LOST IN THE HALL OF THE MOUNTAIN KING

Bachelorette Laurel, vacationing in an American national park, meets a charming stranger who passionately courts her with the astounding claim that he is an elf king.

LaRose modernizes fairy-tale tropes with this series opener starring Laurel Knoll, a customer-service specialist who takes a holiday from her bland, single life circa 2018 to visit an unspecified (but evidently California-area) national park. She falls for an unconventional stranger named Nitch (not Mitch, but Nitch). “The guy was nice-looking, if a bit unusual, with a long, angular face. He was tall and very lean, dressed in brown pants and a green, long-sleeved shirt.” And his ears are slightly pointed. Nitch has an affinity for nature and tells Laurel that he has his own wilderness getaway—a cozy cave full of bioluminescent mushrooms. The relationship blooms with Laurel accepting Nitch’s assertion that he’s not only an elf, but king of the elves who reside in a network of fantastic caverns in a mountain. And the king is seeking a queen. When Nitch eventually shows Laurel the subterranean elf society and its wonders (some, admittedly, pilfered from surface humans), the customer-service rep stubbornly clings to the idea that she is experiencing a lucid dream and thinks she might as well enjoy the experience. Only when Nitch offers an SF-adjacent explanation for the existence of his people does Laurel begin to believe all this is truly happening (it’s possible a few fantasy-minded readers will be discouraged by the reasoning behind this development). LaRose’s prose can best be described as spritely. The narrative is an easy, smooth, escapist beach read that belatedly adds more than a touch of danger and even Lovecraftian-tinged elements (some of the less assimilated elves have froglike features, reminiscent of The Shadow OverInnsmouth). In other words, this elf can sit on the paranormal-romantic shelf, even with its SF subplot. Although this is billed as book one in a series, it can serve as a standalone; no cliffhanger finish (even when there are actual cliffs).

An elf-centered paranormal romance with an SF, mycological twist.