Reviews with content warning for Animal cruelty - A Far Wilder Magic

Read this after Hannah (A Clockwork Reader) talked so highly about it. I really wanted this to be a 5-star read for me, but something about it was lacking, I just can't really put my finger on what. Regardless, I thought the story was interesting and the romance was very gripping. Like this a lot!

Some quotes I liked:

"Sometimes, it's hard to believe this house ever held more than one person," (1:33:38).

"Her hand, warm and roughened from work, fits into his like a gramophone needle in the grooves of a record," (8:54:50).

"Or did you always love the memory of him more than you loved the reality of me?" (14:14:54).

"Growing up with you, it felt like starving," (14:15:12).

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bellebeaumont95's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing medium-paced

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

4.25

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guessgreenleaf's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional medium-paced

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

5.0

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pointeshoebookworm's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

0.5

. . . I still don't know what to even think about this book . . .

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r1vana's review against another edition

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medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.0

“Besides, dreams don't always have to be practical. That’s why they are dreams. And now ours live and die together.”

Contains spoiler:

-beautiful cover but the sorry meh. Disappointing.

-I should have dnf’ed it but since I don’t like to do that, I finished it.

-the story goes in the end of 1800s and beginning of 1900s (I think)

-I hate the romance in this book. I hate when ML’s flirt with other women/girls and even kiss one of them.

-i don’t care if male leads don’t find the woman lead attractive at first. But this guy straight up said that Margaret was not beautiful. He got me flabbergasted. He not only said it once. But two/three times!

-the romance is all about sexual haze/tension. I really taught we would get to see a romance growth since it’s a fantasy….

-Wes was not charming and delightful character

-I wished Margaret had a backbone. She never stood up for herself whenever bullies torment or insult her.

-the magic world was really lacking. Since the story has too much filler… it got boring at the end.

-waiting for the plot(killing the hala) was practically non existent(like 7% of the story)

Margaret is living in a home where only her and her dog Trouble lives there. Her mother frequently goes on trips for new research discoveries… so one day when she decides to participate in the hunting game of the Hala, Wes appears on her doorstep.

At first, she doesn’t want to do anything with him. But the more he lives in her home, the more she realizes how lonely and live less her life has been. She somewhat convinces Wes into participating with her. {reward money and glory and respect which she will gladly give all to him.} Her only reason to participate in the competition is to bring her mom home so she wouldn’t feel lonely.

Margaret hates alchemist because she has seen how it has changes her mother for the worse.

The more both ML’s gets close the more Margaret pushes him away because she doesn’t want to get hurt when he will leave:

“They've seen each other at their most vulnerable, and now the must hear each other’s burdens.”

Wes is from the city and is born into a poor family(4 sisters and him) where his father is a deathbeat. Which push his mother on becoming the breadwinner.

However, Wes had always had different passion and goals for his future.

Once he heard that once you become an alchemy, you can easily get a place as a politician aka in order to overthrow New Albion's fascist government.

He is shown flitirious guy with a lot of charm aka a virgin womanizer.He knows how to sweet talk his ways through the women.

One day, he decides to seek out Maggie's mother as a last resort. Why? Because he got fired from all of his previous apprenticeships due to his origin and it seems to also be due to his dyslexia.

Wes sole motivation to become an alchemy is his family’s financial. Being the only son, he is stuck in this situation where he doesn’t give a F about his older sister and mother who are the breadwinner of the family and he doesn’t want to be doing any kind of manual labour that doesn’t involve alchemy… (eye rolls… I understood why his sister was so mad at him…) the double standards when this guy always pushes Margaret to not do house works and relax aka do not do stuff for him. But with his sisters??? He doesn’t say anything.

Their romance/chemistry is so stressful but sometimes:

“She hasn't let go of his arm, but he finds he doesn't want here. The pressure of her hand anchors him in the chaos.

Love is not the sharp-edged thing she's always believed it to be. It's not like the sea, liable to sip through her fingers if she holds on too tight. It's not a currency, something to be earned or denied or bartered for. Love canbe steadfast. It can be certain and safe, or as wild as an open flame.

I's a slice of buttered bread at a dinner table. It's a grudge born of worry: It's broken skin pulled over swelling knuckles.

Tw: loss of family member(s); blood; gun violence; bullying ; anti-semantic

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neni's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

The thing I liked the most about this book was the writing and the imagery. The autumn woods and mysterious sea side town vibes were great, and the writing was quite beautiful and evocative, especially when the author described environments. The character's were okay, I didn't love them, but I didn't hate them, they were a bit cliché in their tropes, but I enjoyed the development of the main character's response to her family trauma, namely in the way she finally recognized her toxic relationship with her mother. Wes was very sweet as a love interest.
I loved Trouble the hound, especially because my own dear dog is of the same breed so I kept picturing her in the book :)
The pacing was a bit all over the place. The first third of the book felt slow and like nothing was happening, the middle was satisfying in that we finally had some progress in both the plot and the relationship between the main character's, but then the ending, while entertaining, was a bit rushed and left quite a few issues that had been brought up either unresolved or fixed so quickly it didn't feel believable.
I must say as well: the fact that the whole character's main thing was being a huntress and loving it, didn't sit quite well with me as I don't agree with hunting for sport. The descriptions of fox killing as a sport (both the magical/mythical type and the plain normal animal) bothered me.
Overall, this was an okay read, especially vibesy for autumn and with some good romance and pining in the middle but not particularly strong either in plot or character complexity.

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bananja's review against another edition

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emotional medium-paced

4.0

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