Reviews with content warning for Injury/Injury detail - Sweet & Bitter Magic

I absolutely adored this book. The world building was really great and I love the magic system that is in place, the idea of there being direct consequences to the witches themselves for using magic in terms of the physical toll it took was something I found really interesting. I also loved the characters, both the main characters were loveable even Tamsin who has a very cold exterior, her quips and taunts were very funny at times. Even the smaller characters whom we did not get to see a lot of in the book were well written and I really liked them. I would love another book on the school itself and maybe Tamsin's life at the school prior to her banishment, that's something I did want to know about in more detail, however obviously I understand why that would not have really fitted into the book. I would have also liked to see more of Wren's childhood and maybe how her father became to be the man he was when we were first introduced to him, and seen how his relationship with wren was affected. I loved the author's writing style so I will definitely be keeping an eye out for future books, I believe there's one coming out this year. I highly recommend this book as an adventurous Sapphic fantasy and especially as this was a debut novel I was highly impressed.

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adventurous medium-paced

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

2.0

I really wanted to like this book, but I just didn't. In fact I was very close to dnf-ing it at one point after the first hundred pages put me in a month long reading slump, but I expected it to get better so I kept going. It didn't. I think it had a lot of potential, but the majority of the book was excessive (and somewhat repetitive) inner monologuing rather than plot, and that is my absolute pet peeve. It meant the the plot seemed to move so slowly, whilst the climax was completely rushed. Also, it may have just been because I was rushing to finish and missed something, but the climax seemed very anti-climatic. I wasn't the biggest fan of the characters, either; the main two girls were defined by one or two personality traits, and all of the background characters were literally just there to serve a purpose of the story and seemed completely one-dimensional. I did think the romance was sweet and was probably my favourite part, but I am really not a fan of the whole 'love saves the day and breaks the curses' trope. I was also expecting that to happen (whilst hoping it wouldn't) so that made me roll my eyes a little. The world-building and magic system was fairly lack-lustre, but the writing style was fine and concept was pretty good. It had potential, but just didn't quite hit the mark for me.

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