Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for providing me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
I have to admit my feelings on this book are a bit all over the place. I originally requested it because I was intrigued by the synopsis. Curses, an eccentric love interest, a woman trying to earn a living for herself in a man's world. Then I kept getting distracted by other books until I finally realized that the release date for this was creeping up on me. Then it became a little bit like a school assignment where I felt like I had to read it and so was less than excited about the potential story. However, this book quickly changed my mind! I loved Andromeda and her no nonsense way of approaching her work. She had limited options but she was determined and driven to do the impossible and finish a job 10 others had failed to do before her. Setting her against Magnus, for whom eccentric is a bit to kind of a word, was brilliant. I'll admit I fell for Magnus much quicker than Andromeda. He's just so ridiculous it's impossible not to love him.
I also deeply loved the setting of a cursed castle. It made this book the perfect spooky October read! All of the different manifestations of the curse were wonderful and I loved how they spanned the gambit of seemingly harmless to absolutely terrifying. The Librarian was a personal favorite, I love a figure who leaves threatening notes circles in books for one to find. I found the juxtaposition of the very English run household in the Ethiopian landscape truly interesting. Seeing Magnus's English employees who live with the consequences of the Evil Eye and the curse spurn the debtera amulets as superstitious nonsense was maddening.
Early on in the book I had fallen so in love with the characters and was so intrigued where the story was going I was convinced this was going to be a 5 star read. However, around the 60% mark some things started happening in the story that felt really unnecessary and kind of disappointed me from where we had been. There are also some reveals that just raised a lot more questions for me based on information we were given at the very beginning of the story. To be as vague as possible most of these revelations and issues come from moments relating to Saba in the last third of the story. That said there were still plenty of great moments in the later part of the book. I loved that we got to really dive into Andromeda's complex relationship with Jember. He was such a prominent figure hanging over Andromeda's head for the first half of the book I was so excited when I realized we were actually going to get to meet him and see their relationship in action. All in all this was a very good read, perfect for October, I will be picking up a physical copy to put on my shelves when it releases in a week and a half!