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A review by danaichristopoulou
A Thousand Recipes for Revenge by Beth Cato
5.0
4.5 stars, rounded up
This was a very interesting take in food magic; a recentering of Chefs as magicians blessed by the Five Gods.
The author has created a lush, well-realized world with tons of lore and little interesting tidbits, as well as an unexpected twist well into the second middle of the book. While I am not the best audience for court intrigue plots (in one of the POV character arcs) the book quickly went beyond that and it really managed to cover a lot of ground—and I say this with fascination because there's still so much to happen in this world, and we're left well-poised for a sequel.
I really enjoyed the sprawling cast of characters, as none of them felt two-dimensional, and I found the conversations about what motherhood can look like to different people very interesting. Solenn and Ada, the two main POV characters, were refreshingly real and complex on page. I do wonder however if revealing the nature of their relationship to the reader could have been done a bit later, to increase the tension—and I found Erwan's interactions with one of them (spoilers) to somewhat lack the expected chemistry.
But overall, I would definitely recommend this book!
This was a very interesting take in food magic; a recentering of Chefs as magicians blessed by the Five Gods.
The author has created a lush, well-realized world with tons of lore and little interesting tidbits, as well as an unexpected twist well into the second middle of the book. While I am not the best audience for court intrigue plots (in one of the POV character arcs) the book quickly went beyond that and it really managed to cover a lot of ground—and I say this with fascination because there's still so much to happen in this world, and we're left well-poised for a sequel.
I really enjoyed the sprawling cast of characters, as none of them felt two-dimensional, and I found the conversations about what motherhood can look like to different people very interesting. Solenn and Ada, the two main POV characters, were refreshingly real and complex on page. I do wonder however if revealing the nature of their relationship to the reader could have been done a bit later, to increase the tension—and I found Erwan's interactions with one of them (spoilers) to somewhat lack the expected chemistry.
But overall, I would definitely recommend this book!