A quiet yet mesmerizing story reveals how a family was impacted by a curse over the centuries.
A woman works to cast out the evil witch haunting her inherited home in the second book of Roberts’ Lost Bride Trilogy, following Inheritance (2023).
Sonya MacTavish inherited a mansion in a small coastal Maine town, only to discover it was haunted by ghosts known as the lost brides. In 1806, a malevolent witch named Hester Dobbs wanted the mansion and its owner for herself, so she killed his bride on their wedding night and then sealed the curse by killing herself. The first woman in each subsequent generation was killed by the curse on her wedding day. Dobbs has become a poltergeist that controls part of the mansion, while the rest is inhabited by the ghosts of her victims. Roberts follows her typical trilogy plotting: In this middle book, the forces of good retrench, gather information, and build their forces, saving the final showdown for the last volume. Sonya builds a small cadre of supporters around her here, including her cousin, best friend, and lover. Inside the mansion, the foursome discovers a magic mirror that shows them scenes from the past, but as family members, Sonya and her cousin can also travel through the mirror. On the other side, they become ghosts, able to experience the murders of the brides as if they were present in the room. Sonya and her friends treat these visits as fact-finding missions, hoping to use the information to cast out Dobbs and end the curse once and for all. Meanwhile, Dobbs builds her own power, hoping to intimidate and frighten Sonya away. Roberts is a masterful storyteller, weaving together the tales of Sonya’s ancestors, not only the murdered brides but also desperate survivors who did monstrous things to avoid the curse. It’s a fascinating look at the destructive power of ambition, greed, and weakness while Sonya marshals the power of creativity, community, and togetherness.
A quiet yet mesmerizing story reveals how a family was impacted by a curse over the centuries.Pub Date: Nov. 19, 2024
ISBN: 9781250288776
Page Count: 448
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2024
Doesn’t entirely hang together but still manages to hit the spot.
In an alternate early-20th-century Montreal, sparks fly between the operator of a cat shelter and a reclusive magician.
Agnes Aubert is not kindly disposed toward magicians, especially not after a magical duel blows a hole in the building that housed her and her cat shelter. Unfortunately, finding another spot isn’t easy, so she’s happy to take the reasonably priced location on the Rue des Hirondelles. But that’s before she discovers the building’s owner secretly living in the basement: Havelock Renard, the world’s most powerful magician, who also happens to be allergic to cats. As this decidedly odd couple work out a system for cohabitation, Agnes develops some uncomfortable feelings for Havelock; she also can’t deny her attraction to the police detective who thinks (not entirely incorrectly) that the shelter is a front for the illegal sale of magical Artefacts. In comparison to the carefully constructed universe of her Emily Wildeseries, Fawcett’s worldbuilding and plotting are a bit sloppy; the magical system is not laid out as clearly as more pedantic readers might wish, and there’s one part of Agnes’ quandary that gets resolved in a rushed, not truly believable, way. The book also implausibly suggests that an allergy to cats is curable by exposure (rather than managed by a magical antihistamine, perhaps?). But one has to admire the author’s acumen in finding the absolute sweet spot for a cozy fantasy, after all the other ones set in cafes and adorable little shops. It could seem either twee or a cynical grab at the market, but it’s neither; Fawcett clearly understands the complicated but rewarding relationship between humans and cats. It is also charming to set a story in Montreal, where both brioches and bagels are on offer.
Doesn’t entirely hang together but still manages to hit the spot.Pub Date: Feb. 17, 2026
ISBN: 9780593973257
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Del Rey
Review Posted Online: Nov. 8, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Although the melodrama sometimes is a bit much, the superb worldbuilding and intricate plotline make this a must-read.
Using mystery and romance elements in a nonlinear narrative, SenLinYu’s debut is a doorstopper of a fantasy that follows a woman with missing memories as she navigates through a war-torn realm in search of herself.
Helena Marino is a talented young healer living in Paladia—the “Shining City”—who has been thrust into a brutal war against an all-powerful necromancer and his army of Undying, loyal henchmen with immortal bodies, and necrothralls, reanimated automatons. When Helena is awakened from stasis, a prisoner of the necromancer’s forces, she has no idea how long she has been incarcerated—or the status of the war. She soon finds herself a personal prisoner of Kaine Ferron, the High Necromancer’s “monster” psychopath who has sadistically killed hundreds for his master. Ordered to recover Helena’s buried memories by any means necessary, the two polar opposites—Helena and Kaine, healer and killer—end up discovering much more as they begin to understand each other through shared trauma. While necromancy is an oft-trod subject in fantasy novels, the author gives it a fresh feel—in large part because of their superb worldbuilding coupled with unforgettable imagery throughout: “[The necromancer] lay reclined upon a throne of bodies. Necrothralls, contorted and twisted together, their limbs transmuted and fused into a chair, moving in synchrony, rising and falling as they breathed in tandem, squeezing and releasing around him…[He] extended his decrepit right hand, overlarge with fingers jointed like spider legs.” Another noteworthy element is the complex dynamic between Helena and Kaine. To say that these two characters shared the gamut of intense emotions would be a vast understatement. Readers will come for the fantasy and stay for the romance.
Although the melodrama sometimes is a bit much, the superb worldbuilding and intricate plotline make this a must-read.Pub Date: Sept. 23, 2025
ISBN: 9780593972700
Page Count: 1040
Publisher: Del Rey
Review Posted Online: July 17, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
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