The prose of this book is genuinely gorgeous, and the setting of an 1800s mining town but with a biblical flair of angels and demons really drew me in. You can tell the author put a ton of work and thought into the setting, and everything is extremely tight, but the book is so short that it didn't feel justified enough for me. This is a story that could have been told almost exactly the same way in just a real-world western setting, so while the angel and demon stuff was interesting, I kept wanting it to be more fleshed out so that something new could enter the plot.

The characters are unlikable, but I can still sympathize with Celeste and her motivations. Mariel, however, I didn't care for. If we had gotten to see her at all before the plot starts, just an interaction with her and Celeste in the first chapter, I might have felt a bit different. For a novella in which the main drive is a sisterly bond, we really don't see any interactions between the sisters besides... 2? I also have no idea what Celeste and Abraxis see in each other either, so while I enjoyed his scenes (mostly because Dion Graham as an audiobook narrator is phenomenal), he felt like a huge distraction from the plot.

Overall, I would have liked more! More worldbuillding, more character building, more stakes to the plot. I do think I will check out other works by this author, because she is obviously very skilled.