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Book Review: WHISTLER by Ann Patchett

| Jessica Crawford

Whistler by Ann Patchett is a 296 page standalone novel published in June of 2026 by Harper.

Genre

Literary Fiction, Contemporary Fiction

Description

The acclaimed, prize-winning #1 New York Times bestselling writer returns with a moving, luminous novel that reminds us of the sweetness and impermanence of life and the power of connection to defy time.

When Daphne Fuller and her husband Jonathan visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art, they notice an older, white-haired gentleman following them. The man turns out to be Eddie Triplett, her former stepfather, who had been married to her mother for a little more than year when Daphne was nine. Now fifty-three, Daphne hasn’t seen Eddie for many years, not since the fateful event that changed the direction of both their lives. Meeting again, time falls away; while their relationship was brief, it had a profound impact on them both, and now that they are reunited, they have no intention of ever being separated again.

Whistler is a story about two adults looking back over the choices they made, and the choices that were made for them. It’s a story about bravery, memory, the often small yet consequential moments that define our lives, and the endless stream of loss that in time comes for us all. Beautiful in its simplicity, it is ultimately about how love endures, and how the feeling of being known by one other person, even for a short period of time, can change everything.

Opening Line

“Old guy,” my husband said in a low voice, his lips touching my ear. “Near the exit sign.”

My Thoughts

This is a literary novel about an adult woman reconnecting with her former stepfather. They already had a lovely relationship during his relatively brief marriage to her mother, but then they also trauma bonded just before circumstances forced them apart for the next several decades.

This is a sweet story, and I loved Eddie. I also quite liked Daphne’s sister Leda and father Buddy, but for the life of me could not understand most of the characters in this book (someone had apparently just been unfriendly, but that wasn’t how I had interpreted the scene; someone was described as witty after saying something completely mundane and unremarkable to this reader). Does the author only interact with pretentious weirdos, and so believes that’s just how everyone in the world is? Even Jonathan, who in most regards was quite lovely, was really annoying me at times – for a spell I believed the story might be heading toward a divorce for the Fullers. And don’t even get me started on Polly, Skip, or…Daphne’s mother (did we ever get her name?)

Was the story of the horse, Whistler, a metaphor for Daphne, or for Eddie, or both? I’m not sure. Regardless, I felt warm all over from the power of the positive relationships in this story. It has some great lines as well: both the profound and the humorous. I appreciated the messages about childhood, parenting, family, death, etc etc.

She would say it was because childhood never leaves us. We seal the room up and cover it in sheetrock. We dry and sand and paint, but the pocket of history remains, and sooner or later someone always winds up tapping on the wall, commenting on the way it sounds strangely hollow in there, and then the whole thing comes tumbling down.

And a bonus point for the mention of George Saunders’ Lincoln in the Bardo!

Bookshop.org

Book Review: SWITZY by Emma Cline

| Jessica Crawford

Switzy by Emma Cline is a 352 page standalone novel being published today, September 8, 2026, by Random House.

Genre

Literary Fiction

Description

A mesmerizing portrait of an aging man’s last pilgrimage, from the New York Times best selling author of The Girls and The Guest. 

A private plane cuts through the winter night, somewhere over Greenland. David, a retired executive, sits back in his leather seat, playing solitaire on his phone. Click. Click. Drag. Click. The notebook in his jacket pocket is filled with familiar phrases, urgent reminders to himself, but he struggles to recognize his own handwriting. 

A mystery, among many mysteries. The world, once so knowable, has been rendered inscrutable.

This is what David Cody, his assistant, asleep in the seat next to him, will shepherd him along the voyage. A stopover in London. Dinner with his adult daughter. A meeting in France with an old friend, estranged for decades. 

His final destination is Zurich. 

David glides through hotel rooms and airports and foreign cities, running out the clock on his mortal life. His grasp on the present slips away, and the past rushes the Sunday roasts of childhood. The stiff clothes meant only for church. A summer at a school friend’s house. The losses and missteps that punctuate a life. 

As David’s arrival in Zurich looms, an exquisitely rendered portrait of an unraveling mind emerges, both darkly humorous and profoundly moving. Hypnotic and startlingly original, Switzy probes the depths of human consciousness, revealing what a man is left with when the accomplishments and compromises that have defined him, and the illusions he’s relied on, vanish

Opening Line

It was always nighttime there.

My Thoughts

A literary novel about a man with progressing dementia pursuing assisted suicide.

