Magic for Liars

by Sarah Gailey

[ibeforem]

Ivy Gamble is a private investigator. Normally she spends a lot of time following around cheating spouses, so when a well-dressed woman appears in her office and offers her a chance to work on a murder case, it's tough to refuse. But there's another wrinkle -- the possible murder happened at a school for magically-inclined children where Ivy's very magical twin sister Tabatha is a teacher. Ivy isn't magical at all, something which has come between the two sisters over the years.

Unable to pass up the challenge of the job and what it could do for her business, Ivy finds herself ensconced at the exclusive school, not really sharing with others that she doesn't have magic and feeling very imposter-syndromy about the whole thing.

I don't want to share much about the mystery itself, because it's very twisty-turny and did not go in the direction I expected it to, which I really appreciated. Ivy is an interesting character. She is far from perfect, very insecure about her background and lack of magic, and in danger of getting sucked a little too deep into the mystery. I also liked the dynamic between Ivy and her sister and their struggle to heal their relationship.

As far as I can tell, this is a stand-alone novel, but I would be up to reading about Ivy solving more magical mysteries.