Book Review

Book Review

The Witch and the Vampire by Francesca Flores

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The Witch and the Vampire by Francesca Flores is a young adult, queer Rapunzel retelling set in a fantasy world where witches and vampires coexist. The novel follows Ava and Kaye, who used to be best friends until the fateful night when Kaye’s mother was murdered and Ava was turned into a vampire against her will. Struggling to overcome their own personal traumas, their relationship is tested when they must put aside their differences to confront a looming threat against their community. With its blend of romance, adventure, and suspense, this novel delves into a supernatural realm of magic made thorny by the prickly complexities of family loyalties.

Book cover for The Witch and the Vampire by Francesca Flores.

I can’t accept it as coincidence that Ava disappeared that same day, and I saw her with blood on her chin a few days later.

Francesca Flores, The Witch and the Vampire

While the premise is compelling, the pacing and worldbuilding is where this novel falls short. The story feels rushed and formulaic at times, with pivotal events unfolding too quickly, and plot twists being entirely too predictable. The combining of vampire and witch lore was initially intriguing, but I was constantly confused as to why only Ava was a vampire who retained her witch powers. Her mother keeps it a secret to use for her own benefit, but it’s never quite clear if Ava’s an anomaly, or if it’s common knowledge that she would have retained her powers due to how she was turned into a vampire.

I often found myself craving more details, especially when it came to why vampires and witches hate each other. I was looking for nuanced conversations or metaphors about the racial and species prejudices in this world, but all I got was a “fantasy” where those prejudices just get to exist without question. For instance, Kaye, who was told her mother was murdered by a vampire but has no other evidence to prove it, sees her best friend Ava in a tower with blood on her face a few days later and somehow decides Ava did it. She…allegedly murdered her best friend’s mother and just didn’t wash her face for days. And that’s all it takes to rewire Kaye’s entire personality. Uh…what? Make it make sense!

And speaking of Ava’s mother — the woman murders her own daughter and turns her into a vampire against her will, keeps her imprisoned, siphons off her power, and emotionally manipulates her. All that sounds incredibly traumatizing, especially since Ava makes the brave decision to run away and rescue herself from this life; however, Flores’ treatment of this storyline is flippant. It’s simply a passing detail, and is yet another aspect of the novel that I really would have liked to see fleshed out. What was her mother’s motive? Were there no warning signs for the first sixteen years of Ava’s life?

Had she stared at the same moon those long nights and wished to be with me too?

Francesca Flores, The Witch and the Vampire

On a positive note, I enjoyed Flores’ accessible writing, and particularly the beautiful prose as Ava and Kaye pine for one another. Whether it be for their lost friendship or their budding romance, it’s easy for readers to relate to the yearning and inner turmoil each girl experiences. Flores excels at illustrating this sapphic romance, and I especially enjoyed the parts in the first half of the book when the girls travel through the forest and skirt around each other after two years apart. However, I constantly had trouble telling Ava and Kaye apart! Maybe it’s just me, but I felt their personalities and voices often blended together, and the girls lacked the depth needed to truly resonate as fully developed characters.

The Witch and the Vampire is a one-dimensional, predictable sapphic romance, and the worldbuilding and pacing leaves much to be desired. I really wanted to love this book, but it was a letdown in almost every way. So much potential was left on the table, and the Rapunzel foundation of this retelling is almost an afterthought! (Honestly, it seems more like a Tangled retelling, though just barely.) A standalone novel simply doesn’t have the room Flores required to successfully weave the rich tapestry of the world she created. The potential for something truly immersive and captivating is there, but the execution simply is not.

Thank you to NetGalley and Wednesday Books for sharing an advanced reader copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Book Review

Keya Das’s Second Act by Sopan Deb

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Keya Das’s Second Act by Sopan Deb is a poignant novel about grief and forgiveness that follows a Bengali American family reeling from the sudden loss of their daughter and sister, titular character Keya Das. Each member of the family regrets not being more supportive when Keya came out, and now it’s too late to do anything about it…or is it? The novel picks up when Shantanu, Keya’s father, discovers a box containing a play Keya was writing with her girlfriend. It briefly brings Keya back to life for them, so her family embarks on a mission to stage the play to honor her memory and make amends.

