Item: A Marvellous Light
Rating: 3.00
Author: marciemarie

by Freya Marske

Robin Blyth has more than enough bother in his life. He’s struggling to be a good older brother, a responsible employer, and the harried baronet of a seat gutted by his late parents’ excesses. When an administrative mistake sees him named the civil service liaison to a hidden magical society, he discovers what’s been operating beneath the unextraordinary reality he’s always known.

Now Robin must contend with the beauty and danger of magic, an excruciating deadly curse, and the alarming visions of the future that come with it―not to mention Edwin Courcey, his cold and prickly counterpart in the magical bureaucracy, who clearly wishes Robin were anyone and anywhere else.

Robin’s predecessor has disappeared, and the mystery of what happened to him reveals unsettling truths about the very oldest stories they’ve been told about the land they live on and what binds it. Thrown together and facing unexpected dangers, Robin and Edwin discover a plot that threatens every magician in the British Isles―and a secret that more than one person has already died to keep.

I really, really wanted to love this book, and I debated for a couple of days on what to rate this book. I settled on a 3 because when compared to other books I've read this year, it just comes in somewhere below 4 in terms of my enjoyment. My big ding to the rating is that I didn't fully buy the chemistry between our love interests, and their romance moved a little faster than my own preference. Ultimately this meant it was missing a level of tension that would keep my attention. But was it a super fun book? absolutely! It was magical and lighthearted, and a bit of a palate cleanser between heavier reads. I liked it enough though that I will probably pick up the sequel when I need something else light and refreshing!

A Marvellous Light (Last Binding, #1)

by Freya Marske

Reviewed by marciemarie on Dec 29, 2021

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