So, I’m gonna be straight with you fam, not that I can be anything else, but to spare any potential author their feelings and maybe prevent them from reading the review, not that that would happen, I hope:

This book was not for me.

Now, that doesn’t mean it was bad. Far from it, I think it’s pretty much exactly what it’s advertised as and anyone who thinks they might enjoy it will defo enjoy it. It’s a polished work of art that’s professionally written and presented, on par with and often above a lot of traditionally published stuff, and if you want a fluffy magical sapphic YA romance, this is for you.

But it wasn’t for me. Or, at least, I don’t think I’m the target audience. I enjoyed reading it, don’t get me wrong, but my enjoyment was always lukewarm, like I wasn’t quite getting the full experience. And that’s more on me than the book.

I won’t structure this review the way I usually do, mainly because I feel like my problems with the book are all intertwined and stem from the same source, which is ... I’m not sure? Genre? Target audience? Intent? All of the above?

The writing still carries the same sort of easy-to-read style that was present in The Songbird’s Refrain, though the main characters’ voices are obviously vastly different.

Overall, I liked the writing on a technical level, and I’m once again impressed with the author’s ability to avoid swear words, though Lydia is a bit more of a potty-mouth than Elizabeth was.

Lydia has a clear personality and voice, and one of my problems is that maybe it was a little too clear at times.

I know how that sounds, but it could be a side-effect of the book’s target audience being teens. Both Lydia and Eden have extremely defined and spelled-out character arcs. Lydia is too reckless and spontaneous and needs to chill, Eden is too chill and calculating and needs to let loose. A fine concept in theory, a good mirroring for a romance, but here, its execution feels a bit like a checklist? It’s basically spelled out for us how one influences the other, the character acknowledge their own flaws and at the end note how the other has changed them for the better, rounded them out. It didn’t feel very natural, and I thought it would’ve been better to leave that stuff implied since it was already pretty obvious.

It doesn’t help that both Lydia and Eden are far, far too mature for any sixteen-year-old I’ve ever met. They both recognize and acknowledge their feelings as irrational and apologize exactly for what they’ve done wrong, which sure, maybe is feel-good and a positive influence upon a teen reading this, but for me just felt a bit unrealistic. My favorite part of the book was when Lydia and Eden had a fight and Lydia stomped off all pissy and Eden refused to apologize later. It showed them being teens, individuals, idiots, flawed people who are growing up and learning to deal with their emotions. And then it’s somewhat undercut by them both having perfect apologies afterward where they know exactly what they did wrong just based on intuition? Like, complete with “here’s what I did wrong and why that was bad of me.” Idk, maybe JM was a better person as a teen than I was.

I really can’t say a lot about the other characters. The heroes of the story were all defined and had motivations and flaws of their own, while the antagonists were either a faceless mob, a faeceless mob (get it?), or just a dude who shows up in the last chapters and then is immediately dealt with. Compared to the antagonists in TSR, these guys felt a little underwhelming. They were set up from earlier in the story, of course, but their inclusion still felt a bit last-minute instead of a natural progression and integration into the fabric of the story.

And, again, I get it. This isn’t about the villains or that conflict. This is about the love story and the familial bonds and everything else comes after. Which is fine, but not something I personally found very compelling.

I think my favorite character was Eden, because she was cranky and awkward and flawed to a degree that felt right. She made mistakes but had her reasons, she was unlikable at times, and she felt grief and remorse.

I also liked Lydia’s mother, who, despite being in fear or pain for a lot of her on-page presence, still loved her daughter fiercely. She felt a lot like a real parent, even if her and Lydia’s relationship was a bit too saccharine for me to fully get behind.

Now let’s talk about the plot, or rather, the pacing, which was my other big problem with the book. The first third is very slow, my dudes. It may have contributed to why it took me so long to finish the book, a lot of it is just Lydia faffing about. The book is very light on magic stuff in the beginning, and it would’ve been fine if it didn’t do a whole 180 at the end and turned into a low-fantasy menacing mystery, complete with the vague threat of a human-fae war. I would’ve liked to have seen less Lydia and Eden faffing about and more of that magic plot, and while I understand that the focus of the first third was character-building, it still could’ve been done with a more balanced spread of plot vs character interaction.

But here’s where my personal tastes cloud my judgment. I’m not a young teen, so maybe I don’t see the value in more compassionate and understanding teen characters who could serve as role models. I’m not a WLW, so maybe I don’t see the value in two girls faffing about looking for a magic stick in the forest. I’m not a fluff-enjoyer (whatever the proper word for that is), so maybe the universally loving and positive characters just don’t land as well for me.

I can’t say that I hated this book, because I didn’t. In fact, I really enjoyed the latter half of it. I thought the fae were cool and interesting and felt disappointed there weren’t more of them in the story. Despite my grumbling, I do still appreciate what the book tried to do with the comfortable and loving family relationships between the characters and their relatives. I can see how this could help other readers and make them feel seen or perhaps soothe them when they don’t have the same thing in their lives.

I can see what this book was going for. I respect it, and I respect the work and effort and love put into it. It oozes from every word like a warm, sweet sludge.

But I’m covered in goop now. And my hands are all sticky.