On the wheel of fortune, who will emerge on top... and who will die? When Ann Stilwell arrives in New York City, she hopes to spend her summer working as a curatorial associate at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Instead, she finds herself assigned to The Cloisters, a gothic museum and garden renowned for its collection of medieval and Renaissance art. There she is drawn into a small circle of charismatic but enigmatic researchers, including Patrick Roland, the museum's mercurial curator who specializes in the history of tarot; Rachel Mondray, Patrick's beautiful curatorial associate and sometime muse; and Leo Bitburg, the gardener who nurtures the museum's precious collection of medicinal and poison plants. Relieved to have left her troubled past in rural Washington behind her, Ann longs for the approbation of her colleagues and peers and is happy to indulge their more outlandish theories, only to find that their fascination with fortune-telling runs deeper than academic obsession. Patrick is determined to prove that ancient divination holds the key to the foretelling of the future. And when Ann stumbles across a breakthrough in the form of a mysterious and previously-believed lost deck of 15th-century Italian tarot cards, she finds herself at the centre of a dangerous game of power, toxic friendship and ambition. Then there is an unexpected and devastating death, and suddenly everyone becomes a suspect. As the game being played within the Cloisters spirals out of control, Ann must decide if the tarot cards can not only teach her about the past, but also about her future.
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Fun read and surprisingly interesting in regards to ancient tarot. Could really imagine New York in this novel and enjoyed the thriller/horror/dark academia vibes
02.5 stars
ugh really disappointed by this one. I was so excited to pick up a fresh dark academia and was pulled in by the promise of the occult and tarot cards. I kept patiently waiting for those themes to flourish, convinced we would be pulled into the world of tarot and the occult at SOME point... but aside from a few half baked scenes where the characters performed readings, the theme wasn't explored in full until there were only 30 pages left and I was already tuned out. I could have forgiven this bait and switch if the writing and character development weren't so weak; I found myself skimming past useless description and was constantly baffled by the characters decisions. Their motives weren't really explained and instead of adding interest it made the characters feel flat and emotionless. I wasn't invested in any of them or in the story itself - even the plot twists and large moments of conflict lost their luster in the bland and unemotional writing. I forced myself to finish this one and am excited to move on to my next read.
SPOILERS AHEAD CONTINUE AT YOUR OWN RISK
Ok for those readers that disagree with opinion or want to commiserate, let me break down my gripes...
* Ann's inner dialogue is so grating I could not for the life of me get invested in her character. She had thoughts and realizations at the most random moments that made no sense in the scene - prime example, at Patrick's funeral she contemplates how happy she is that the Cloisters gave her a fresh start. YOUR COLLEAGUE WAS JUST MURDERED why are you thinking about this rn girl. It felt like the author realized she didn't develop the Ann enough and in a later revision added random asides like this.
* this is a first person POV. If Ann is keeping a secret, I should know why. There was zero explanation for her hiding the false front tarot card from Patrick initially, and it was never explained why she kept so many research finds from both Patrick and Rachel. We were forced to accept this at face value and it really made the plot crumble.
* Ann's emotional responses, or lack thereof, made absolutely no sense to the point that I actually laughed in disbelief at certain points. She suspects her love interest has committed murder to cover up his habit of stealing from the museum and she comes right out with her accusations and tells him she outed him to the police!? And he isn't upset with her, but APOLOGIZES? Please. The lack of buildup or emotional insight into the decline of her relationship with Rachel made the ending so unbelievable, but then I realized I don't know much about Ann at all. Apparently she can go from loving friend to murderer in the span of an hour, huh.
* I get this is a work of fiction, I can suspend my real-world criticism for the sake of a story, but this book really pushed the limits. The whole police interrogation and investigation was so sloppy and didn't follow any real world norms (the detective openly telling Ann who she thought was a suspect or not and why), Ann's father telling her to leave the scene of his death to save herself (it was an obvious accident, it wouldn't have ruined her life?? also she would seek medical care for him??), Ann and Rachel quite literally going on a carefree PICNIC right after Leo is arrested (Leo, who Ann is supposedly falling in love with...). There were smaller things as well (Ann just waltzed right into Rachel's parents' penthouse that miraculously didn't have a security system? Her mom just happened to mail her a scrap of trash from her father's academic trash collection that held the secret to her very obscure research? Rachel & Ann's groundbreaking paper only took less than 3 weeks to discover, research and write?)
I appreciate the concept of this novel - fate, an academic look at the occult, the power of destiny - but the story did not serve the exploration of these topics and so was sadly a flop for me :/
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