Artistry and Craft
I went into this book without reading the excerpt at the back. I trusted Heather Fawcett’s writing and her ability to weave a world together from reading her past series, Emily Wilde’s Encyclopedia of Faeries, and absolutely loved it. In hindsight, I realize now this was a mistake, as one of my main critiques for artistry and craft is how difficult it is to follow at first. In my mind, there was no indication of any other time period except for the present, and it was only about a third of the way through the book, when I was almost tempted to put it down, that I realized it was set in the nineteen sixties, and that’s why everything felt a bit off.
I also should mention that it was hard to follow at first because of the way it was written. The prose is much less attractive than in her previous series, and I find it a bit awkward at times. There are large, overly complicated words right in the middle of average writing, which makes it feel blocky and put together just for the sake of seeming more intellectual.
Also, I wasn’t a huge fan of the food descriptions. As this book is a cozy fantasy, it’s almost to be expected at this point that food descriptions, especially bread and similar items, are a staple of the genre. But it felt just like that: tropey, predictable, and boring.
I felt like the magic system was pretty cool, and I wish that the author had focused a little bit more on it. It was already pretty extensive for a single standalone book. The magic system added to the charm of the book and was very imaginative.
I felt like the characters were unique in some ways, but also flat in others, though it wasn’t too noticeable.
Themes and Messages
A large theme is, aptly, second chances. The main character is the sole operator of a cat charity, naturally giving the feel of the book one about altruism, especially because it’s a cat shelter in the 1960s, an altruistic endeavour that maybe not a whole lot of other people believe in.
She also believes that most of the time, people will do the right thing, or at least want to do the right thing, only failing when their weakness wins out over their convictions. She takes care of others even when others don’t see the reason why she’d want to, or what benefit taking care of others brings, and believes that people should be given second chances. This was probably my favourite aspect of the book. It was unique in the way that it provided opportunities for readers to reflect on second chances, both romantically and morally, as well as situationally across several characters.
That being said, I think this book captures the emptiness of and limits of human forgiveness. When someone wrongs us, it is natural for us to feel angry about it, but as Christians, we are called to pursue forgiveness of grievances that we commit as well as those that have been committed against us, even if that takes time. Agnes is a character who is willing to give second chances to others when they haven’t personally wronged her, but when they wrong her, all of a sudden, second chances become something that isn't even in question. So, redemption comes by means of dissociation and not necessarily true forgiveness or second chances. This, of course, may have been resolved in the last number of pages of the book I didn't read, but still, it is something I noticed.
Another large theme is grief. The theme of grief is explored in the characters' personal struggles and experiences over loss, loss because of death, loss because of estrangement or conflict. Because of this, the characters have to grapple with how to live with grief, the daily struggles and the particular mourning that attends the grief that comes with it.
Final Thoughts
I appreciate and admire how ambitious the author was by taking on a book set in the 1960s, and I feel like my experience with the book would have been a lot different if I had known. Going into the book completely blind made it a very confusing read that I found extremely difficult to get through, and I ended up DNFing at around page 395, almost near the very end, but I couldn’t stand the feeling of wasting my time by completing it, even though I was so close.
I really wanted to say that I loved this book because I loved Heather Fawcett’s previous book series, but I can't unfortunately.
Content Discretion:
Magic, death from heart disease, deception, poverty, grief, and estrangement.
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