This is the second in a series but it stood pretty well on its own. Anne has just found out her younger sister is dead. Anne has spent her life denying the existence of magic while her sister studied at a magic college. Just before her death, she sent Anne some articles of magic that she crafted in the hope that it would convince Anne of the existence of magic. Before Anne can deal with her grief or understand the gifts, she is visited by the man she hates most in the world – Duplais, the man who prosecuted her father for performing the most heinous acts of black magic. He has come at the King’s behest to bring Anne to court in order to find a suitable match for her. And that’s when the weird stuff starts happening.
The biggest problem I had was Anne’s complete belief that her father was guilty even though he had spent his life debunking magic and believing in science. She spends most of the book hating his betrayal and lies while trying not to think of the events that gave lie to the charges. Life at court is extremely confusing – she is made to comply with the orders of Duplais, and the psychotic mother-in-law of the Queen, and is terrorized by the mysterious and frightening mage, Dante. All around her is chaos as some unknown sorcerer is attempting to overthrow the natural order of life. So the big question of the story is – who is the mysterious sorcerer? Could it be her father? Dante? Duplais? And, of course, it falls to Anne to stop him and save the world.
Anne has opportunity to prove to herself that she does, indeed, have magical talents as she manages to save the Queen on more than one occasion. She continues to deny it, even to herself. But when she finally has reason to use one of her sister’s gifts she can no longer fool herself – there is real magic in the world. Even then she doesn’t want to believe it could exist in her…right up until she discovers she can hear others’ thoughts and can actually communicate with one special mind. This prompts the next big question – who is her secret friend?
It was a very engaging novel. The plotting was a complex and a trifle over-complicated. The characters were great. While I wanted to shake Anne, I did like her a lot. I would have liked a deeper understanding of some of the other characters but we only saw what Anne saw. I liked it enough that I will definitely read more from this author. ~~ Catherine Book
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