Review by jessica_flower - A Sorceress Comes to Call

jessica_flower 's review for:

A Sorceress Comes to Call by T. Kingfisher

4.0

adventurous dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

This is my first by T. Kingfisher and WOW!!! I loved it! Damn, this author knows how to write an excellent story.

This book combines an alternate Victorian-era setting with magical realism and the atmosphere of a domestic psychological thriller to create a wonderful dark fairytale that makes you eager (and a little anxious) to turn the page just to see what happens next, and to find out if the evil sorceress wins or not.

I actually got anxious reading parts of this. I wanted so badly for this poor girl to find a way to get away from her abusive mother, and for the "spinster aunt" to take her in and get her own happy ending in the process.

The ending scenes, though, holy shit.

For a story that started out so quietly tense, the second half really builds into a fantasy thriller. The anticipation builds up and up and it is so gratifying to see this selfish, cruel bitch get defeated by a found family led by her daughter that she always treated like a servant/pet/pawn in her schemes. And then, then, her dying by the familiar she summoned/created herself? Beautiful karma. Like, I never expected an undead familiar/demon horse to fuck shit up like that. Actually, I never expected to read about a "horse" that could be so creepy. Eugh, it really contrasts against the typical helpful magic horse-trope that you usually see in fantasy or fairytales. Again, Kingfisher is brilliant. Eeek, it was so creepy.

Content Warnings