Leave the party right when you think, I’m having such a nice time at this party. Because after that…[it] could only go downhill.

This is an uneasy story about David seeing to a few last things before voluntarily shuffling off this mortal coil before his mind deteriorates any worse than it already has. Perhaps not making amends so much as just acknowledging that mistakes were made.

The telling is somewhat disjointed in a stream of consciousness type style, and of course this stream is a bit rockier than most. It’s pretty well done, although it did start to lag a tiny bit for me in the middle.

This emotional work falls somewhere between 4 and 5 stars for me. The biggest factor pulling it down from 5 for me is that David, though the reader sympathizes with his plight, seems to never have been a particularly likable person. Hard to love spending that much time in his head as a result. And I wished for a tad more closure in regards to one particular character, but how to do so without making it trite is not something I could explain how to do (but hey, I’m not the author!) (But also, the author made their choices about how to handle the various facets of the story, and they don’t all have to jive 100% with every reader, which of course is not possible anyway.)

Overall an important piece of work that will likely make you reflect on aspects of your own life as you have lived it.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House for the eARC in exchange for my unbiased review.

Bookshop.org

Book Review: SHE’S A DOLL by Barbara Truelove

| Jessica Crawford

She’s a Doll by Barbara Truelove is a 313 page standalone novel coming September 8, 2026 from Ezeekat Press of Bindery Books.

Genre

Horror(ish), Humor(ous)

Description

Lucy isn’t a normal girl. Ghost. Victim. Killer. She’s a doll on a mission—to find the man who killed her and return the favor.

Lucy McQuinn has been murdered, but she’s not about to go quietly.

If she doesn’t get to keep breathing, then neither does Kyle, her killer. Possessing the body of an antique doll, she sets out on a quest for revenge. But it’s hard when you’re eighteen inches tall and made of porcelain.

For help, she turns to Nicola, a human and fellow outsider with her own reasons to hate Kyle. But in their small idyllic town, no one wants to hear the truth, especially not about such a promising young man. If they can’t expose his crimes, Lucy will have to roll up her lacy little sleeves and teach him a lesson the old-fashioned way—as slowly and painfully as possible.

From LA Times bestselling author Barbara Truelove, She’s a Doll is a ghoulish and gleeful tribute to the unstoppable power of female rage and a love letter to the friends who have our back—in this life and the next.

Opening Line

There are a lot of really profound, poetic people who have said a lot of really profound, poetic things about death.

My Thoughts

A wickedly funny wild ride that also hits you right in the feels.

When Lucy McQuinn is murdered, the last thing she lays her eyes on before everything goes dark is an antique doll sitting on a nearby shelf. So focused is she on this item that the moment her soul (or whatever you’d like to call it) leaves her body, she winds up transferring it right over–Lucy is now a vengeful spirit possessing a porcelain doll. And she’s out for blood!

Lu is a book nerd (favoring the classics), gamer (even if her console is three gens ago), and cosplay winner (second place, novice division) at the beginning of what doesn’t seem to be a very promising career when her mortal remains meet their end. Because a revenge killing while stuck in a doll’s body and still learning the ropes of being a ghost seems like a nigh impossible task, she’ll need an (embodied, living) ally. This is where the edgy Nic, whose hearing aid is able to pick up Lu’s projected thoughts, comes into play. Plenty of snarky banter between the two ensues.

…she bought a strawberry milkshake that smelled so sugary I wished I had a stomach so I could hurl. Have you considered eating real food?

“Have you considered that you’re still on thin ice, you porcelain piece of shit?” she said, exhausted and without venom.

What kept this from being a 5 star read for me is the fact that it did take me a good while to really get all in on the story (right around when Lu teams up with Nic is when I became engaged, and I think that’s over 25% in), and that some of it was a bit repetitive (any time the two of them disagree, for instance with the logistics of how to go about enacting revenge, they tend to make the same arguments to one another over and over again). But overall I wound up enjoying this dark, amusing, emotional story with wonderful representation quite a lot!

I actually think I miss spending my time with ride or die gals Lu and Nic already. Sadge.

My gratitude to NetGalley and Ezeekat Press of Bindery Books for the eARC in exchange for my honest review.

Bookshop.org

Book Review: UNTAMED COAST by Kevin C. Morris

| Jessica Crawford

Untamed Coast by Kevin C. Morris is a 304 page standalone debut novel being published by Ballantine Books on September 1st, 2026.

