Synopsis:
Love. Loyalty. Sacrifice.
Grey Flynn has dedicated her life to her mage, Kier.
She will be his blade on the battlefield, his healer and protector. The deep well of raw power inside her is Kier’s to use. Grey would do anything for Kier – be anything for him – if he would only ask.
When a quest to protect the child of an enemy kingdom pulls them into the dangerous heart of their nation’s war, Grey and Kier will need to decide what they are willing to sacrifice to protect their secret.
For Grey is no ordinary magical well, but heir to the lost island of Locke – the root of all power. If she dies, all magic dies with her.
Review:
Hello again dear reader or listener, when I tell you BookTok/Booksta will not know how to behave when this book comes out… These lovable idiots will be the death of all of us. But I am getting ahead of myself.
With thanks to the team at Orbit UK for approving my NetGalley request, I promise an honest review!
First things first, did you SEE THAT COVER?! Yeah, we know we know never judge a book by its cover but holy shit is this thing gorgeous and already telling me the story will wreck me! Orbit, whoever in your team picked the artist making these lady knight covers is a genius and you need to pay them more.
Making her adult debut with The Second Death of Locke, Bovalino brings all of the skills she honed with previous books and levels them up to present us with a brand-new fantasy world brimming with magic, found family, action, and so. Much. Yearning. It is romantic and gritty and hilarious and, honestly, it delivers on so much promise I kept being positively surprised. In fact, the number of times I expected some of the tropes or clichés of the Romantic Fantasy genre, only for the author to either bypass them completely or maturely develop them in ways that felt utterly satisfying, is testament to an author who knows what readers want and, more importantly, knew how to deliver it without sacrificing an ounce of tension or story intricacy. Not to mention so many tiny tid-bits that made for an extra layer of authenticity and freshness throughout the story, for their realism and modernity.
I am in no way exaggerating when I say this is the kind of book lovers of Romantasy and/or Romantic Fantasy desperately needed right now. Let’s be honest, the trend was fun at the beginning but it swung a bit too hard in the other direction of a lot of stories being badly marketed or badly written to meet a trope quota. Resulting in a lot of, let’s call them empty, stories that no longer moved us the way the previous books that kickstarted the trend did. I am of course generalizing for simplicity’s sake but the point remains, in that with this book the genre can rejoice, and be refreshed. Not light on the action either, this story is cinematic to say the least, with edge of your seat duels/battles that see our protagonists needing to sharpen their blades and clean out viscera from their hair more often than they’d like.
Bovalino takes her time to get the story going properly and to ease the reader into this new and intricate world of mages and their power wells, of bonds that sometimes transcend the mere romantic or physical, and she does so through a female protagonist who is layered and interesting, but also emotionally intelligent enough to recognize her own mistakes and biases. Seeing the work the character puts into her own development was nothing short of satisfying as it made for someone we could root for even when fully aware she was being an idiot. The bond between the main couple was downright adorable and I just wanted to punch a wall with every time they were each showing denial of some kind. But oh the author makes it hurt so good, as they say, and I both hated and loved her for it. I don’t often read friends to lovers dynamics, not because of a particular dislike but because it is rarely within a plot context that I find myself drawn to. I’ve seen other early reviews lament the fact that these two are not a couple at the start of the story when it is so clear they adore each other and to that I can only say, that is the point guys, come on!! I am notoriously picky when it comes to romance and I found this relationship built so well and realistically that even I couldn’t find a hangup. Truly the disaster bi to end all disaster bi characters, and that goes for both of them! They are fools, your honor, and I love them.
As the story progresses, the plot picks up and rarely lets you go, in fact, I think it is safe to say that past the 55% mark this book had me stressing for all the remaining hours it took for me to finish it. I neglected my pets, my mother, and my boyfriend (the mvp here for walking and feeding the aforementioned quadrupeds in my stead) so that I didn’t have to pause reading. At one point I was even asked if I’d had enough water throughout the afternoon. That’s how deep Bovalino had me hooked, and as I finally shut my kindle and its remaining 3% battery near midnight, I could not stop grinning from the satisfying ending and all the good feelings you get from an amazing book that took such a hold of you. Not to mention all the feels from the events that lead to said ending or the cozy vibes of the found family that is created with the varied side characters you would die for.
This is a deeply romantic and epic tale of what it means to be loyal and love so much you’d be willing to sacrifice anything, but also a cautionary one of when to recognise that a life built on a cycle of sacrifices is perhaps one of too high a cost. What if instead of dying for love, you live for it, and fiercely so?
It works perfectly as a standalone even though I have some ideas as to what Bovalino might have in store for us next, there is after all one resolution that leans on the bittersweet, but I cannot wait to meet these characters again for I miss them already and it’s barely been a day since I finished reading!
Until next time,
Eleni A.E.
Visit the Author’s Website Here!!!
[This review originally appeared on BeforeWeGoBlog]
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