A review by linaver
The Betrayals by Bridget Collins

5.0

I found this book in the fantasy and science fiction part of my local library because I wanted to read more about fantastical, magical worlds. It spoke to me first by visual language of the gorgeous cover art. The blurb told me nothing and I'm so glad it didn't. I went into this dark, strange world blindly and came out... christened? Ironically to the book, that would be the closest word I can think of right now. Or maybe sanctified? No, that's too grandiose for what the experience actually was.

I was mystified, my heart was dragged through ashes and shards of glass, my intelligence humbled (yes, I am not sure I understood everything I read). And at the end, there's also something more tired but also (a bit more) pure and playful, and slightly more in love (with life as it is) in me than before reading this book.

I was looking for fantasy or science fiction, and instead I received a gift of great fiction.

However, I can also see how this book might not be for everyone, and even might not have been for me at a different moment in my life. And that's ok. Such is the game of storytelling and of living through stories.

If you're reading this review and thinking, omg I am even more confussed now, well, I am not sorry.