i know this is a novel about growing up, but maybe he should’ve grown up faster 🙃

A novel has not made me so irritated with its indecisiveness like this one did in quite a while.

The bones of this book had the potential to be great-the world with its base in Hungarian history & folklore (edit: specifically, Hungarian history and Jewish mythology is mentioned on the back of the book, but also there’s Hungarian folklore!), the workings of a compelling enemies-to-lovers romance, and cool magic and monsters. But so much of it fell flat for me, mostly due to two glaring flaws.

The first flaw was that it felt like Reid couldn't pin down what ideas they wanted to explore. At the start, we got some really interesting themes of religion and its weaponization, specifically through the expectation of self-sacrifice, but it disappeared as quickly as it was introduced (pretty much as soon as the "romance" started to take center stage). There were glimpses of a larger commentary trying to break through in the latter half, but it felt disjointed and even contradictory at times, especially in regards to Évike's decisions and thoughts.

The second major flaw was just how unbearable our two main characters were, primarily in regards to Gáspár, though Évike definitely had her moments as well. Gáspár seemed like he was meant to be this brooding sad prince, a deep and complex character who is discriminated against for his mixed-heritage, but he truly is the concept of an idea of an attractive emo "I'll do anything for you" love interest. He is pathetic but only because he DOESN'T DO ANYTHING, and I thought it was such a shame because I really thought there was such potential!

It wasn't all terrible, I did enjoy Reid's writing, with their detailed, gothic-flowery descriptions, and the atmosphere in the woods was good. I've read and enjoyed another of their works, and I can see in their debut the foundations of it. But it wasn't enough to save this novel for me, and honestly this overall was such a disappointment.

Attempting to write a review for this book is actually an insane undertaking but here we go.

I loved it. This was my first Discworld and it will not be my last. I will come again.

The things I loved about this book were, in no particular order:

• the humor, duh, it's off the chain
• a really fun plot the humor is layered upon
• WHIMSY, goddamnit - in what other book might you be told, "This was one of those points where the Trousers of Time bifurcated themselves, and if you weren't careful, you'd go down the wrong leg--"
• my increasing affinity for Captain Vimes (acab all day, but still)
• the characterization of the city, Ankh-Morpork. It is... kind of like the characterizations of NYC as seen on 30 Rock or Pawnee as seen on Parks & Rec. Which is to say, it's too good.
• the raising up of an older woman, a large woman, an unladylike woman. I love you, Sybil.
• a real punk-ass book jockey who low-key saves the day
• a champion of the IBS community who high-key saves the day
• call-backs for days. Successfully landed call-backs are some of my favorite things in this world and this book is loaded with them.
• the secret society comprised of a "Supreme Grand Master" and acolytes named "Brother [Place]" with the exception of Brother Fingers. The Supreme Grand Master staffed his society not with "the skilled, the hopefuls, the ambitious, the self-confident." No, "he'd take the whining resentful ones, the ones with a bellyful of spite and bile, the ones who knew they could make it big if only they'd been given the chance... the ones in which the floods of venom and vindictiveness were dammed up behind thin walls of ineptitude and low-grade paranoia. And stupidity, too."
• lastly,