaced with a changeling.

The strong literary and fairy tale themes in the book were a delight to read, and the description of Madeline’s interior world was so rich and fraught and captivating. I found myself eager to return to the book when I was forced to put it down.

I highly recommend this book to all readers, but especially those who enjoy books about womanhood, motherhood, and references to classic literature. A true gem of a book.

[Mary Angel · Rating 2 out of 5]

Reading some of the reviews lets me know that I'm definitely in the minority because most readers seem to love Queen Mab. I wanted to love it. I tried to love it, but I just couldn't get into it. There are run-on sentences and long, drawn-out paragraphs, and I didn't like that format. It felt a little chaotic to me. That being said, others saw something I didn't, so I would never dissuade someone from reading the book and forming their own opinion. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

[ladyintrovert21 · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a debut novel. It follows a new mother dealing with fear and exhaustion, and the feeling that something isn’t right. The mix of folklore and her unraveling felt intimate and heavy, but it worked for me. It’s slow and atmospheric, and it stayed with me after I finished. I really enjoyed it, it was something new for me and offered meaningful lessons and awareness.

Thank you Netgalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux for the ARC

[Lydia Hephzibah · Rating 4 out of 5]

4

Setting: UK
Rep: n/a

At its heart, this is a book about postpartum psychosis and Madeleine struggling with the conviction that her baby is a changeling, and I really liked her voice. She was an engaging protagonist and I enjoyed the audiobook. I disagree with it being listed as magical realism as, although I guess you could argue it's an element, it's a result of Madeleine's postpartum psychosis rather than actual magical realism.

[Kelsey · Rating 3 out of 5]

Part post-partum character study, part folklore thriller, Queen Mab chronicles a new mother's growing obsession that a changeling is in her midst.

While the book is a charming meditation on motherhood and postpartum conditions, it could have done more to stand out. I wish there were more faerie presence, and I wish the book had less restraint when it came to Queenie's behavior. The story threatens to cross into unhinged, "weird-girl" fiction territory but ultimately doesn't earn the label.

[Emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is literary fiction at its most metatextual, with references to Victorian fictions and intertextualities that wrap around the characters in ways that will appeal to fans of Helen Oyeyemi, just a bit heavier handed than some of the best books in this space (like anything by A.S. Byatt).

[Anna Beiler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely beautiful and captivating. McBride brings you into the world of Madeleine- whether her physical surroundings or her mental unravelings- with a subtle and deft touch. Through the story of new motherhood, she leads us to universal questions of belonging and the slipperiness of reality’s borders. I couldn’t wait to return to this book each evening and was dreaming about it at night.

[Venneh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hell of a debut that looks at a young academic's experience of pregnancy and new motherhood, including post partum psychosis, changeling lore and mythos, and woman trying to keep it together as her world increasingly falls apart. Genuinely surprised a take on post partum psychosis and changelings hadn't been done yet.

[Lauren Bayne · Rating 3 out of 5]

mcbride does a wonderful job of fully immersing the reader in madeleine’s spiral of psychosis. readers will be uncomfy the whole time.

anyway this book took forever for me to read because of the sheer number of run-ons. i get what it was emulating, but it was still painful to read.

thank you to netgalley and farrar, straus, and giroux for an earc in exchange for my honest review.