This book is an odd one to review, because much of it is poignant and perfect, and makes you reflect on our own society and the combined corrosive effects of Greed and Complacency. But parts of it are cliche or confusing - there are whole characters who seem underdeveloped, or who suffered from an edit taking too much away. Gina Chen's writing is gorgeous, quotable. And Violet is fully fleshed out and relatable (though not /likable/ universally, some readers will struggle with her, I'm sure). But the rest of the cast... I will say, if you're hungry for a "dark fairytale, with a strong female protagonist who rises from ruined to rebel queen", this is a good first book, a good foundation for that kind of arc. BUT it's also a genre-savvy book that subverts a lot of the usual YA expectations, for better or for worse.

Spoilers ahead.

One thing I will say that this book gets right, right off the bat, is that the passionate, often violent, conflicted relationship between Violet and Cyrus is NOT love. It is lust, mostly for dominance and partially for sexual gratification. But at no point is Violet dismissive of Cyrus's abuses towards her. She recognizes immediately that he projects his fantasies and fears onto her, and doesn't actually SEE her or care to try, he is too caught up in his own story. This is something most YA fantasy gets WRONG, pedaling the myth that if an abusive boyfriend - a dark prince, an ancient vampire, somebody with a grand scheme riddled with violent failures and good intentions - seems cruel, forgive his arrogance and wickedness. View his manipulations and outbursts as reasons to love him or pity him. Trust the plan, trust that he does See you, deep down - even as the man betrays you, belittles you, and deflects from genuine connection with bold sexual attention. Assume there is someone Good beneath The Beast's exterior. I am excited that, FOR ONCE, a YA book was genuine in its depiction of a volatile relationship. They are who they are, and bad BDSM is not a harbinger of a respectful Happily Ever After to come.

I am also grateful that this book holds its characters accountable for their bad behavior. Nobody is romanticized as being a tortured hero, everybody is just a person making mistakes. For example, the trope of the Brazen Heroine who runs her mouth at authority and magically impresses them with her uniqueness and toughness - NOT at play, here! Violet loses everything, in large part because she was TOO brazen with a person in power, and it backfired. He learned to believe in her temper more than her judgment, and not to expect honor from a person with a chip on her shoulder. (Sub bullet point, YEY for highlighting the hypocrisy of gender roles, and the helplessness a woman feels when she's labeled "emotional". Oh how easily society makes witches of women).