Book cover for Keya Das's Second Act by Sopan Deb.

Rejection is often a much more powerful emotion than acceptance.

Sopan Deb, Keya Das’s Second Act

With loss of a child and implied homophobia at the forefront of this novel, this is an emotional read. Grief impacts different people in different ways, and that makes Deb’s cast of characters even more important as they are vehicles through which readers can experience the central themes in this story. Following Keya’s death, Shantanu isolates himself from his family, his wife Chaitali tries to move forward with her own life, and their eldest daughter Mitali tries to distance herself from her sorrow — all very relatable coping mechanisms. But because their journeys are so disparate, it’s a little challenging to keep up with the various side characters that help to bring the family back together. None of them are developed enough, which sometimes makes their heavy influence on our key characters a little difficult to understand. The ultimate message is to encourage leaning on community to help assuage and process the big feelings that occur during times of grief, but the poignancy of that takeaway sometimes gets lost in Deb’s delivery.

I particularly enjoyed the Bengali words interspersed throughout otherwise English language sentences. As a Bengali American who grew up in a bilingual household within a diaspora community, that is exactly how we speak! I’ve seen criticism about the lack of a glossary or sufficient context clues to decode the meaning of select Bengali phrases in other reviews for this novel; however, I like to view this creative choice as a postcolonial resistance to the residual effects of Orientalist policies that defined English as the medium of instruction and the language of knowledge itself. Deb’s language choice — his refusal to translate, sanitize, or suppress the story he wanted to elevate — empowers him to seize back control of how he defines himself in a postcolonial reality still very much influenced by the lingering aftereffects of imperialism.

But more than anything, they each blamed themselves. In their own ways, they had made Keya feel unseen.

Sopan Deb, Keya Das’s Second Act

The one thing I really struggled with in this novel was lack of LGBTQ+ representation. Yes, Keya is gay, but her identity felt like a plot device for characters who didn’t want to accept her sexuality when she was still alive. They took her manuscript, interpreted it for the stage as they saw fit, and essentially used it for their own devices. For lack of a better term, the allyship after the fact felt performative. I realize with a tragedy like this, catharsis just might be the best we can hope to achieve since it’s too late to apologize to Keya or treat her the way she deserved. Still, I expected to see more positive and normalized representation. Keya’s lack of voice in this aspect of the novel has me going back and forth with classifying this novel within the LGBTQ+ category.

For all the heavy themes that form the foundation of this novel, it is surprisingly heartwarming and hopeful. Keya Das’s Second Act begins with characters weighed down by grief, regret, and trauma, and Deb navigates them through a healing journey that leaves them in a better place. This novel reminds readers it isn’t too late for us to take the time to listen and carefully consider how our actions affect the people in our lives. And even if it is too late — like it was for Keya — her family demonstrates it’s never too late to learn and grow from mistakes.

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for sharing an advanced reader copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Book Review

A Show for Two by Tashie Bhuiyan

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A Show for Two by Tashie Bhuiyan is a young adult contemporary romance about aspiring screenwriter Mina Rahman, whose deepest desire is to win the Golden Ivy student film competition that will all but guarantee her a way out of New York City. So when indie film star Emmitt Ramos enrolls at her school under a secret identity to research a role, Mina does whatever she can to have him star in her film. Emmitt is game — so long as she serves as his tour guide in the city. Inspired by Bhuiyan’s real-life experiences when Tom Holland enrolled at her school under similar circumstances, this long-awaited novel doesn’t disappoint!

Book cover for A Show for Two by Tashie Bhuiyan.

I feel such a disconnect from my identity. Sometimes I feel like I’m not Bangladeshi or Muslim enough because there’s so much I don’t know — being diaspora is a huge part of that.

