The 13 treasures is a novel written by Michelle Harriston, the novel is published in 2009 and it was her first novel. This novel is the first part of her trilogy which following parts are The 13 curses and The 13 secrets. Michelle Harriston is a 28 years old editorial assistant in children’s publishing and a former bookseller.
The 13 treasures is a fantasy novel and the theme of the novel is a detective story and it fits in its genre very well because fantasy novels often includes secrets and mysteries which are meant to be solved.
Main characters in the novel are Tanya, her grandmother Florence, Florence’s groundskeeper Warwick and his son Fabian. Tanya’s relationship to Florence has always been quite distant and it still is, Tanya has never felt herself welcome to visit her. And what comes to Fabian he and Tanya had never actually been friends and Tanya had never really enjoyed his company. Tanya is a normal teenage girl except she has a second sight which means that she is able to see fairies. Her grandmother Florence is pretty distant and old-fashioned. Fabian is the same age as Tanya and he is a spindly nerd boy with messy hair and eyeglasses who likes to read about science and explore nature. His father Warwick is a grumpy and scary man who spends most of his days hunting in the forest. Tanya has always been a bit afraid of Warwick and avoided him.
The book begins when Tanya has an argument with her mom because of her bad behavior, which is a result of the tricks that the fairies have done to her and of course Tanya hasn’t told anyone about the fairies. Tanya’s mother sends her to live with her grandmother in a manor for a couple of weeks, where she founds a 50 years old newspaper cutting that says a young girl named Morwenna Bloom has disappeared in the woods near the manor. Later when Tanya’s dog Oberon runs into the woods Tanya and Fabian sees a girl there who looks just like Morwenna Bloom. After that Fabian tells Tanya that her grandmother had been best friends with Morwenna and Fabian’s grandfather Amos was the last person who saw Morwenna and because of that, the police and the village people suspected him of murdering Morwenna even Amos was in love with her. All the rumors about Amos being a murderer had ruined his life so Fabian and Tanya decided to go to the woods again to find out what really happened to Morwenna and to prove that Amos is innocent. One night Tanya saw an intruder in the manor and followed her into the secret passage. The intruder’s name is Red and she has a second sight too. One day Tanya receives an anonymous letter which says that when Morwenna disappeared she was caught to the fairy world so Tanya and Fabian went to the forest to rescue her. In the forest Morwenna tells them that Tanya’s grandmother Florence had also the second sight and she and Morwenna had made a deal 50 years ago to go to the fairy world together but Florence had betrayed her so now Morwenna was angry and intend to switch places with Tanya. Red came to rescue Tanya by taking her place in the switch and Morwenna died suddenly aging all those 50 years after the switch.
At the end of the book when Tanya realizes that her grandmother’s rejecting and distant behavior has been the result of her trying to protect Tanya, she starts to understand her grandmother better and they become more closer. Also Tanya’s relationship with Fabian gets better and they realizes that they care about each other and actually are friends and have a good time together. Tanya also got more information and experience about the fairies during her time in the manor and now knows better how to deal with them so she won’t get in trouble so easily.
I really liked the book and the plot was great even though at first I was skeptical because of the fairy things. The plot really was riveting and I read the novel surprisingly fast and in some parts the novel was even a bit scary so it was exiting to read it. I also think that it was easy to read a novel in English and the language of the novel was pretty easy so I understood the meanings of the sentences easily.