13
votes
Accepted
Old management game in which you could send fairy critters to do work, like chopping down trees and building a house
This sounds like it could be Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos. Specifically the Night Elf campaign.
Warcraft 3 is an RTS game originally released in 2002 for PC.
The Night Elf faction specifically used a ...
- 20.4k
11
votes
Accepted
Did the word 'pillywiggin' exist (in print) before 1977?
I actually wrote the Writing in Margins pillywiggin analyses (starting here), and posted this question as one of several attempts to gather more information. I did receive one comment from someone ...
- 384
10
votes
Accepted
Books about semi-modern alternate world of demons and fairies; protagonist from real world enters fray
This is probably Faerie Wars by Herbie Brennan.
Blurb from Goodreads:
When Henry Atherton helps Mr. Fogarty clean up around his house, he expects to find a mess and a cranky old man; what he doesn't ...
- 13.1k
10
votes
Accepted
Story collection with upper-class fairies who amputate their wings?
Perhaps Kingdoms of Elfin by Sylvia Townsend Warner.
It's probably 30 years since I read it, and I don't specifically remember the details you mention, but they do have the sort of feel I remember.
...
- 3,189
9
votes
Accepted
What's the first example of fairies being divided into Summer and Winter Courts?
I've found a blog that dates the practice to the Victorian era -
In Victorian children's literature, fairies were responsible for painting the flowers, decorating the autumn leaves, or bringing ...
- 9,947
8
votes
Accepted
Looking for a Fae book that includes the Cú Sidhe
A Crack in Everything by Ruth Frances Long
The story introduces us to Izzy (Isabel) Gregory, who lives with her parents in a Dublin suburb. She has friends, she is into music, she has a part-time job ...
- 239k
8
votes
What is the origin of elves (and fairies and Vulcans) having pointy ears?
This likely has it's roots in mythology and folklore and probably dates back further than we can tell. However, I have found a very good article on the subject here which points to the earliest ...
- 144k
7
votes
Old book about three girls unlocking their (fairy?) powers thanks to a magical stone
It could be the W.I.T.C.H. series (2004 onwards), at least the novels.
Arguments in favor:
Fairy with short hair.
Pink cover - take a look at the first one's cover, in various languages. Granted, ...
- 58.3k
6
votes
Title of a book about a fairy princess
Could this be Alice the Fairy by David Shannon?
Of course, I also have a Magic Mirror."Mirror, mirror, on the wall,
who’s the fairiest of them all?" Well, what do you know - it’s me,
Alice! ...
- 718k
6
votes
Accepted
Why did the author choose 3 min 4 sec to be stolen by the Sídhe?
The author answered the out-of-universe reasoning in a series of tweets in 2016.
Q. How long is a day in the Grey Lands? Also why is it 3 mins and 4 seconds?
PÓG: Nobody really knows. It feels like ...
- 718k
5
votes
Children's book about fairies and purple cards with poems
Flower Children: The Little Cousins of the Field and Garden by Elizabeth Gordon and illustrated by M. T. Ross
Originally published in 1910 it has been re-published numerous times and so there was ...
- 144k
5
votes
Accepted
90s/2000s French comic about kids accidentally summoning a monster
Pixies (1991) by Pierre Dubois and Robert Rivard?
From Wikipedia, most of the translation courtesy of DeepL:
The Pixies are a band of children who play at casting spells and defending nature and the ...
- 58.3k
5
votes
Identification of a Fantasy book About Fairies that are like plants
Could this be Illusions (or Wings or Spells) by Aprilynne Pike? The blooming happens in Book 1, but the pollenation thing is in Book 3.
Per wikipedia;
Lauren ... is a fall fairy who was sent to live ...
- 718k
5
votes
Accepted
Book set in a time of dragons featuring a boy and his dragon saving their homeland from weird monsters
Might you be thinking of Eragon?
A Shade named Durza, along with a group of Urgals, ambushes a party of three elves. They kill two of them, and Durza attempts to steal an egg carried by the remaining ...
- 239k
4
votes
What's the first example of fairies being divided into Summer and Winter Courts?
Prokofiev's ballet Cinderella (1945)
Prokofiev's ballet has a somewhat different take on the story than we see in Disney's animated movie, in that the fairy godmother summons the fairies of Spring, ...
- 21.1k
4
votes
Children/ Young Adult Fantasy Book featuring fairies
A Google search on fairies bluebell sapphire goblin maid short stories turns up the answer: Shadow Castle by Marian Cockrell.
Quoting the Amazon description:
In the middle of a deep forest is an ...
- 21.1k
3
votes
Accepted
What is the earliest mention of fae being able to literally steal a human's name?
The only example I can find of a fae stealing a name because the victim named themselves is SCP-4000 AKA "taboo", published in 2018.
In this case the victim names himself "fellow ...
- 11.3k
3
votes
A fairy fantasy, possibly a trilogy - a woman lives in and used to be a tree, a house built with right-angles and iron
Possibly Sheri S. Tepper's Beauty (1991)
I don't recall all the details you mention, as it has been many years since I read the book. However, the protagonist, a girl called Beauty, has a fairy mother,...
- 21.1k
3
votes
Accepted
did a fey ever lie?
Yes, the fairies in Sleeping Beauty can lie.
Maleficent claimed to bear no ill will.
Maleficent, the evil fairy in Disney’s Sleeping Beauty, claims she was not offended and bears no ill will at not ...
- 106k
2
votes
Old book about three girls unlocking their (fairy?) powers thanks to a magical stone
Another answer could be the Rainbow Magic series (2003 onwards). No particular book, though.
From Wikipedia:
The series follows the lives of Kirsty Tate and Rachel Walker and their magical ...
- 58.3k
2
votes
Why does Strephon look like he is 25?
He is 25. That's why he "looks" 25.
25-year-olds look very similar to 17-year-olds [citation needed], so even if, from the waist up, Strephon looks like he's 17, the people who are calling him 25 ...
- 18.7k
2
votes
Book, possibly YA, about a young girl with fey powers, sought by fey royalty to destroy the human world
Darkness of Light (2013) by Stacey Marie Brown.
It's the accepted answer to this Goodreads identification request, posted the same day as this very SFF question and worded the same.
The Goodreads ...
- 58.3k
1
vote
What's the first example of fairies being divided into Summer and Winter Courts?
This may only be a partial answer, but you could possibly trace it to the Greek myth of Persephone and Hades, specifically the Rape of Persephone (rape as in the Greek "raptus" - "...
- 5,636
1
vote
Book series in which fairies can become human and return to being fairies if they die
Possibly the Faery Rebels trilogy by R J Anderson? The main character from the first book, Knife, is a human-who-used-to-be-a-fairy in the other two books; and fairies that die in the first book can ...
- 9,947
1
vote
1
vote
Anime about a girl whose necklace can summon musical fairies
I think you might be looking for Mirmo Zibang
It doesn't show a necklace though but they are definitely music fairies and necklaces with powers might appear every so often. But the fairies come from ...
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible