I want to say, right off the bat, that this book has a lot of fairly graphic sexual violence in it. I didn't find it necessarily gratuitous, and it's not like SUPER graphic, but there were enough details that I was triggered reading it. Just want to be clear because I had no idea going in and might have been better if I had known going in.

That being said, this was still a good book--I enjoyed Alex as a character quite a bit, and the relationships she develops in the book. The magical parts are super compelling and interesting,

even though they are deeply rooted in violence against women.

I will say that's helped by the fact that the narrative is super aware of that fact, rather than it just being a background element of the world. I have a lot of thoughts actually about the way this has been framed by other folks versus how the narrative plays out, but it's a really compelling narrative and I'm definitely lookin forward to the sequel!