But for all that the book does well in realistically representing its protagonist and her doomed dalliance, it falls flat with... the rest of the cast:
- Violet's struggle for security, and with the misnomer "witch" when she's simply a shrewd person, is undermined by the arrival of an actual Wicked Witch, whose eye-roll-worthy monologue about, "We're not so different you and me; You deserve more in life; Turn to The Dark Side, we have cookies" is paaaainful for any veteran fantasy fan to read, and THANKFULLY is short enough to not ruin the whole book.
- Cyrus is presented as a charismatic person whose charms don't work on Violet because she's known him long enough to see beneath the veneer. She believes him to be a lazy altruist of the "Let them eat cake" variety; his privileged birth enables him to pity his struggling subjects and war-torn neighbors, but blinds him to any actionable political change if it means sacrificing some of his power and comfort. Fans of the genre expect that by Act 2 or 3, Cyrus is going to reveal himself to have a heart of gold, and to be moonlighting as an activist or something. You will be sorely disappointed. For all that Violet sets us up to believe everyone in this universe is a liar, and that her initial beat on Cyrus SHOULD be wrong... she turns out to be right. Cyrus BELIEVES himself a future savior, and envisions a world where everything is fair and painless simply because HE'S on the throne. But in the present, he's as volatile as his father, spouting delusions of grandeur, false promises, and even outright threats to the "friends" he seeks to control. If anything, Cyrus's self-righteousness comes across as a little psychotic. He's the deuteragonist, you're supposed to root for him, but just because he's the lesser of two evils doesn't mean that he's good, and he loses a lot of the audience's sympathy over the course of the book. Now, a subversion of prince charming is GREAT! But, this is book 1 of however many, and the cliffhanger at the end sets us up for a SECOND fake marriage plot in book 2. Without some humility or true heroism from either Cyrus or Violet, I'm not interested in investing in a Fake Relationship Turns Into True Feelings plot for them, they haven't earned each other. Cyrus definitely hasn't earned the audience's sympathy; it's not enough to have dreams, you have to DO something Good with your reality.
- In every bad ensemble there is a catch-all character. They are usually a token, be it race or gender or LGBTQA representation, etc. They have a very "strong" personality, which seems to mean different things to different people, but is somehow always the right kind of "strong" in every context: Confidant, authoritative, but also counter-culture, roguish, independent... All the things. They have a trillion different tricks up their sleeves, as many loopholes as the plot needs. And they are always "conveniently" incapacitated when the villain shows up. Camilla is that character. Need a makeover? She's got you. A swordfighter? She's that too. A token queer character who never develops any meaningful relationships over the course of the book, and who has to hide her queerness from an orthodox society? Check check check! She is a loud, vain, fashionista, who supports her father's war-mongering, and has a love-hate relationship with cake! But she's also the only woke person at court, wise to any gossip or magical trickery, is totally not a racist, and will be the only character who actually takes steps to unravel the evil conspiracy unfolding before them. AND ALSO, she's a nosy, sex-positive, gal pal, who shows up to offer unwanted relationship advice, or to add levity to an otherwise gloomy book. Camilla...you're doing too much. And yet, surprisingly, too little! Why isn't Camilla in cahoots with Dante? Or developing a relationship with Nadiya? Why isn't SHE making a grab at the throne, publicly supporting Violet and calling her brother out for being an idiot? You can't BE all of the things, and then DO none of the things! What heroic qualities Camilla might have we are told, not shown. She is summarized as HAVING DONE them. Camilla should be a proper character, with motivations and pitfalls and who grows over time, NOT a tool for fast-forwarding the plot.
- Dante is a ward of Balica, a neighboring kingdom basically at war with our heroes' home turf, Auveny. He is outwardly mocked at court, but is trusted implicitly by Prince Cyrus and co. He repeatedly pleas for Cyrus to intervene on behalf of the Belicans, and to publicly denounce the king of Auveny's current policies. He warns that if Cyrus won't take drastic and immediate action, then he, Dante, will, because the situation has gotten too dangerous to wait for help any longer. He will join a bloody revolution, and fight for his people... Even without Violet's ability to read minds, it should come as NO SURPRISE TO ANYONE that Dante does exactly that. AND YET, our dumb DUMB heroes truly believed that Dante was all bark no bite, wasting his days in scholarly pursuits instead of taking action, as he claimed he would. But once again, the author devastatingly underused this character, summarizing his discontent, and wasting his appearances in the book on huffs, eyerolls, and giving unwelcome advice on Violet and Cyrus's attraction for each other. If Dante's conversations with Violet were a little more suggestive that he was feeling her out, maybe trying to recruit her to his cause, or to persuade her to be a whisper in Cyrus's ear to make mutually beneficial changes at court, THAT would have been something. But alas, Dante's betrayal is both telegraphed too loudly AND not earned well enough with actual character moments. He is another character who suffers from summaries, existing to hurl the plot forward, but not really to provide any intrigue, growth, or foils.
In short, it seems like most of these characters were given broad palettes to work with as to who they could become in /future/ books, but weren't given enough concise arc moments in THIS book. I don't understand them, or care about them, as well as I do Violet.

Final thoughts, I am all about a dark fairytale. I love that you can see the influence of so many classic fairytales in this book, but it's not a 1:1 of any single story, it stands on its own. It's nice to see the subversions, too: The sympathetic witch; the charming-to-the-point-of-untrustworthy Prince Charming; The Prince and The Pauper swap made unwillingly/Cinderella at the ball under duress. But the book played a little too coy with its mechanics. I can see that some clues were laid about how the Fairy Wood, magic, and rot and witchcraft, are all connected, but my non-Puzzlemaster brain can't tease it all out. It's confusing, where magic draws its power, and who should be capable of what; the rules seems to change chapter to chapter. But, our narrator is unreliable, she was never formally trained in how to use her powers, and she misunderstands or makes assumptions to her detriment. I think I'm SUPPOSED to be confused, and I hope future books will make the mechanics clear. BUT, I hate when a book depends on its sequels too much. I feel like I should feel intrigued, not bamboozled. I should have part of the puzzle solved, and be looking forward to fitting the next piece. I wish this book's clues were a little neater. AND, similarly, I wish THE MAP at the beginning of the book, was for the CONTINENT, not Auveny's districts. Because the districts play NO role in the plot of this book, our heroes largely keep to the castle. But they discuss the outside world at length. This book is ALL a setup of the border disputes and the war to come, but it's hard to understand the dangers of this WORLD when I can't properly picture where these places are in relation to each other, or the comparative size of each neighboring realm to Auveny. There was no reason to give folks a map they can't use, and then make the plot hinge on a realm they need to visualize. If I can't wrap my mind around the physical or the magical aspects of this book... I'm just clinging to the narrator, hoping that Violet figures things out for me... when I know SHE'S unreliable. It's not a great place for a reader to be. And /I/ identify with Violet, but many other readers might find her cynicism grating, and give up on her. Without sympathy for her, this book and all its secrets and promises, won't be enough to captivate the audience. There is POTENTIAL here, a great fairytale aesthetic. But there is not enough that's concrete and known and sticks with the audience after this first book.

Hindsight will be 20/20 with this one; a sequel might make me rethink my opinions of the first book. But for now, I love Gina Chen's writing of Violet, and am at least invested in what Violet becomes, and what Gina Chen has to say about women, power, and what stories we really ought to be telling each other.