Synopsis:
All they needed to break the world was a door, and someone to open it.
Camford, 1920. Gilded and glittering, England’s secret magical academy is no place for Clover, a commoner with neither connections nor magical blood. She tells herself she has fought her way there only to find a cure for her brother Matthew, one of the few survivors of a faerie attack on the battlefields of WWI which left the doors to faerie country sealed, the study of its magic banned, and its victims cursed.
But when Clover catches the eye of golden boy Alden Lennox-Fontaine and his friends, doors that were previously closed to her are flung wide open, and she soon finds herself enmeshed in the seductive world of the country’s magical aristocrats. The summer she spends in Alden’s orbit leaves a fateful mark: months of joyous friendship and mutual study come crashing down when experiments go awry, and old secrets are unearthed.
Years later, when the faerie seals break, Clover knows it’s because of what they did. And she knows that she must seek the help of people she once called friends-and now doesn’t quite know what to call-if there’s any hope of saving the world as they know it.
Review:
This is why I don’t post wrap-ups until January 1st.
Cementing my favourite sub-genres and niches in my reading tastes. Character-driven fantasy with an academia setting, an underdog, a found family friend group, a well-deserved twist or reveal, and blood family bonds.
Clover is a scholarship witch who had never even heard of magic until her brother returned home from the war with a faerie curse.
In her quest to discover a cure, she is drawn into the enigmatic, golden, popular clique.
As a clear lonely, bookish outsider from the secretive aristocratic magical Families, Clover falls fast and hard for her new three friends who are way outside of her social bubble.
They are witty, sharp, full of banter and cleverness. And they know it.
“Alden,” she would say dryly, “if you get any more decorative someone will nail you to the gallery wall, and I’ll be happy to help them.”
This book is emotional, addicting, and reflective. Identity, sexuality, class politics that play into this compact story that is utterly satisfying.
It’s about wanting to belong to this old world of dusty tomes and ancient stone, but also being rebellious to old authority and conventions.
My complaint is I wish we had more time with the characters, but this was perfectly balanced for its length. Whilst it didn’t make my top list (on Instagram now), it would have made my top 15%.
This is an odd comparison, but if you enjoyed King Sorrow by Joe Hill, A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik, even Blood Over Bright Haven by ML Wang; pick this up.
Leave a Reply