A review by wardenred
The Ruthless Lady's Guide to Wizardry by C.M. Waggoner

adventurous challenging funny

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

2.5

And what the hell sort of domestic position could you be interviewing for? They want a girl around to drink them dry and make the house dirtier than it was to start with?

Even though I enjoyed the characters and the humor, this book was rather hard for me to get to because of the prose. I totally get what sort of effect the author was going for, and maybe it's just an ESL thing, but the language was just a bit too quirky and whimsical. For me, it ended up to be distracting rather than immersive.

The plot was also a lot of thinner than I expected from the blurb and the book's overall presentation. I thought there'd be a bit more action and excitement; instead, what was building up to be the main plot got resolved in a matter of a few short chapters, and then it turned into a rather slice-of-life story. And hey, I love slice-of-life! When it's presented as such and doesn't keep promising to turn into some sort of revenge plot soon, except first let's spend some time making jokes and house-cleaning. Basically a case of misplaced expectations, I guess.

Another aspect here that was a lot thinner than I would have liked: worldbuilding. At the beginning of the story, there's a lot of promising stuff. Magic! A fantasy version of Victorian society with all the class issues that come with it! Mystery drugs! But then none of that gets properly explored, and most of the cool factors about this setting fill like just some whimsical trappings. Something decorative and not to well thought-through.

There were lots of genuinely funny moments, Delly and Winn were cute together, and I generally liked Delly as the MC. But overall, this book fell quite flat for me, I'm sorry to say.