enne📚 reviewed Dark and Drowning Tide by Allison Saft
Dark and Drowning Tide
5 stars
This fantasy novel has a fun blend of politics, murder mystery, and rivals-to-lovers romance.
Lorelei Kaskel is picked to lead a small expedition to find the Urspring, source of all magical power, for King Wilhelm to unify his fragile empire. On her team is her infuriating academic rival Sylvia von Wolff. Once on the boat, Lorelei's mentor is murdered, and Lorelei has to work with Sylvia to continue to the expedition and find the murderer.
The dynamics of enemies-to-lovers don't always work for me, but somehow this one was a lot of fun! I felt like there was a lot of nuance around class and power dynamics, around misunderstandings, and around the tension of Lorelei not wanting to abandon her culture any more than she already had. This romance was as bumpy of a ride as you'd expect, but that bumpiness didn't feel artificial--it revealed characterization or heightens the mystery …
This fantasy novel has a fun blend of politics, murder mystery, and rivals-to-lovers romance.
Lorelei Kaskel is picked to lead a small expedition to find the Urspring, source of all magical power, for King Wilhelm to unify his fragile empire. On her team is her infuriating academic rival Sylvia von Wolff. Once on the boat, Lorelei's mentor is murdered, and Lorelei has to work with Sylvia to continue to the expedition and find the murderer.
The dynamics of enemies-to-lovers don't always work for me, but somehow this one was a lot of fun! I felt like there was a lot of nuance around class and power dynamics, around misunderstandings, and around the tension of Lorelei not wanting to abandon her culture any more than she already had. This romance was as bumpy of a ride as you'd expect, but that bumpiness didn't feel artificial--it revealed characterization or heightens the mystery and politics. The ending of the book felt a little anticlimactic, but even so I found it satisfying in the way that it realistically addressed the needs of all the characters.