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carololiverbooks's review
lighthearted
mysterious
5.0
After being on the road for too many years, Zoe bought a fixer-upper house in Portland, Oregon. But her plans to settle quietly into her new home are disrupted by the discovery of a stone gargoyle who stowed away in her shipping crates to beg for her help, the intrusion of curious teenagers investigating the local "haunted house", and the murder of the one handyman willing to tackle Zoe's new home.
Pandian's murder mystery is light and fun and full of warm-hearted characters. But Dorian the gargoyle makes the book. His escapades in Zoe's kitchen are both amusing and impressive, and Pandian's food descriptions made me hungry while reading. Three recipes from the story are included at the end of the book. The Roasted Butternut Squash with Lemon Tahini Sauce is now one of my favorite meals (I substitute salted sunflower seeds for the pepitas).
Pandian's murder mystery is light and fun and full of warm-hearted characters. But Dorian the gargoyle makes the book. His escapades in Zoe's kitchen are both amusing and impressive, and Pandian's food descriptions made me hungry while reading. Three recipes from the story are included at the end of the book. The Roasted Butternut Squash with Lemon Tahini Sauce is now one of my favorite meals (I substitute salted sunflower seeds for the pepitas).
slferg's review against another edition
4.0
Zoe Faust is tired of traveling around the country with her Airstream. She has decided she wants to settle down in Portland. The Blue Sky Teashop makes her feel at home. She has found a fixer-upper that needs lots of fixing up and major repairs. She has a special reason for wanting the space and to certain modifications she wants. The movers come with the stuff she had in storage in Paris. She opens one of the crates and finds a gargoyle she didn’t remember having and holding a big leather book. The. The gargoyle blinks at her and she realizes it’s alive. The next day the builder arrives and she returns from her walk to find the builder dead and the gargoyle’s book is missing along with some of her antiques. Then she finds the owner of the teashop unconscious. She recognizes some unusual poison that affected the builder and the shop owner. She is extremely sensitive to plants because she has an affinity for them and experience with them. She is an alchemist and really needs the gargoyle’s book to help cure him. A boy broke in to her house the first night and is immediately causing trouble for her and the gargoyle. She is desperate to recover the book and find the killer and thief.
themindlessmess's review against another edition
3.0
A promising plot which got messed up by several honest (sometimes stupid) mistake. Honestly I don’t want to criticize the book because I’m torn. The plot is very promising of a fantasy murder mystery but it got ruined by mistakes from the author. Overall I enjoyed listening to this as an audiobook. I want to read the series but I’m not sure if I wanna spend money on it.
Too many vegan recipes (many of them extremely absurd - Lettuce, Ginger, Cacao for a smoothie???!!) and they were being included during the “intense” climax of the book?! Like there are murderers on the loose, we’re catching them along with some other intense shit and why am I reading about a hot chocolate recipe?
Also who takes in (almost adopts if not babysits) for a 14 year old whom you have met only once before?
So many honest as well as stupid mistakes. But if you put them aside a decent enough storyline.
Too many vegan recipes (many of them extremely absurd - Lettuce, Ginger, Cacao for a smoothie???!!) and they were being included during the “intense” climax of the book?! Like there are murderers on the loose, we’re catching them along with some other intense shit and why am I reading about a hot chocolate recipe?
Also who takes in (almost adopts if not babysits) for a 14 year old whom you have met only once before?
So many honest as well as stupid mistakes. But if you put them aside a decent enough storyline.
usuallydave's review against another edition
3.0
The premise here is that Zoe Faust, an alchemist that's been alive and doing her best to live in anonymity as much as possible, has just moved to a new home in Portland. Upon arriving she finds a living gargoyle has stowed away in her shipping crates from Paris and needs her help deciphering his special book because he's dying. The next morning the handyman she's hired to do some work on her new home is found dead on her front porch, stabbed and poisoned, and suddenly Zoe finds herself in the middle of a magical murder mystery to find the killer and the stolen book of the Gargoyle.
So... here's the thing.
This book presents itself as a fantasy story, with the magic of Zoe's alchemy, the living gargoyle, etc.
But when it comes down to it, this is more of a murder mystery with hints of fantasy and a healthy dose of the "found family" trope to keep things interesting. As far as the mystery goes, it's not a SUPER INTENSE thriller either.
In the end it feels much more like a YA murder mystery with some fantasy elements thrown in and while I won't say it's an AMAZING read, it's a perfectly enjoyable experience and a great palette cleanser after a month of July that was SO disappointing in terms of the stories I consumed.
If you want a cozy feeling, murder mystery with hints of fantasy that you don't have to get TOO involved in, this is a solid option.
I found it enjoyable, though really wished it had just picked a direction and gone all in with it rather than try to tip-toe the line between fantasy and mystery while really just being a mystery.
So... here's the thing.
This book presents itself as a fantasy story, with the magic of Zoe's alchemy, the living gargoyle, etc.
But when it comes down to it, this is more of a murder mystery with hints of fantasy and a healthy dose of the "found family" trope to keep things interesting. As far as the mystery goes, it's not a SUPER INTENSE thriller either.
In the end it feels much more like a YA murder mystery with some fantasy elements thrown in and while I won't say it's an AMAZING read, it's a perfectly enjoyable experience and a great palette cleanser after a month of July that was SO disappointing in terms of the stories I consumed.
