Book review: A Marvellous Light (The Last Binding #1) by Freya Marske
A charming magical adventure set in the early 1900s. When Robin Blyth reluctantly accepts a new government position he finds himself unexpectedly swept up in magical conspiracies, deadly curses and a passionate whirlwind romance.
I chose to read A Marvellous Light on a whim, knowing very little about it other than the fact that it had a beautiful cover and had been blurbed by the author of The House In the Cerulean Sea. I’m pleased to report that it was everything I could have hoped for: a beautifully written queer romance wrapped up in the complications of magical intrigue and Edwardian sensibilities.
Told from the dual third-person perspectives of ordinary civil servant Robin Blyth and Edwin Courcey, the haughty magician forced to take Robin into his protection, A Marvellous Light centres around the mysterious disappearance of a liason between the ordinary and magical worlds. Robin and Edwin have a classic mutual-annoyance-to-friends-to-lovers relationship and their burgeoning feelings are definitely the heart of the book. The pace of the mystery slowed considerably after the first few chapters, but I didn’t really mind since this gave us more time to focus on Robin and Edwin getting to know each other.
One thing that definitely stood out to me in this novel is the worldbuiding. It’s a testament to debut author Marske’s skill that the magic of her world feels refreshingly original. Magicians in A Marvellous Light use gestures called cradles to weave together the requirements of their spells. It’s an entirely new way of approaching magic, but there’s a logic to the rules and regulations of Marske’s secret magical society that keeps it from becoming confusing.
All in all, there’s a lot to love about this novel and I’m excited to read more from Marske in the future!
Many thanks to Tor Books for providing a copy of A Marvellous Light. The opinions expressed in this review are my own.
Publisher: Tor Books
Rating: 4 stars | ★★★★✰
Review cross-posted to Goodreads
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Every so often, no matter how much I want to, I just can’t get into a book. Rather than give books I didn’t finish a lengthy bad review, here’s a mini-review for each of the books I’ve DNF’d since January 2021. Unpopular opinions lie ahead:
The Upper World by Femi Fadugba
As much as I appreciate that this is science fiction rooted in real science, there were too many physics lessons and not enough character development in this one. Ended up skimming the last quarter because I just wasn’t invested enough to read at my usual pace.
Grand Union by Zadie Smith
Technically only a DNF because I fell asleep while listening to the audiobook and didn’t care enough about the story I was listening to to rewind. I’m sure there will be people for whom Smith’s stream-of-consciousness prose and commentaries on humanity will be appealing. I’m just not one of them. Each story in this collection felt lacklustre, and suffered from an ambling, idle pace, as if Smith decided to just do away with the concept of structure altogether, which might have been a great artistic choice if she’d done it once, but when every single story in the collection has no conclusion and takes its characters precisely nowhere, getting through it begins to feel like a slog.
The one saving grace was Doc Brown’s audiobook narration. His voices for Smith’s characters, in particular, were marvellous.
Renegades by Marissa Meyer
I’m a huge fan of The Lunar Chronicles, but this just really wasn’t for me. Honestly, I think I knew going in that I wasn’t going to enjoy Renegades - I put off reading it for literal years. Then I tried both the physical copy and the audiobook in an attempt to keep myself from giving up on it. No luck. I’m completely apathetic towards superhero stories, having reached Marvel burnout several years before everyone else did, so maybe I’m just not this book’s target audience.
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the relationship between girls and the fantasy series they read when young is so special nothing comes close to it
“yes, I’ve been wanting to read that!” I say with complete earnestness, as I proceed to ignore every opportunity I have to read it
“I’ve been meaning to read/watch/listen to that, but the stars are not in position, so I can’t do it yet”
Book review:The Hollow Heart (The Midnight Lie #2) by Marie Rutkoski
If you’d asked me at the beginning of the year what my most anticipated read of 2021 was, I’d have answered instantly that it was this book. The Midnight Lie took my breath away when I read it, and THAT ENDING had me desperate to get my hands on the sequel.
Which makes it all the more disappointing that The Hollow Heart didn’t meet my (admittedly high) expectations.
With Nirrim’s sacrifice and Sid’s departure at the end of book one, The Hollow Heart sees both women on very different paths. Sid returns to Herran, only to find that her gravely ill mother needs her to play the part of palace spy once more. Meanwhile in Herrath, the heartless Nirrim begins a reign of terror over the people who subjugated her.
WhileThe Midnight Lie is set in the same universe as The Winner’s Curse, it holds its own as a separate story. The Hollow Heart, however, does not. Sid’s quest to investigate her mother’s illness feels disjointed from the events happening on the island of Herrath - and feels more like a sequel to the Winner’s Curse trilogy, rather than a sequel to The Midnight Lie. Don’t get me wrong, I loved getting to see Sid interact with her parents. But the entire storyline was centred around Sid’s parents and the mistakes they’d made in the past - not around Sid herself. Rutkoski barely touched on what I felt was the most interesting potential aspect of bringing Sid’s parents into the story - her turbulent relationship with them, and her determination not to let them dictate how she choses to dress or who she loves. The focus instead is on characters from The Winner’s Curse and their relationships with each other. Sid felt like an afterthought in her own story.
Tonally, Sid’s storyline also felt odd. While Nirrim makes mistake after mistake in Herrath, Sid is miles away playing detective. The two perspectives felt unintentionally jarring, so much so that Sid and Nirrim’s eventual reunion - which happens far, far later in the book than I expected - didn’t have the angsty emotional catharsis that I hoped it would. Reuniting Sid and Nirrim almost feels like an afterthought - something hastily slotted in at the end.
If you’ve read my reviewofThe Midnight Lie, you’ll know how gutted I am when I say that I wasn’t a fan of this book. It’s been a few months since I read it, and looking back I think what disappoints me most is that it made such little impression on me.
Many thanks to Farrar, Straus and Giroux for providing a copy of The Hollow Heart. The opinions expressed in this review are my own.
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Rating: 2 stars | ★★✰✰✰
Review cross-posted to Goodreads
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A Cute Girl with Large Eyebrows