Genre

Mystery

Description

A late-night mayday call drives a grieving man to embark on an unexpected journey along the wild Alaskan coast, unraveling a decades-old mystery of stolen gold, missing women, and murder in this atmospheric and propulsive debut novel.

After the loss of his wife, Marconi Franco is content drifting alone on his boat through the isolated waters of Southeast Alaska with no real destination in mind. But when a mysterious distress signal cuts through the static on his radio one sleepless night, Marco feels an overwhelming pull to help the woman whose plea he heard—a pull he can’t explain or ignore.

His search for the missing woman draws him to Radioville, an abandoned 1930s communication outpost now decaying on an uninhabited island off the coast of Alaska. There, Marco begins uncovering fragments of a story long a Depression-era theft, a shattered marriage, and a disturbing pattern of disappearances. As he sifts through the past, his own grief starts to mirror the tragedies that echo across decades, and his search draws the attention of someone determined to keep the truth buried.

Told across three evocative timelines—a radio operator in 1938 collecting more than just telegrams, a young woman in the 1980s fighting to survive her abusive husband, and Marco in the present day searching for a voice in the static—Untamed Coast is a story of fierce determination, missed signals, loneliness and connection, and the unseen ripples that reverberate across generations, standing the test of time and the tides.

Opening Line

There it was again.

My Thoughts

This is a decent mystery told through chapters with three alternating timelines.

We have Joe, the radioman engaged in a ploy to skim some of the profits from a gold mine to keep afloat during the Great Depression; Anya, the fisherwoman and domestic abuse survivor who has run afoul of some bad actors in the 1980s; and Marco, the grieving widower seeking solace in the Alaskan landscape when he overhears a distress call and finds that he has stumbled upon a decades-old mystery related to all of the above. I found one of the revelations at the end about the distress call particularly satisfying.

On the other hand, I found the writing to be clear but uninspired and lackluster. An additional criticism may be related to the fact that this is a debut novel from an author still honing their craft, but far too much detail was included about things such as the nitty gritty of boats and specific Alaskan landmarks—you can tell the author has a passion for these things and wants to share them, regardless of necessity to the plot. Naming a few songs playing on the radio is good at setting the time period of each part of the story, but this was also overused.

In the end, a solid mystery with writing that could stand some polishing = 3 stars for this reader.

Book Review: BLACKTAIL by Scott Hawkins

| Jessica Crawford

Blacktail by Scott Hawkins is a 288 page standalone novel to be published on September 1st, 2026 by Crown Publishing.

Genre

Fantasy, Horror

Description

A wolf sets out on an epic journey of revenge in this one-of-a-kind dark fantasy—the long-awaited second novel from the author of The Library at Mount Char.

The wolf Blacktail is faithful to his Forest God, but in these times, faith is not enough. His world is besieged by men. Soon his territory will be overrun, and then there will be nowhere left to go. When his mate, a house dog, is killed, Blacktail rebels. He invades the house of her owners, seeking vengeance.

Blacktail’s fury catches the notice of an ancient and terrible feline witch, who makes an offer. What if Blacktail could end the human race responsible for the death of his family and for the destruction of the natural world, altogether? To do so, Blacktail must find and wake the Forest God. Only He might stand against the plague of men. Blacktail knows that his north woods are dwindling to nothing. He sees no other choice.

As Blacktail journeys farther from his wild home and deeper into the world of man, he encounters strangers—animal, mortal, and otherworldly—who, for their own reasons, want to help Blacktail rid the world of humans. Along the way, it becomes clear that he is more than just a wolf. The Forest God is sleeping, yes. But what will be the price of waking him?

Opening Line

Guile snapped to her feet at the sound of gunshots.

My Thoughts

The long-awaited second novel from the author of The Library at Mount Char (an all-time favorite of mine) is as brilliant as it is bloody and brutal.

From such a beginning, all things are possible.

This dark fantasy story, featuring only animals POVs, describes one (half)wolf’s epic journey into cosmic horror territory. In these pages, nature craves revenge against humankind for generations of cruelties and abuses that have left the world in an imbalance. The God of Reason may have granted humans dominion over the birds and beasts, but the gods of the natural world that predate Him surely have something to say about that. If only the most powerful among them, the Forest God, god of the hunt, hadn’t been slumbering and unseen for ages.

