2021: Overall pretty meh for me, but it might be better for you!

Here's the deal: this book was really hyped, and I wanted to be a part of the zeitgeist. So I took a chance, and was disappointed. There is so much almost-rape in this book (by which I mean a lot of non-consensual sexual advances) that I was ready to vomit. I also don't love historical fiction as a whole, and for me, there was no need to return to a world in which women had such limited agency, just to get a fun mystery going.

The number one biggest deterrent for me was the amount of time spent in the "hmm something weird is going on, but I don't know what yet" phase of exposition. The main conflict of the story wasn't even introduced until almost 2/3 of the way through the book! Some of you might love this and languish in the (very) subtle foreshadowing spread throughout the first half of the book. But I was ready to pull my hair out if I read about one more "words whispering in the walls" or "was she dreaming? She couldn't tell" or "the ~mist~ was everywhere (was it mist?)".

Noemí is a strong, badass narrator who deserved SO MUCH MORE, but thankfully she is a large, redeeming part of this novel. If she had not been the main character (or worse, if we had been following the story through Catalina's eyes, no thank you!) this novel would have been much different (and not for the better). This book definitely could have used a family tree at the front, please and thank you.