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21w

the_bookishmum

Apr 03, 2026

Daughter of Crows

4.5

Enjoyment: 5.0Quality: 4.5Characters: 4.5Plot: 4.5

Daughter of Crows was one of my most anticipated reads of the year from one of my new favourite authors (ever since reading The book that wouldn’t burn). The narrative skips through time and we experience Rue’s life (and the life of the other two kindnesses) in fragments as the torment they went through and the reality of why they faced what they faced becomes clearer. Sold into a school that trains girls into becoming furies (assassin’s and necromancers) they are put through hell knowing the only escape is death. There were a lot of really dark moments as Lawrence explores the trauma that the girls go through to come out of the other side full of feminine rage. There are a blend of gods and goddesses, magic and mythology too which I always love when done well. Looking forward to the rest of this series!

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Daughter of Crows

Mark Lawrence

The survivor of a brutal academy must exhume her own past in the first book in a new series from the international bestselling author of the Library Trilogy and the Broken Empire series.Set a thief to catch a thief. Set a monster to punish monsters. The Academy of Kindness exists to create agents of retribution, cast in the image of the Furies—known as the kindly ones—against whom even the gods hesitate to stand. Each year a hundred girls are sold to the Academy. Ten years later only three will emerge. The Academy’s halls run with blood. The few that survive its decade-long nightmare have been forged on the sands of the Wound Garden. They have learned ancient secrets amid the necrotic fumes of the Bone Garden. They leave its gates as avatars of vengeance, bound to uphold the oldest of laws. Only the most desperate would sell their child to the Kindnesses. But Rue … she sold herself. And now, a lifetime later, a long and bloody lifetime later, just as she has discovered peace, war has been brought to an old woman’s doorstep. That was a mistake.

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Pádraig Kenny

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After

Pádraig Kenny

The Last of Us meets Wall-E in this post-apocalyptic tale of family, hope and survival from a multi-award-winning author “Tell me again how the world ended.” Jen and her father are making their way across a deserted world after a technological collapse brought civilization as people knew it to an end. The Flood took out all all technology, but also many people who were connected to a central information hive. Those who are left behind must find each other and build a new life. But Jen's father isn't related to her by blood – he is a human-appearing AI, a glitch in the system, and a secret that must be kept, even from those she wishes she could trust... Exploring themes of what it means to be human, the value of every individual and where true danger lies – in our technological creations, or the ones who create them – this is a powerful and hopeful dystopian adventure for readers age 9+

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Daughter of Crows

Mark Lawrence

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Daughter of Crows

Mark Lawrence

The survivor of a brutal academy must exhume her own past in the first book in a new series from the international bestselling author of the Library Trilogy and the Broken Empire series.Set a thief to catch a thief. Set a monster to punish monsters. The Academy of Kindness exists to create agents of retribution, cast in the image of the Furies—known as the kindly ones—against whom even the gods hesitate to stand. Each year a hundred girls are sold to the Academy. Ten years later only three will emerge. The Academy’s halls run with blood. The few that survive its decade-long nightmare have been forged on the sands of the Wound Garden. They have learned ancient secrets amid the necrotic fumes of the Bone Garden. They leave its gates as avatars of vengeance, bound to uphold the oldest of laws. Only the most desperate would sell their child to the Kindnesses. But Rue … she sold herself. And now, a lifetime later, a long and bloody lifetime later, just as she has discovered peace, war has been brought to an old woman’s doorstep. That was a mistake.

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