Author Moirah Gemel is much the same as most other authors published by Interlude Press in that she is part of a much larger movement among mass media to write the world as it is today – in particular, to be much more inclusive with regards to overall diversity and to shed light on various communities. Gemel embraces the notion of telling the stories of characters of increasingly varied sexuality, race, and spirituality. Where some approach the movement with a desire to normalize seeing these stories as frequently as the ones that have come before it, Gemel has consistently been unafraid to take a risk in injecting an extra edge into her storytelling.
Gemel’s current exploration into urban fantasy can be found in her upcoming novel Céilí.
The Los Angeles music scene has not been kind to Devon Caelin. He struggles to fit in and has a streak of bad luck the length of the Sunset Strip. One rare rainy night, he drowns his sorrows from bar-to-bar, until he stumbles into an alley club called Céilí. He discovers that it’s home to a small community of mystical people making their way in the human world and that he found it only because he is Fae himself. With mentoring from the pub’s proprietor, Eldan—a powerful Fae Lord protecting his kind in the city—Devon unearths his past and discovers his magical abilities. His life appears to be back on track—until a member of the Faerie Court is murdered and the secret of their world is threatened.
In Céilí, Gemel’s strengths lie predominantly in two areas: the clear arcs of character development for each protagonist and the ways in which those arcs coincide, and a particular attention to detail.
Devon’s arc is painted clearly through Céilí’s pages, each stroke broad and clean. Not only does Devon’s view of the world broaden the further he immerses himself into the lives of Céilí and its people, but Devon’s perception of himself and his place in that world – and ours – also becomes more clear with exploration. In contrast, Gemel’s other protagonist of the piece – Eldan – approaches clarity from the opposite end of the spectrum. Where Devon’s perception broadens, Eldan’s narrows in an attempt to do more than just plant roots in the ground. Eldan’s arc falls in juxtaposition to Devon’s rise as Eldan searches for an anchor in a mate. The places in which the arcs of each character intersect are the places that the overall picture seems most clear, vivid, and bright. Each comes from their own incarnation of isolation and aimlessness, and in the other, finds a sense of belonging, home, and a renewed sense of what it means to really redefine oneself.
Gemel’s apptitude is also apparent in her attention to detail throughout the book. In constructing the setting for Céilí, Gemel’s words are descriptive enough to paint a startlingly clear picture of the home of the Fae in the mind of the reader, stark in all of its edges and height and warm in its light. Gemel’s depictions of Céilí also feel immensely lived in – from the exploration of the drinks at the bar to the cobwebs cluttering the fourth floor – and as such, contribute immensely to enabling the reader to sink into Devon’s point of view throughout his journey.
In Céilí, there is home.
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