“Across the Green Grass Fields” is the sixth novella in Seanan McQuire’s Wayward Children Series. These are really the ultimate portal fantasy series for modern readers. In these novellas, certain children and or young adults find impossible doorways to places they need, or that need them. Sometimes they return to our world, sometimes they go back. Unlike the other novellas in this series, this one does not directly feature Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children. This novella features Regan, who is a young girl trying desperately to fit in with an unsuitable friend who does not respect her for who she really is. When she learns a secret about herself, she turns to that friend to share this secret. She quickly realizes this was a terrible mistake. She runs away from school in tears, and on her way home through the woods, she finds an impossible door made of trees which seem to have grown together. Curious, she goes through this door… Regan then finds herself in the Hooflands, a magical world that seems to be everything a horse-loving girl could want. Every kind of hoofed creature from myth seems to be represented there, and it is their mythology that when humans appear, they are to perform some heroic task and thereby save the Hooflands. Regan isn’t ready for heroism yet, she just wants to be herself and be accepted for who she is. She happily finds this simple life for a time, but destiny seems to have a way of catching up to her… These stories are modern and inclusive fairy tales, with which readers from the 21st century can relate. I’m now looking forward to the next installment in the series, which looks like it will be somewhat different from the rest. It’s titled “Where the Drowned Girls Go” and it’s expected to be released in January of 2022.