This was everything a fantasy should be tbh.

Yes, the first couple of chapters were a bit world building heavy, and could maybe be seen like a bit of an info dump. However personally, I am quite content to get all the world building out of the way in the first few chapters and have them require a bit more thinking, for the rest of the book to be plain sailing. If this isn’t your vibe, you might struggle a bit at the beginning (it does ease off quite quickly though)

The friends to lovers was gorgeous. Built on years of familiarity and devotion, the trust and love that the two have for each other really shines through and makes the book what it is. It’s like they’re constantly in each other’s orbit - keeping close and basing their decisions on how it affects the other. The yearning and tension is sublime.

The characters are so well fleshed out. Grey (FMC) is incredible - a strong fighter hiding a secret, who loves Kier (MMC) with every fibre of her being, who has heaps of trauma from her childhood, and the weight of the sacrifices that people made for her bearing down at all times. She’s written so vividly - she feels real and human.

Queerness is normalised as well - same gender marriages and relationships, a non-binary character, a trans character. It’s so easily done in this novel as well, no big song and dance is made about anyone.

This is a stunning debut. From what I understand it’s going to be part of a series, but each novel will focus on a different character, so it can be read as a standalone.

Absolutely amazing!!!! Ah the storytelling,the yearning the pining. I absolutely devoured this one. I was hooked from the start and I want to read more from this author.

I received an ARC of this from Netgalley.

I loved this book, I found the plot good and the direction that the characters went in. I know this book has been compared to Gideon The Ninth a lot due to the magic system but I honestly found it explained so much better and easier to understand. The draw to this book for me was the author, I have read three other books from this author and loved all of them. But mainly I am impressed by the range that she has, one was about devils, one about grief and loss and the other about a fairy market. All of them drew me in with the writing style flowing so well and making the characters and the world so immersive.
This book follows Grey who is trying to stay alive in the army along with her mage Kier. Grey has secrets and Kier just wants them to stay alive. What starts as a simple story soon expands into a world changing plot that will test the relationship of Grey and Kier to its core.
I loved it and will be picking up a copy when it comes out in paperback to match all my other books by the author.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own. - Freya, arc & monthly book box pick reviewer (athenafreyag on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/athenafreyag/ )

3.5 stars rounded up.

Initial thoughts: This is a very hyped release, and the premise sounded intriguing, so I requested it on NetGalley and got approved with joy!

What I liked 🤩: I liked the worldbuilding! I liked the idea of pairs, one mage and one well as in one being able to use magic and one having magic but not being able to use it. It was executed rather lovely, too. Ever since the magical island Locke disappeared, no well has been born, which means the number of wells has been decreasing. Which isn't good especially since two kingdoms have been at war with each other for years.

I also liked the found family dynamic. Grey and Kier only trusted each other since childhood, due to Grey's big secret, so it was gratifying to see them open up to their new group members and build friendships to them.

Grey and Kier were also fine as main characters. We follow Grey's pov, and she was an alright main lead. I really felt for her, and her guilt of surviving and guilt of wanting more and yet expecting nothing truly spoke to me. She had dreams of a future with Kier (at some capacity) but she didn't expect she would ever get it. She didn't think she deserved it.

As I will explain below, the first half of the book wasn't for me, but the second half was great. Grey took the reins of her life, and she truly shone. She made one decision, though, that pissed me off, and for the life of me, I don't understand her reasoning. All in all, very good character development!

Kier was the devoted love interest, as in he had literally dedicated his life to keeping Grey safe. He was dependable and strong, resourceful and competent. He and the rest of their friends were my favourites.

Great character ensemble, too! Diverse!!!!!!!!! Not only are our two main characters bisexual, but we also got more! The excitement I got with every new identity being revealed was unreal. It was well handled, too.

What I didn’t like 🙃: The yearning during the first half of the book did not seem realistic. Grey and Kier were closer to each other than anyone else, and while intimacy does not equate to attraction, the scenes of Grey's longing and "hopeless, unrequited love" were maddening to me. Kier acted like he was in love with her, whereas it was Grey's behavior that was nonchalant despite the endless yearning. The magic was more believable than the yearning because it was so glaringly obvious to anyone that Kier was in love with her and Grey's self-misery "he'd never love me back" made my eyes roll, sorry to say.

Some plot devices towards the end weren't my thing, either.