Tashie Bhuiyan, A Show for Two

Much like Bhuiyan’s debut, Counting Down with You, this novel features a Bangladeshi-American protagonist grappling with relatable and decidedly American coming-of-age milestones involving friends, love lives, and decisions about the future. Mina’s South Asian parents have worked hard to provide her with a plethora of wonderful opportunities, but Mina’s ambitions simply don’t align with her parents’ expectations. It results in a deeply fraught relationship with her parents, and watching Mina (and her younger sister) struggle with it was both distressing and cathartic for me. Growing up in a diaspora community presents so many unique challenges that mainstream media absolutely fails to address at this time, so it was incredibly validating to read about a character with complicated, messy feelings that also fail to align with most depictions of young adult stories but are no less valid.

As much as this novel is about Mina and Emmitt falling for each other, I would argue the true romance is between Mina and New York City. She’s desperate to get away from the familial conflict and generational trauma she deals with on a daily basis, so she incorrectly holds her beloved city — “the city that loved me, even when I didn’t love it” — responsible for her grief. But seeing the five boroughs through Emmitt’s eyes reminds her how New York City has helped to nurture and grow her when other influences in her life have failed to measure up.

There are so many of us drowning in plain sight, and so little the rest of us can do to help.

Tashie Bhuiyan, A Show for Two

My favorite aspect of this novel is how Mina’s forced to grapple with the fact that her experiences aren’t the same as her immigrant parents’, and they really aren’t comparable to her friends’ either. Her relationship fumbles are especially frustrating for readers due to her struggle to choose a side, so to speak. She isn’t American enough, nor is she Bangladeshi enough, and she feels judgement from both sides for attempting to walk the hazy line blurring the two defining cultures in her life. However, she leads a hybrid existence created where two cultures converged to form something new, and — as she slowly learns — something uniquely hers. Once she accepts that as her power, she’s able to redefine her dreams in relation to her own hopes and values. It liberates her from many perceived familial and societal expectations that confine her character growth for much of the novel.

I also enjoyed watching Mina and Emmitt be passionate about their artistic pursuits, and I appreciated that Bhuiyan placed value in the arts as both hobby and career — a distinction often mistakenly presented as a dichotomy.

Home doesn’t have to be with your parents. Home can be your friends, your sister, this city. Home can be yourself. Don’t you get it? Home is where you find love.

Tashie Bhuiyan, A Show for Two

Initially, it was difficult for me to like Mina, but upon reflection, I think it’s because I saw way too much of my own teenage self in her! Counting Down with You is much easier to read because it takes place while Katrina’s parents are out of the country. It’s a monthlong, borderline fantasy experience that is as charming and light as it is largely because Katrina deals with familial and cultural issues through internal monologues instead of difficult conversations and experiences with her own family in real-time. And that’s really what makes A Show for Two such a beautiful journey of self-discovery. It validates the most challenging experiences and allows us to watch Mina find beauty and power in her own circumstances.

A Show for Two is a heartwarming and bittersweet read that represents a unique perspective on familiar growing pains. It will soothe your inner child and remind you to be proud of the experiences that have helped to shape you into the person you are today.

Thank you to NetGalley and Inkyard Press for sharing an advanced reader copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Book Review

Among Thieves by M. J. Kuhn

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Among Thieves by M. J. Kuhn is a high fantasy adventure featuring a merry band of queer misfits who must work together to pull off an impossible heist. Sounds manageable enough…unless they’re all scheming to double-cross each other the entire time. Brought together by a common enemy — the Guildmaster who rules over the five kingdoms of Thamorr — Ryia Cuatella and this plucky group of outsiders must carefully tread the line that glimmers between monster and menace to dismantle an oppressive magical system that could change life as they know it.

Book cover for Among Thieves by M. J. Kuhn.

Long after gold had lost its charm and men no longer had a taste for bread and wine, words would still hold their value.