If you want a cozy feeling, murder mystery with hints of fantasy that you don't have to get TOO involved in, this is a solid option.
I found it enjoyable, though really wished it had just picked a direction and gone all in with it rather than try to tip-toe the line between fantasy and mystery while really just being a mystery.
theetherealelf's review
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Suicide and Murder
Moderate: Drug use
Minor: Ableism, Cancer, Vomit, and Alcohol
the characters are somewhat diverse, like Max, who is Chinese or Dorian who is a gargoyle (which fits under the "it's complicated" category for me. Could be much more diverse, though.unofficialcate's review against another edition
adventurous
informative
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
metaphorosis's review against another edition
2.0
reviews.metaphorosis.com
2 stars
A long-lived alchemist in a new city gets caught up in strange doings when her shipped goods turn out to include a living gargoyle, her intended building contractor turns up dead outside her door, and a key book is stolen. She must race against time to save a friend's life.
The Czech language is not written in any variant of Cyrillic, and as far as I know never has been. In fact, a quick glance at Wikipedia will tell you that its interesting and regular Latin-based orthography is used for transliteration of other languages. Getting the Czech alphabet wrong is unfortunately just one of the many errors that crops up in The Accidental Alchemist.
I don't read a lot of urban fantasy, but this book had other aspects that drew me in, including a vegan protagonist, a setting in Portland, Oregon, and the aforementioned Czech elements. I'm part Czech myself, but it didn't take much to spot this alphabetical error. There isn't that much about else Czechia, and most of the rest seems alright.
Pandian does use a fair amount of French and some other languages. Unfortunately, she occasionally uses them incorrectly; more likely the result of bad memory or transliteration than of machine translation ("sait" instead of "c'est"). Since two key character are said to speak French well, it's notable.
The story is set in Portland, the city I call home when I pretend to have one. It's always nice to see familiar places in a new light. Unfortunately (again), Pandian's Portland is a caricature of the real city - all new age hippies all the time. Even in the Hawthorne district where part of the story is set, there's more variety than this, and Hawthorne is no more stagnant than any other neighbourhood. It doesn't look like this now, and really never did. Just as irritating, Pandian's knowledge of the geography is pretty weak - a character lives near enough to Hawthorne to walk over, but also lives on a hill. Thing is, close-in East Portland is flat. Really flat; almost Florida-flat. The only hill worthy of the name is a volcano, and very few people live on it. It's nit-picking, sure, but a quick look at an online map is all it takes these days.
I've been a vegan for a long time now, and on this front, the book really does deliver. It's a little heavy-handed on the 'magical herbs will cure all ills' angle, but for the rest, it's great. The recipes sound delicious (barring a strange fondness for beets), and most of the dishes are really things that vegans really eat. Happily, Pandian includes actual recipes as an appendix, and I plan to try some of them out.
I wish I could be more positive about the book, but on two of the three above points, it doesn't deliver. More to the point, the writing is consistently awkward, both at the sentence level and plot-wise. It reads like a fair early draft that needed a harsh editorial hand and didn't get it. The prose isn't smooth, the characters neither deep nor credible. An example - our narrator has been alive for hundreds of years, fending for herself in a cruel world. Yet she seems almost deferential to a few cocky teenage kids, and it's not because she's using reverse psychology on them.
All in all, I can't recommend this. It's lighthearted, but also thin. If you're a vegan tired of reading about heroes eating steak, this may be the book for you - the frequent mentions of food are mouth-watering. But if you're reading for the story, you're probably in the wrong place.
NB: Received free copy from Net Galley.
jerefi's review against another edition
3.0
Cute characters, fun diversion from more dense reading for sure. Themore than necessary detail into her vegan diet over and over again seemed unnecessary. Are they trying to convert me?
baronessekat's review against another edition
2.0
This book fell under the category of "I was kinda disappointed." I didn't HATE the book but it certainly did not keep me so engrossed that I feel the need to ever finish the series. The description for the story caught my attention.
Zoe Faust is a 300 year old alchemist who has recently moved to Portland, Oregon to start over again. While unpacking her things, she finds a living gargoyle who needs her help as he is slowly dying and needs her alchemical stills to save his life. But then her handyman is murdered at her new home and the book that has the information to save the gargoyle is stolen and she must work to find the book and keep herself from being blamed for the murder.
But in reality, the story just kinda dragged. And there was more focus and reference to the fact that she is vegan (almost every scene has to mention that she's vegan and what super-smoothie she is drinking at the moment). By 3/4 of the way through the book I found myself not really caring about any of the characters, if she was exonerated, if she finds the book or if she saves the gargoyle.
All in all the book just felt rather... flat.
Zoe Faust is a 300 year old alchemist who has recently moved to Portland, Oregon to start over again. While unpacking her things, she finds a living gargoyle who needs her help as he is slowly dying and needs her alchemical stills to save his life. But then her handyman is murdered at her new home and the book that has the information to save the gargoyle is stolen and she must work to find the book and keep herself from being blamed for the murder.
But in reality, the story just kinda dragged. And there was more focus and reference to the fact that she is vegan (almost every scene has to mention that she's vegan and what super-smoothie she is drinking at the moment). By 3/4 of the way through the book I found myself not really caring about any of the characters, if she was exonerated, if she finds the book or if she saves the gargoyle.
All in all the book just felt rather... flat.
sarakeeler's review against another edition
adventurous
inspiring
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? It's complicated
5.0