Overall: This was fine but not as amazing as the hype suggested. I feel like this had a lot of potential, but it was full of choices that didn't land well for me. With every new thing I found and liked, there came a choice or plot device that I didn't like at all. I won't be reading the sequels; I am not that invested. It is a pity because the worldbuilding was great and the diversity was genuine.

SE info: This is the monthly pick for the Illumicrate September box, and I skipped it.

The premise of this grabbed me right away, and I loved the idea at the heart of the story.

That said, I did find myself wishing for more. The world building felt a little thin, like there were pieces missing that could’ve made the setting come alive. The pacing was a bit uneven too, some parts dragged, while others sped through moments I wanted more of. And while the characters were interesting, they didn’t feel fully fleshed out, so it was harder to connect with them on a deeper level.

Overall, it’s a book with a great hook and plenty of potential, but I wanted more depth to really make it shine. Still worth a read if you’re in it for the unique premise.

DNF at 20%

Unfortunately this book is boring me to death. I feel like we’ve been dumped into the middle of a story. I think seeing the full relationship between Grey and Kier as kids up to adults would have made me care and rooted for them more, but the format this is in, where we just get brief flashbacks in the middle of inner monologues, isn’t working for me. I don’t care for the plot either.

DNF 34%

oh, I'm so disappointed in this book

I had issues since literally the beginning, reading chapter 1 and felt like it was going on for ages

my main reason is the writing style, I couldn't get used to it and therefore couldn't get into the story, feel like the sentences were repetitive and there was a lot of paragraphs with "she did sth... he did sth... she felt sth... she sth sth" I just found that weird to read

and every other chapter felt so long and boring, had to do many breaks and seeing I only read 30 pages when it felt like 100 was frustrating

and about the characters - they annoyed me so much, Grey was always thinking about Kier and how he doesn't want her when he clearly does and there was no yearning or tension whatsoever

and the plot? there was something, but nothing concrete, couldn't focus enough to even remember the names of other kingdoms and the thing I found the most irritating- when they captured the prisoner - girl who is supposedly heir of Locke, but they know she isn't because Grey is, but they don't tell this to anyone because how would they know right? but Grey 26 yo saw that the girl has not yet fully developed adult bones and must've been a baby when massacre happened, so couldn't they literally say "its impossible for her to be the heir, cus she's too young" ??? like i don't understand what's so difficult with it, and so the plot is they're taking that fake girl somewhere

Thank you Netgalley for providing digital advanced copy in exchange for honest review.

I adored this book, a perfect standalone fantasy! Incredible, fast paced plot, with such lovable character's! I cannot recommend this enough, easily my favourite read of the year!

2.75 stars

What made me want to read this book was not just the gorgeous cover, but also the description of the book, of a magical lady knight who is also the heiress of a mysterious lost island.

I would say some positive aspect I appreciated were the prevalence of queer characters in the story, including our MCs. The magic system is also quite unique.

I think the main criticism I have about this book is how surface level a lot of things felt, from the world building to the characters and their relationships. I found both of the MCs quite dull, their relationship read as a bit generic for my taste despite the potential it had. The world felt shallow, I didn’t quite immerse myself in it.

I don't think this is a bad book, I think it had a lot of potential but it unfortunately fell short. Despite some adult content, I found it to be a bit like a YA, which I would say explains my reticence.

Thank you NetGalley for this eARC!

First, I’d like to say a big thank you to NetGalley and Little Brown Book Group for providing me with an eARC of this book.

The cover caught my eye, the synopsis reeled me in and when my request got accepted, I was over the moon. The Second Death of Locke felt like something I needed to read, and boy was I right. Lady knights, novel magic, destiny, strong relationships, gritty battles and power struggles, count me in.

This was my first full-length novel by Bovalino (previously read a short story by her in a dark academia anthology), but it certainly won’t be my last. I really appreciated her prose and the way she worldbuilds. Nothing felt infodumpy, rather it was a well-paced trickle of information through memories, war talks over military maps, recountings of myths around the fire pit, etc. I also loved the addition, at the beginning of every chapter, of excerpts from journals, books, letters, treaties, all things that helped with my immersion into the story and added to the world building in a new way.

