I received an e-ARC of this book from NetGalley in return for an honest review.
The world building in this one was interesting and the magic system was reminiscent of Mistborn without being a direct copy of it. There are different types of magic people can become imbued with, which give them extra abilities, and there are different levels within the categories that signal how rare an ability is. The magic comes from an aurora like wind (or two) that 'selects' people for skills, so not everyone gets one.
There's a lot of world building going on, which gets a little bit repetitive at times, but the character development is decent although perhaps a touch on the rushed side. There are a lot of point of view characters, and some of the scenes could probably have been cut without too much of the story being lost. Don't get me wrong, I liked Thom and all, but a lot of his scenes felt a little bit like scenes the author wanted to write to get them out of his head; the lore behind him is decent but kind of secondary to the main plot. Like a whole other book could have been written about him and his journey and I would have read that as well; having finished this book it feels a little bit like Thom was written into a corner and Fenne's plot overtook it. With good reason, since once you get past all the world building it's a pretty good book, with a solid finish. Will be looking out for the sequel, assuming that there is one.
4 out of 5 stars
