In the town of Whimsy, elves exchange magic for items of human craft; often, the magic has a dark side. Painter Isobel has learned to be very precise with her dealings with elves, but one day makes a mistake by painting a mortal emotion that she sees in the eyes of Rook, the autumn prince. He demands that she appear in his court to answer for her crime; however, during their journey they find that things have gone very wrong in the elven lands. I really loved Rogerson’s elves, who are prickly, vain, and superficial but in their hearts crave the touching, transient beauty of mortality; I also loved Isobel’s defiant embrace of her own humanity. I rolled my eyes a bit at the relationship between Isobel and Rook, but by the end of the book could not imagine them any other way. Surprisingly good; the book just got better as it went along.