The world of The Second Death of Locke is a world at war. It’s gritty and treacherous. There is cautious hope but it’s tied to terrible deeds. The more squeamish amongst us might not enjoy the battles and infirmary scenes described in vivid and gory details, however I personally am a big fan. I am not a soldier myself but I believe the military encampments and the life within were remarkably described. I felt as if I was there myself, covered in mud, surrounded by the smells of battle, rotting corpses and dirty bodies. The author truly nailed the atmosphere.

The magic system being developed is incredibly original (to me at least) and calls for intensely interesting dynamics between characters. The hinting at other types of magic being available in other continents piqued my curiosity and I’d love for that to be explored in sequels. This review is not without spoilers but I’d like to tell as little as possible about the magic as I believe it’s a great detail to discover yourself.

Grey was a great main character. She was strong and fierce, with a vulnerability that it felt great to explore throughout the book. She made mistakes and learned from them, she apologised and tripped again. Her personality fit her past, her choices, her status and her personal journey through trauma and pain towards trust and stability felt justified and fully mature.

What a delight it was to be privy to hers and Kier’s relationship, to something so raw, so intimate, so fierce. Their friendship, with its disagreements, its jokes, its familiarity, was just as captivating as their later romance. In life as in their relationship, their status as equals, as well as the respect they hold for each other, is emphasised. If they’re both willing to sacrifice for each other, there a no weird power dynamics between them, more a deep understanding of the other’s qualities and flaws, which make them feel deeply authentic in every way. Friends-to-lovers is a personal favourite trope of mine (and reminds me of my own relationship with my fiancé) and to see it so well executed in this story made my heart swell. The pining guys, the sheer power of their yearning for each other!! Reign in the enemies to lovers, let’s have more friends to lovers like these two, I beg!

As for the rest of the cast, I was equally smitten. Those who know me will know I’m a sucker for a found family and that is exactly what we get in this book with Eron, Ola, Brit and even Sela. And again, what I truly loved about their dynamic was that it wasn’t always pretty, not always perfect. There was strain, there was doubt and suspicion, and we got to see true development in the way they moved past that and started forming true friendships with one another. My little heart…

I had been promised a story that would remind me of The Six Deaths of the Saint by Alix E. Harrow and The Second Death of Locke did deliver in a lot of ways. I devoured this book and I’m sure plenty will too when it finally comes out at the end of September.

** ⭐️⭐️⭐️.5 **

This story was so interesting to me from the outset. The dyamic between Grey and Kier was different from other stories.
It felt like I was truly being led through the story, not dragged. I really enjoyed the pacing and premise of this story. I would really recommend this to anyone that wants something that isn't quite like all the typical fantasies with romance. It was *yearning*, it was magic, it was adventure.

Thank you to netgalley and little brown books for the ARC.

5 STARS! this is definitely one of my favourite books of 2025! friends to lovers YAS unique magic YAS found family YAS! it reminded me so much of the knight and the moth and the prison healer!!!! UGH I LOVE IT
(THANKYOU NETGALLEY)

This book was great ! I love so much the romantic plot and the link between Grey and Kier ! Grey is a very interesting and complex character. Kier is a lovely mage and a such a good support/friend to hier (i love him so much).
The Lady Knight era is here and i love it.
4 stars ! I will recommand it to every romantasy and Medieval girlies

tropes :
- friends to lovers
- YARNING
- Miscommunication (but it was a good one)
- not fated mate but...

DNF at 30%

This is not the right book for me. I thought this would be more adjacent to epic fantasy, but the story is very focused on the romance. That's my bad. I do think that this story is not epic enough to call it an epic romantasy.

I was not a fan of the romance, as I felt like Grey and Kier grew up together (almost) like siblings. (They didn't actually grew up in the same house, but they were neighbours and Kier's mom often took care of Grey, since Grey's adoptive mother was very young and not great in taking care of her.) I still think it's weird to be madly in love in that situation. I'd rather not read about that because it feels a bit icky to me.

I also didn't like the language that was used. The word "fuck" (or variations of it) is used 52 times in the entire book. Other swear words such as shithole were also used. I don't like this type of language.

However, this is not a bad book. I liked that the story took place in a queernormative world, and I thought the magic system was pretty unique.

This just wasn't for me. Give it a chance if you like romantasy and childhood friends-to-lovers!

