A review by zazzeaux
Armed in Her Fashion by Kate Heartfield

5.0

Heartfield pulls off a neat trick in this engaging story. She manages to write empowered female characters with agency while remaining true to the historical setting of the time period. These aren’t your typical damsels in distress waiting in towers for their heroes to rescue them. But neither are they feminine analogs of the classic hero trope (save for one). Further, this isn’t done at the price of emasculating or cuckolding the male characters, who are simply unfortunate pawns of the forces of competing political machines. The fantastical element is woven through the narrative naturally, and the reader has the sense that this terrifying state of affairs is both fantastic yet commonplace to the people inhabiting it. I’m no expert on 14th Century Bruges, and have no idea how much research the author did, but the details feel accurate, at least to the point that they aren’t blatantly anachronistic or out of place. This is a quick and interesting read and I highly recommend it.

I received an advanced kindle reading copy from Edelweiss, but my opinions are my own.