“When the god of men went forth to slaughter the gods of beasts, was this not a hunt? It is difficult to kill a thing when the very attempt is an act of worship toward it.”

Perhaps Blacktail might be the one to finally find and wake Him.

“But love died in this one long ago. Now all that’s left in him is judgment.”

This emotional and harrowing fable is so good, but also so hard to read. Readers be warned that it contains a whole heck of a lot of violence by and against animals. But if you can stomach that knowing that it’s not gratuitous here, know that those of you who remarked, “Good for her!” at the end of Stephen King’s Carrie will have a similar reaction to this vengeance tale.

“The secret,” she said, “is that there is no secret. Everyone suffers. Some choose to surrender, and some do not. The nature of your courage, the degree of it…these are entirely up to you.”

One criticism I have is that this story did take a while to really get going, but then things escalate REAL quick!

This was not an easy book to read due to the subject matter, but it was so worth it. I imagine I will find myself thinking about it for some time. Should Hawkins write more novels in the future, he has officially become an autobuy author for me!

Thank you to NetGalley and Crown Publishing for the eARC in exchange for my honest review.

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Book Review: ETNA by Paul Yoon

| Jessica Crawford

Etna by Paul Yoon is a 208 standalone novel published by Scribner in August of 2026.

Genre

Literary Fiction

Description

Beloved author and winner of The Story Prize, Paul Yoon, is back with the unforgettable story of a working dog, Etna, who, after a devastating war, embarks on an odyssey in the hopes of returning home.

Set in a fictional country in the present day, this is a story told through the eyes of an ex-military dog, Etna. After surviving years of a devastating war, Etna decides one night to leave the men he has fought alongside for years and return home—to the place where he was taken from when he was young, in the thin but persistent hope that if a home exists for him, it might be there.

Thus begins an exhilarating odyssey told through the eyes of a dog as he traverses across ruined landscapes and fights to survive in a world that, even in peacetime, proves to be just as precarious. Along the way, he encounters other animals and humans who are attempting to figure out how to start again. What makes a life when there is no home to go back to? How do we begin to trust each other again after such profound loss?

This is a novel about the power of an idea, about never giving up, and ultimately a novel about finding hope in the most dire of times.

Opening Line

I was born near water.

My Thoughts

We need friends, Etna, the bird says. We need a pack.

Even if we lose our pack, I say.

Especially because of that, she says.

Well, I knew going in that this book would ruin me. Obviously that means it’s a contender for my favorite read of the year!

When he was basically still a pup, Etna was taken from the farm by the coast where he was born to be trained as working dog for the military. After four years of helping the troops locate landmines, UEX, and IEDs, he strikes out to try to find his way back home again across a war-ravaged land.

This is a literary novel told from the dog’s POV, with no quotations around dialogue. It is very emotional, as it deals with the devastation of war, both physically and mentally.

I got injured six times. Most times it was only the graze of shrapnel or a bullet or something else small and sharp…

Fuji: she got injured five times.

As time went on, the more hurt she was, the more she wanted to hurt.

And the blue in her eyes grew less blue, and I could never explain that.

He meets others on his journey, both animals and humans, and he is the goodest boy ever.

I highly recommend reading this if you also appreciate being emotionally damaged by books.

Bookshop.org

Book Review: PORTRAIT OF A WITCH UNDONE by K. S. Shay

| Jessica Crawford

Portrait of a Witch Undone by K.S. Shay is a 368 page debut novel being published by Erewhon Books, an imprint of Kensington Publishing Corp., on August 25, 2026.

Genre/Subgenres

Fantasy, Horror, Paranormal

Description

For fans of Starling House and A Discovery of Witches with a Thomas Crown Affair twist: a contemporary New England coven hides the mysteries that lurk in the marshes north of Boston—and how they are connected to the largest unsolved art heist in modern history.

Once, Maeve Ryan was the strongest witch of her generation. But Maeve messed up a spell to contact the Lady of the Fens, an eerie Revenant who lures the unwary to their deaths in the brackish marshlands of the North Shore. Maeve destroyed her reputation, hurt her best friend Ash, and tainted herself with unbound, wild magic that transforms witches into insane Revenants.

With unbound power eating away at Maeve’s mind, all she wants is to get rid of her magic. Forever. But Ash’s research into how the spell went awry leads in an unexpected direction: the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, and a link between the Lady and a decades-old art theft worth $500 million. When Ash disappears through a stolen painting’s empty frame, Maeve has to follow.