A masterpiece.
The answer to "bring back yearning"
I adored everything about this book.
Full review to come when my brain starts working again.

thanks to Netgalley and Orbit books for sending an earc my way

I was really hyped for this book. Female knight x male mage? Sign me right up. It's also a September 2025 Illumicrate pick. But unfortunately, this joins a long list of books I've read with amazing premise, disappointing execution.

First of all, the worldbuilding doesn't make sense to me. If for 16 years no wells were being born and they're 100% necessary to fuel the mages, it's the wells who should be protected and have their own bodyguards. But nope. They're treated as something between expendables and workhorses? They need to be bodyguards, healers, soldiers, everything at once. And the mages? They're mostly portrayed as having extremely limited power, often revolving around 1 quirk they can perform, but they still jump headfirst into the fray and constantly get into trouble and need to be saved by their wells (called Hands).

Kier doesn't seem to do much with his power, he's also described as taller and with bigger hands than Grey, but somehow SHE needs to be his sword? And he constantly gets himself into trouble so she needs to save him...

That's the second biggest issue. The utter dumbassery of these characters who are theoretically veteran soldiers. This isn't much of a spoiler, because it happens in the 3rd chapter iirc, but Kier does something very stupid, illogical, not supported by any good motivation, that's a plot convenience so the story can get rolling. I really hate the "mc caught the idiot ball so the plot can happen" trope.

To explain, they're on a mission to kill enemy soldiers and capture and bring back whatever they're transporting. They find it's a prisoner teenage girl they know nothing about. They kill the enemy soldiers and take the girl. Kier unties her and takes off his armor to give it to her. Why? All the enemy soldiers were killed, there's no need to give the girl armor, nobody's left to attack them? And why would you untie her if you don't know who she is? And then she stabs him. Just so Grey has to use lots of her power to keep Kier alive until they get him medical help, so she can get under the commander's suspicion for having TOO much power and then get blackmailed into the next quest, a mission to escort the prisoner to the king. There were so many less stupid ways to kick off the plot...

And until the very end characters keep making illogical, needlessly risky decisions that can get them killed (and often nearly do).

The "romance" is an equal mix of stupid for plot convenience reasons. They know each other since childhood, live on top of each other, sleep on the same bedroll, have endless PDA gestures, save each other's lives, send each other feelings through their magical bond, there are scenes of sensual massage, Grey "moaning" when she eats tasty food, but nope, they refuse to discuss their relationship, they'd rather endlessly pine, make up in their heads reasons why the other one wouldn't return their feelings, and sleep around with random one night stands.

Is their relationship forbidden? Not really, it's "not recommended" or "not customary" but not explicitly forbidden. Would it matter even if it was? Most likely not, since they already broke the law and didn't care in another aspect, creating an exclusive bonding between a mage and a well that increases their power but also was supposedly punishable by death.

There's NO obstacle to their relationship except dragged out miscommunication / refusing to talk / making up excuses in their minds. It's just another thing that happens "for reasons" in this book, i.e. no other reason than because the author needed it to happen to drag out romantic angst.

Except that, the rest of the characters feel really flat. Around the quarter into the book, we get D&D-esque rag-tag team road trip trope with repetitive and boring banter. Brit is supposedly "funny" but whatever they said wasn't funny at all. The amount of time the same lines were repeated in another iteration, like Kier sleeping with cartographers or Grey being angry at Sela that she stabbed Kier before was getting tiring and stopped being funny after one or two repetitions. Sometimes I've felt the only thing I know about the side characters is that this person is non-binary and that person is trans. Which, good effort for diversity, but that's NOT how you write diversity with token unmemorable characters whose only defining trait is their diversity status.

The worldbuilding felt equally shallow, perfunctory, and a fantasy name soup. The island has something like 5 nations, not counting the "gone" nation of Locke in an even smaller isle, and then there's the continent with multiple other countries, but there's very little point to so many countries except having them all at war. It feels like multiplying entities for the sake of a worldbuilding flex, just a bunch of names slapped together rather than feeling immersive and purposeful.

The pacing was very slow with constant embedded flashbacks from Grey's childhood. It doesn't feel like much happened across the book with the impactful events and reveals being fairly sparse. At start I thought Grey didn't know she was Locke (this isn't a spoiler, it's in the blurb), I thought she had amnesia from the trauma / ptsd (she has a lot of nightmares and flashbacks) but apparently she and Kier know it all the time, just hiding it from the rest (and from the reader for a good 50 pages). That's another baffling narrative choice to me, either we should know from the start, or Grey should have not known and had to discover her heritage across the story.

