Reviews

An immersive and warm-hearted historical fantasy that has lots of Howl's Moving Castle and Half a Soul vibes but centers familial love instead of romantic. Our young heroine (though I wouldn't shelve this as YA), Biddy, has spent her whole life on a magical island with only her mage guardian and his rabbit familiar for company. She wants to go to the mainland, and she wants to know where her guardian disappears to each night. When he doesn't return one morning, so begins her adventure, discovering the world and herself.

I expected this to be much cozier than it turned out to be. And there were cozy vibes, but the plot itself is actually very high-stakes and tense. I love Biddy's arc, as well as all the longing she feels for her own life and for magic. On the whole, a great read.

jennykeery's review against another edition

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adventurous dark funny hopeful mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

mk64's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional hopeful mysterious tense

4.0

a_rutter's review

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5.0

If you're looking for a cozy-fantasy book that answers the question, "Why do things feel so BROKEN and GRIMY and SAD these days?" I'd say that TMD is a good choice. Oh, also "these days" refers to the early 1900's.

Biddy grew up on a magical island and was raised by a mage (Rowan) & his familiar. She's 16, so naturally, she is chafing at her boundaries (the island, the rules) until she gets the opportunity to go "undercover" in London to try to help solve the mystery of where all the magic is going. Oh, yeah, the answer to the question above is that magic is drying up (magic makes wonderful things more possible/probable; is a little bit of a joie de vivre-maker). I appreciated her character -- her desire to be secretly magical or powerful, her desire to be the one to save magic, her love for her found family, and her magical island.

I enjoyed this book & my time spent in Biddy's world, and while I love the stand-alone nature of it, I would be very interested in reading a companion novel from the POV of Morgaine.

ameliez's review against another edition

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inspiring tense

4.75

Content Warnings

thecatandmereadingpeacefully's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional hopeful inspiring lighthearted mysterious reflective relaxing sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

ailaghast's review against another edition

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adventurous hopeful lighthearted mysterious slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? N/A
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

Interesting premise and concepts that are unfortunately bogged down by an over-explanative narrative voice that insists on telling rather than showing, and brings down moments that could be emotional by telling the reader things they already know instead of letting them make connections themselves. Characters felt knee-deep for the most part. We have an interesting magical world under the Surface of our own that hints at a much bigger setting, yet we only ever meet at most 4 mages. Could certainly be 100 pages shorter with no loss of story. Really wanted to like this, but felt the story was unfortunately let down by the writing.

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