I enjoyed this, but it did drag on. Perhaps that's because I'm more used to reading mid-grade fiction than ya, but I still felt that a lot could have been cut without losing anything important. Still, I love the premise of assassin nuns and will probably read the rest of the trilogy.

Extremely clear-eyed view of tangled emotions. I like that the spirit world both clearly exists and is never the focal point, never even fully corroborated by other characters. Feels more memoir-ish in the reading than like a narrative.

Not as great as the other Penric and Desdemona books, mostly becasue of the lack of climax. The plot goes along as you expect it to, and then keeps going in that same direction and eventually ends. That's it.

Super well done! The emotions-- complicated feelings, joy, cringey moments, and ragey parts, felt very true. I felt a little...disappointed that the dad was actually dead. Even truer to life would have been having him alive but not a good guardian for a trans daughter. On the flip side though, I appreciated that this book holds very few brushes with truly evil people, and only acceptance from the current adults in Zen's life.

Delightful! Read next: The True Meaning of Smekday, by Adam Rex

BRILLIANT. I am fascinated by the way the cult is depicted, which is both stark and totally age appropriate for mid-grade fiction.

Sweet story with some light suspense and intrigue. I prefer a bit odder and more intrigue, but this was well done.

Despite the impeccable prose and rich world building, I can't see recommending this book to a child. The world it builds is so unforgiving of differences, and Wynn so utterly disregarded by her brother for so so much of the book. Though they are eventually granted safe haven in the land of the fairies, the entire journey is full of the brother telling Wynn what she can and can't do, and even so at the end it is he who is knighted when Wynn should be the hero. Wynn is crowned a princess, but it still feels unfair. On the one hand, representation is important. On the other hand, this representation feels too problematic to be a pure positive. I'm left feeling pretty conflicted about this story.