What's there to like in this book?
* Atmospheric writing style.
* Diversity representation (Grey & Kier are bi/pan, there's a non-binary and trans side character, there's a dark skinned character, the world seems to be fairly queer-normative, but sadly it felt like a checklist of identities to include with little care to make all those side characters impactful and memorable).
* Main romantic pairing that isn't toxic or hateful.

Overall, sadly, I must admit the book didn't do enough for me in any aspect of it. Plot, pacing, worldbuilding, characterization, romance, all of it was underwhelming. A shame.

Thank you Netgalley, Orbit & Little, Brown Book Group UK for the ARC.

P.S. This didn't affect the rating further, due to all my other criticisms, but seriously, you can't have a word like "technicolor" used in a pseudo-medieval fantasy.

So, the pining and the yearning in this book were ELITE.
I loved the story, the magic system, and the side characters were well fleshed out. Also, the actual romance was really good, and I liked how for once the love wasnt in any way unsure or difficult. They are both obsessed with each other and that is so beaitiful to me.

This is supposed to be a series (i dont know how many books), but the book ended well and did not give off aby vibes of needing a continuation. I liked the open ended end and the fact that there was no cliffhanger.
.
I have one single issue. I could not keep up with the names and genders, due to the fact that in this world, the country leaders are called by the country name. Which means every leader has 2 names, and many leaders are called the same name. It got confusing from time to time, and im still not sure i got it right
PS. I may be traumatized by other books, but I was expecting some kind of twist where the main character would be betrayed by someone close to her, maybe even by the love interest himself.

Grey (a magical well) and Kier (her mage), embark on a quest to escort the long lost heir of Locke across the Kingdom during a time of war over power and magic

But Grey has a secret, and it’s not that she’s hopelessly in love with her childhood best friend …

If she dies, all magic dies with her

The plot, the pacing, the beautiful writing, Grey and Kier’s YEARNING - if you are here for the medieval, lady knight vibes of 2025, then this one is for you!

𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘁𝗼 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗰𝘁
⚔️ Medieval inspired fantasy vibes
🏰 Adventure
⚔️ Hidden identity
🏰 Friends to lovers
⚔️ Magic
🏰 Slow burn
⚔️ Found family
🏰 Yearning

Thank you to the author, publisher and NetGalley for this eARC.

Book 1 in The Hand and The Heart series, out 23 September.

⭐️⭐️⭐️.5
3.5 stars
Rounded down to 3 stars

Not sure if it was the marketing or the high number of 5 star reviews I've seen, but I expected something else, something more of this book, which led to disappointment by the end. It's an understatement that I disliked everything about the last 20%.

Still, it's not a bad book by any means! The writing is beautiful, the magic system is unique, and there were parts where I was on the edge of my seat or on the verge of tears, but ultimately, the weaker parts ruined the experience for me.

My main problem is that every decision the characters make revolves around the romance. And I guess it was not enough for me to carry the story, I wanter more of the world building and better motivations. But yeah that's probably more of a me problem.

I'm sure many people will love this book, sadly I'm not one of them.

A massive thank you to Little Brown UK, Netgalley and the author for providing a digital ARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

I really don’t know how to rate this book since there were passages I really liked the flow of it but there were also many points I thought disappointing.
I really liked the idea of well and mage tbh. Not every person being able to do magic by themselves is a nice concept and what was described about it was well thought about and made absolute sense- especially with the problems arising especially for the wells.
But what was absolutely lacking for my taste was an explanation of Lockes magic. It was always just „power“ somehow it can do everything and Kier is perfectly able to draw from it without needing to train for it? Nah, that was lost potential in my opinion. Later it gets clear that Grey got some training as a child so there could have been more information without her knowing more than logical.
Same with worldbuilding: there was some, but could have been more.

Lastly the romance plotline. In my opinion it was nicely written even tho they were blind for their whole life apparently. What I was really missing was the sapphic part tbh. Yeah it was mentioned her being bi but in my opinion it’s not enough for the book to be classified as anything other than straight romance.

Overall it was a nice read but nothing I would need to read again anytime soon.

Thanks to Netgalley for the eARC!