A review by astilbethehobbit
The Isle in the Silver Sea by Tasha Suri

adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

3.5

This book was tragically, heart-achingly, beautiful. The writing was truly so poetically stunning. I absolutely loved the concept of the story. I loved my lady knights, my witches, sapphic love, the trans representation, the found family, the magical creatures, I loved all of those buzzwords that was woven into this story so much.

However, and this is a sad however, I felt this just needed more, needed to bake a little longer. The world building got confusing sometimes and didn’t feel fully clear. The romance, as excited as I was for it, felt so disconnected for me. I don’t feel our characters were given enough time to actually fall in love with each other given their circumstances and form this connection of deep longing for each other. I couldn’t find their love for each other believable sadly. I kinda wish it was longer, maybe it needed more books. I’d have so deeply loved to explorer the magic, the world, the characters both main and side just a little more. I did love so many of the elements and there were so many good and beautiful quotes. The overall messaging being told through the story I loved as well. 

I am bit bummed as I wanted soooo badly to love this more than I did. It has so much potential. I do want to try again once it’s physically published and I hope through all the edits it may need before then AND with a map to go along I may like it more than I did.

I do still recommend it as I did again love the messages being told in the story. I do also now want to read more from this author if all of their writing is this beautiful.

Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher and the author for allowing me to read this ARC for my honest review.