The Irresponsible Reader

Gnomes of Lychford

by Paul Cornell

DETAILS:
Series: Witches of Lychford, #6
Publisher: Tor
Publication Date: September 9, 2025
Format: eBook
Length: 160 pg.
Read Date: September 19-20, 2025

Autumn quickly filled in some gaps in her knowledge of supernatural beings. “They’re usually incredibly laid-back. What do they want?”

Lizzie read from the leaflet. “They demand that ‘the old promise must be kept,’ whatever that means. That ‘crude depictions of their bodies and culture’ must cease—”

“Do they mean—?”

“Garden gnomes.”

“Around here, that’s a big ask.”

What’s Gnomes of Lychford About?

The people of Lychford have a new challenge facing them—podcasters.

Yes, that’s right—after the events of the last book, rumors have started spreading about Lychford. They’ve caught the attention of podcasters who love debunking supernatural urban legends and the like. So they’re wandering around, asking questions that no one wants to answer.

And they’re not the worst thing facing the citizenry. They’ve annoyed the Gnomes, too. And they have demands. Not only do they have demands, but these tiny aggressors have the ability to back up their threats. If only any of the humans in Lychford could understand the demands (other than the ones about the garden gnomes).

The Gnomes

The gnome king was about half a metre tall, and wore a golden, ceremonial version of the work apron and tool belt she’d seen on a lot of gnomes; plus, of course, more facial hair than seemed feasible. His little blue eyes peered from a mass of it like he was a particularly perplexed beagle. His name, oddly to Autumn’s ears, was Greg. That was bound to happen from time to time, though. The chosen names of other races would sometimes seem very like human ones.

These gnomes are ridiculous; their threats, however, aren’t. And they seem to be able to follow through with them. You can easily bounce between chuckling at them and then being glad they don’t really exist.

Cornell shows us this new race and new world in a very economical fashion—he spent book after book setting up everything else for us (that’s not a complaint), and he does almost as good a job in this book in just a few pages. Sure, a lot of that is building on the foundation from those other books—but not all of it.

So not only did I enjoy his gnomes and gnomish culture—I’m impressed by how he gave it to us.

So, what did I think about Gnomes of Lychford?

I’m worried about her. And I’m worried about her dropping the ball. When ‘the ball’ might be, I don’t know, the universe.”

One of the best parts of this series has been its awareness that this is a somewhat silly idea, but Cornell’s largely addressed it in a serious way. And that combination works well. It’s done particularly well in this volume—better than in some of the earlier works. There’s a strong stream of comedy throughout—but the dangers to the town are never a joke, and everyone treats them accordingly.

I do not like the way Lizzie was handled here—in almost any way. From the way she’s dealing with her romantic issues to the way she reacted during the crisis, it didn’t feel like her—she was the reader’s entry point to this world, and for her to be so off puts a dampener on a lot of the book. Her inner monologue about faith and comfort, I should add, was fantastic.

That said—just about every other thing made up for it. The town meetings—just great. The town’s involvement in everything else, too—and the way the events of the previous book clearly altered things (for many) are just cool to see. The discovery that there’s more supernatural activity (and connections with humans) in Lychford was a great bonus. The Gnomes and Gnomish culture—again—just fantastic. I worried about the podcaster idea at the beginning, but I really came around to it. The return of Zoya and her daughter was wonderful to see—I’d honestly (sadly) forgotten all about them, and getting the memory jogged was wonderful. The out-of-nowhere love story worked so well, too; it just charmed me no end.

Basically, aside from Lizzie, this was just great (and her stuff wasn’t bad, per se, just disappointing).

I always enjoy a quick visit to Lychford, and this is one of the better—you’d do yourself a favor if you picked up this series. I look forward to the new direction it seems to be taking.

This post contains an affiliate link. If you purchase from it, I will get a small commission at no additional cost to you. As always, the opinions expressed are my own.