Inside is the Other Marsh, a haunting, deadly realm where only the Lady’s rules apply. Within this half-world lie secrets about North Shore’s history, Maeve’s failure, and the fate of the masterpieces that disappeared over three decades ago. But as Maeve fights toward the truth, she risks her friendship, her coven, and her life against enemies hiding in plain sight

Opening Line

Birds call from dying limbs, a harvest moon rises, and I take the commuter rail home to rob my grandmother.

My Thoughts

❧ A coven of witches
❧ A competent, obstinate, scrappy MC
❧ A spell that turns paintings into a prison
❧ A horrifying Revenant with a tragic backstory…plotting her escape
❧ The importance of positive relationships!

Let me begin with the latter portion of this book, which was really something else! I would actually call this a horror novel with an urban fantasy setting. The creepy veiled Lady of the marsh following our characters from painting to painting, plenty of violence via physical fights against enemies (both human and not), flocks of birds following the characters wherever they go—all very menacing! Some of the characters begin the story as friends, some as strangers, and some as rivals, but in a satisfying plot arc they are forced to accept one another as allies and fight the evil that plagues the North Shore coven of Massachusetts together. And then there is the joy of seeing characters who have struggled stubbornly finally take hold of their own power, on their own terms. Witches be GOATed!

They want to reduce me to a legend? Let them. I will be the worst fable they have ever written.

But I will say that at the start of this book, there were a few things I noted that seemed like they might be debut novel issues. Stylistically it initially read like a YA book even though its characters and themes are not, every character was first introduced by their race (bonus points for the inclusion of a nonbinary character, though), the pacing seemed a bit uneven, the rules about the magic system and the paintings involved in the spellwork were hard to follow, and a great part of the tension in the narrative relied on lack of communication between characters–a pet peeve of mine, although admittedly having a reason to withhold certain information is much preferable to the miscommunication trope.

Even if the execution wasn’t 100% a homerun for this reader, by the end I was “all in” anyway. Full of magic tied to the land, mystery, coven intrigue, desperation, the uncertainty of shifting of alliances, a tangential romance subplot, and monsters created though tragedy, this was an action-packed tale with a touching and very gratifying narrative arc—a powerful story!

“I mean, on a scale of one to an unbound, undead Puritan witch, how bad could family be?”

My thanks to Kensington Publishing and NetGalley for the eARC in exchange for my unbiased review.

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Battle of the Book Covers: Part ?

| Jessica Crawford

U.S. and U.K. book covers often seem to embrace different aesthetics. Many readers (and book collectors—because as we know, BUYING books and READING books can be two separate hobbies!) tend to have a strong preference for one over the other. Personally, many of the U.K. covers utilize a style that’s a little too…cartoony for my tastes? That might not be the correct term, but they many times look like a novel I would mistake for a Middle Grade book if I had nothing more to go on. I also notice they seem to depict more concrete images of the plot, while many U.S. covers employ a style that more often consists of a design featuring motifs from the story. This is, of course, a generalization and not true in all cases.

But, at least in the internet circles I travel in, I feel as though I may be in the minority in my tastes. I’ve heard many others say they are specifically buying a book from overseas because they prefer the cover.

Here I’ll post comparisons of some of the newer books I have read this year. Images of the U.S. covers are on the left, U.K. on the right. What do you all think?

Book Review: A TRADE OF BLOOD by Robert Jackson Bennett

| Jessica Crawford

A Trade of Blood by Robert Jackson Bennett is the third book in the Ana and Din Mysteries series, formerly known as the Shadow of the Leviathan series. It is 400 pages and was published by Del Rey in August of 2026.

Genre

Fantasy, Mystery

This post will discuss the series as a whole before focusing on the latest installment.

The Ana and Din Mysteries, featuring an investigative duo that have often been compared to Sherlock Holmes and John Watson, are first and foremost murder mysteries unfolding in a fantasy setting with some hefty worldbuilding. Each book’s plot follows these two unraveling the puzzle behind a grisly murder that often winds up with far-reaching political implications. Additionally, each addresses the nature of civilization and the question of whether people exist to serve their nation, or vice versa.

