The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo Published by Flatiron Books on April 9 2024
Genres: Fantasy, Historical Fiction
Pages: 384
Format: eBook
Goodreads
In a shabby house, on a shabby street, in the new capital of Madrid, Luzia Cotado uses scraps of magic to get through her days of endless toil as a scullion. But when her scheming mistress discovers the lump of a servant cowering in the kitchen is actually hiding a talent for little miracles, she demands Luzia use those gifts to better the family's social position.
What begins as simple amusement for the bored nobility takes a perilous turn when Luzia garners the notice of Antonio Pérez, the disgraced secretary to Spain's king. Still reeling from the defeat of his armada, the king is desperate for any advantage in the war against England's heretic queen—and Pérez will stop at nothing to regain the king's favor.
Determined to seize this one chance to better her fortunes, Luzia plunges into a world of seers and alchemists, holy men and hucksters, where the line between magic, science, and fraud is never certain. But as her notoriety grows, so does the danger that her Jewish blood will doom her to the Inquisition's wrath. She will have to use every bit of her wit and will to survive—even if that means enlisting the help of Guillén Santangel, an embittered immortal familiar whose own secrets could prove deadly for them both.
A long long time ago, I read Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo. It was one of my first forays into YA fiction and I believe I enjoyed it. But I never got into the rest of the books in the series and even though, I would see the Grisha series and other Leigh Bardugo books pop up on social media and in my local bookstores, I was never inclined to pick up these books and read them.
Until now.
The moment I saw the cover of this book and read its synopsis, it had me. The story is set in Spain during a historical period that I know nothing about – and this intrigued me. Combining that with fantasy elements and a theme about religious persecution and discrimination, well, how could I resist?
I read this book on Fable as part of a book club (my first one ever!) and I’m so eager to share my thoughts before I forget them entirely.
My Review:
I really wanted to love this book, and there were moments when I felt like I would. But by the time I finished the story, I felt more apathetic and indifferent than anything else.
Let’s start with what I liked:
The setting was depicted very well. Bardugo really takes her time to explain the political and cultural climate during this time period in a way that doesn’t bog down readers. I loved the immersive feel of the historical setting and this was a great time period that was chosen.
With the characters, I really went through a major shift in how I felt about them. Initially, I didn’t like a single character – especially Luzia, our protagonist. I was irritated by her lack of foresight and her greediness. Valentina also annoyed me with her selfishness and her cruelty. Hualit was another character I didn’t like because of her indifference and manipulative nature towards Luzia. But as the novel continued, the characters evolved along with their circumstances and my opinions changed. I started to understand Luzia and respect Valentina, especially as they continued to interact with each other. This was one of my favourite things about how this novel was written, so well done to Bardugo!
Having said that, as much as I appreciated the way Bardugo developed her characters, I didn’t truly care about them and what was happening. Nothing was driving me as the reader to become invested in the story. Although there were moments where I felt saddened over what was happening, they were fleeting and I moved on quickly enough.
The plot and pacing were two major elements that suffered in this book. The synopsis made the story seem far more high-stakes than how it actually turned out. I mean, you had this whole threat of an Inquisition looming over the head of our main character and yet, there was no tension at all in the story. In addition, the story plodded along quite slowly with abrupt action scenes that ended just as quickly as they were introduced; there was no time to process what had happened. Vague descriptions of the magic system and an overwhelming focus on a lackluster romance made it even more difficult for me to be invested.
Also, that ending just didn’t give me any true satisfaction. I did like the resolution for each character but the way it was told to the readers and the lack of clarity on how some things occurred really bothered me and left me disappointed.
Overall, I felt underwhelmed. This isn’t a terrible story by any means. I enjoyed moments of it. But it wasn’t remarkable or special. I certainly won’t be gushing about it and recommending it – it just didn’t have that impact. For those reasons, I’m giving it a 2.5/5 stars.
Happy reading