M. J. Kuhn, Among Thieves

From the summary, I expected Among Thieves to focus solely on Ryia, but each chapter is told from a different character’s point-of-view. Ryia, Evelyn, Nash, Ivan, and Tristan all come with their own motives and backstories, so initially, it was difficult to understand who we’re supposed to be rooting for. I kept muddling through chapters that weren’t about Ryia because I was waiting to return to the story and character that initially sparked my interest. Fortunately, I was able to appreciate the storytelling format as I got further into the heist plot, but the alternating chapters meant it took a long time to get my bearings.

Kuhn’s ability to develop characters and personalities that can blend well together and stand apart is the driving force behind this novel. It’s a delight to witness this ensemble cast transition from enemies to reluctant allies to something like friends. There are so many comforting found family moments balanced by thrilling fights and blindsides that make for a gripping story that isn’t too easy to predict. Character foils Ryia and Evelyn are my favorites, but I have to admit I have a soft spot for Tristan, too!

Magic was something to be feared, not bought and chained.

M. J. Kuhn, Among Thieves

Among Thieves is full of twists and turns and doesn’t read like a typical debut. Kuhn’s worldbuilding is impressive, full of intricate details that make for a memorable romp in this high fantasy world. I love a good anti-hero story, but the one thing that’s a bit of a speed bump with this one is it’s challenging to keep up with a plot that’s constantly stretching in at least five different directions. Still, the suspense ramps up as the novel progresses, and that ending is going to leave you begging for the sequel!

Thank you to NetGalley and Gallery Books/Saga Press for sharing an advanced reader copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Book Review

The Maid by Nita Prose

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The Maid by Nita Prose is a cozy mystery told from the perspective of Molly Gray, a hotel maid whose steady, routine life is turned upside-down after she discovers a dead guest in one of the rooms she cleans. Molly, an autistic-coded character who struggles to read social cues, facial expressions, and anything that isn’t meant to be taken literally, quickly becomes the prime suspect for the murder after a series of misunderstandings. With help from a cast of eccentric characters and charming proverbs from her recently deceased grandmother, it’s up to Molly to clear her name and clean up the hotel before it’s too late.

Book cover for The Maid by Nita Prose.

Most guests avoid touching maids, especially our hands. They associate us with other people’s grime—never their own.

Nita Prose, The Maid

Prose’s writing style brings a refreshing levity to heavy themes, and that easily makes The Maid one of my favorite new reads this year in particular. Molly is lonely and grieving—two emotions many of us have surely experienced in varying levels over the past year—but her voice is so genuine, too. You want to root for her because she’s just trying her best to be a good person and find joy where she can (even if it’s in cleaning up messes!), just like the rest of us.

The Maid also features an impressive array of characters: half are blatantly devious, and they cast just enough suspicion on the rest of the quirky bunch to really challenge readers, no matter who they might suspect committed the murder. And because Molly takes everyone she meets at face value while readers are compelled to dig beneath the surface, every interaction she has is twice as tricky to decipher. All I’ll say is every one of my guesses ended up not even close to correct. But that’s okay. The guessing is part of the fun!

However…the murder mystery actually isn’t the best part of this novel. It’s Molly! She is a wonderfully nuanced character, and I absolutely adore her. Molly sees the world differently than most people, and while it affects her daily life, it doesn’t stop her from functioning and isn’t her only defining quality. She evokes concern but is never pitied. She’s sweet, thoughtful, compassionate, and absolutely hilarious; she makes mistakes, gets angry, and is held accountable for her actions. If you enjoyed Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman, come get your food! You’re going to love this novel, too.

Everything will be okay in the end. If it’s not okay, it’s not the end.

Nita Prose, The Maid

Being seen is the most tender form of love, and by giving us a character like Molly who is so original and relatable, Prose calls out to those of us who might also feel invisible in certain aspects of our lives, who yearn to be seen. The Maid is a brilliant debut that reminds us it’s cool to be earnest, to take pride in a job well done, to love family and friends, and to live a good life—no matter how big or small. This is a must-read!

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing/Ballantine Books for sharing an advanced reader copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.