The Empire of Khanum is arranged like a succession of spoked wheels, with the the wealthiest citizens living in the center, the farthest from the outer ring’s sea walls. This is because every wet season, leviathans surface from the deep and try to breach the walls, destroying everything in their path. Branches of the military are dedicated to shoring up and defending the wall from the monstrous titans. Some people who serve the empire are given grafts or suffusions, altering their abilities in specific ways. Our main character, Din, is an engraver; he has been cerebrally altered to have a perfect eidetic memory of everything he sees and hears. He carries little vials of different scents with him to use as cues to associate with particular memories. With this ability, he acts as the eyes and ears of the exceedingly eccentric, and brilliant, Ana, the investigator to whom he is apprenticed.

Each entry in the series offers clever and twisty mysteries, the charming and hilarious relationship and banter between irreverent Ana and sincere Din, and lessons that go beyond magical mayhem to say something about the ills that come part and parcel with society.

And of course, the series has wonderful representation and inclusion.

If these things sounds like your jam and you haven’t yet picked up this series, what are you even doing?!

Now on to the specifics of Book 3, A Trade of Blood.

Description

Brilliant detective Ana Dolabra must prove a man’s innocence to stop a civil war in the third book of the series that began with The Tainted Cup, named an Edgar, Hugo, and World Fantasy Award Finalist and one of the best books of the year (New York Times Book Review, NPR, Elle)—from the bestselling author of The Founders Trilogy.

In the canton of Sapirdad, two of the Empire’s most powerful families are moments away from going to war with each other, their hundreds of retainers gathered with swords drawn. If blood is spilt, the whole of the empire may be plunged into starvation and chaos.

To de-escalate matters, someone must do the impossible: prove that one family’s eldest son is innocent of a gruesome and unforgivable murder, despite the incontrovertible evidence against him.

It is with this undertaking that the great detective Ana Dolabra is tasked, her assistant Din at her side—and the two find themselves racing with great speed and little dignity to the scene.

As ever, the impossible proves little obstacle for the deadly combination of Ana’s intellect and Din’s keen eye, and mere hours after riding into the dusty town, Ana glimpses the greater pattern behind the crime. A deeper, subtler web of death is being woven in plain sight, by a mastermind with an ancient magical technology at his disposal.

But even Ana’s uncanny insight is of little use when each new suspect she uncovers ends up dead–with each new killing calculated to bring tensions between the two rival clans past the boiling point. And as Din pursues their adversary through the canton’s wild ranges, sprawling ranches, and reeking slaughterhouses, he finds his loyalties divided in unexpected ways.

Opening Line

“It is an inarguable truth, you know,” said Ana, “that most people are absolutely enthralled by dead girls.”

My Thoughts

This is another interesting and complex murder mystery for Ana and Din to solve in the fantasy world of the Shadow of the Leviathan series that began with The Tainted Cup and continued with A Drop of Corruption.

Our beloved duo is sent to a new location in the third ring of the Empire to investigate what appears to be a clear cut murder between two gentry clans, although this time things seem a little too pat to be left unquestioned. And once again, the story furthermore touches on some philosophical topics and those regarding the ills of society and potential pitfalls inherent in great civilizations.

“How you’ve grown,” I said softly.
“Is dread the same as maturity?”
I filled my glass. “In the Empire, perhaps.”

I have to say, even though the murder mystery that serves as the impetus of this adventure was compelling, it’s the world-building that really hits for me here—specifically the lore surrounding the history of the Empire, its founders, and its pantheons. But the fact that this murder utilizes a feature that often seems to really work for me in my fiction (this part is discovered early in the investigation, not to mention shows up in the cover illustration, but fair warning for readers who like to avoid anything even a hint spoilery, I’m referring here to parasitic fungal horror) serves as an added bonus. This time we get to meet one of Din’s family members. And though the interactions between the eccentric and foul-mouthed Ana and her straightman assistant are perhaps growing a bit stale, they continue to offer some levity amidst murder and a dark lesson about so-called civilized people being all too willing to tolerate the suffering of those they deem inferior for the sake of maintaining their own creature comforts. I do feel bits of the mystery were a little easier to unravel on my own this time, and I wasn’t sure I felt Din needed another dalliance at this point in the series, but the latter at least was a nice opportunity to present this bit:

Though a voice had spoken within me—not my memories, merely my experience—whispering: These things never last.
To which I had responded: Nothing does.

In all, this was an engaging story that was further enhanced by the new things revealed about the Empire and its history, and I will be happy to see where the series takes readers next.

Thank you to Del Rey and NetGalley for the eARC in exchange for my honest review.

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