A review by mjwhitlock18
Magic for Liars by Sarah Gailey

mysterious reflective medium-paced
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

A murder mystery in a magic high school (the students do predictably teenage bullshit with their abilities) and the MC, Ivy, is a non-magic PI (whose sister is faculty there), and is brought in to solve the case. I listened to the audiobook, narrated by Xe Sands, and their performance absolutely improved my experience of this book. 
I like getting to experience Ivy’s emotions with her, her insecurity, her grief, her relationship with her sister. Has a few common tropes, some used in a clever way, and some flipped completely around, which makes this book easy to follow and keeps you entertained. 
The magic system is a bit lazy; because Ivy doesn’t understand the magic system, neither do we, which allows some hand-wavy stuff by the author that occasionally leaves me wanting to understand more. The identity of the murderer is kinda predictable, and the romantic subplot seems unnecessary.  Also, 
I think it’s worth pointing out that the primary lesbian relationship ends up being the murdered and the murderer, which I don’t love. Kill Your Gays and all that.
Expand filter menu Content Warnings