The book is pretty average. It kept me hooked enough to finish the book, but not enough for me to want to read it again. I do want to read the second book just out of curiosity. Wyatt, the main character, is pretty bland. It feels like his only depth is being trans and being mean. I did however enjoy a lot of the side characters such as Emyr, briar, and jin. Emyr had a lot of depth to his character and was very interesting to read about. The world-building was okay at best, a lot of the lore was brought up a few times then almost never talked about again or explained. The plot point of fascism and racism was a little strange at times but I am definitely not the person to speak on that. The LGBTQ representation at some points seemed a little bit forced or over-explained, rather than something that's brought up once and flows naturally with the story, sometimes the story took a little too long explaining that these people are how they are. However, I did really enjoy the way that some of the relationships were written, like Solomons. Overall the book was okay and I would recommend reading it if you're looking for something like this.

It took a little while for me to get into the worldbuilding. The Fae stuff didn't include things I'm used to and the Witch stuff didn't do what I thought it would (I thought it'd be like witches can only be women but aHa trans witch), but in the end I got on board with it.

The relationship Wyatt has with Briar is queerplatonic, which should be a big yay from me, but most of the time it felt like Briar was Wyatt's crutch. I'm glad the story addresses this, but it's still a bit tedious to go through.

I like the chemistry between Wyatt and Emyr. Part of me wishes Emyr had a bit more personality to him because there's not enough show of why he and Wyatt are compatible with their personalities.

There's also the ending that bugged me. There's an entire moustache-twirling villain monologue style thing where the grand plan has to be verbally spelled out to everyone in the room, which conveniently includes *everyone* important in that room.

But, like, I adore Wyatt as a character, and he did a great job carrying the story without making it drag.

I felt a bit so-so on this book but have absolutely no doubt that it'll be a treasure for the target audience. Many teens, especially LGBTQ teens and teens who love magic and excitablr queer culture will probably love this. I liked the fantasy setting, the characters, and the LGBTQ representation in this story. Several things about this book didn't work for me because they felt too forced to be an organic element. My top complaint was how forced the Facebook and cellphone stuff felt. It seemed like a cool concept that just needed a little more kneeding before it was fully mixed in. 

📘The Gist 📘: Wyatt ran from the Fae world and his betrothed prince following a cataclysmic, traumatic event. When the prince comes to drag him back, Wyatt finds himself facing the same anti-witch discrimination and new transohobia as he fights to return home. 

📒Representation📒: trans mc, mlm, wlw sc, nonbinary sc, bipoc mc and sc, native American mc

💕 For readers looking for 💕: Complex characters, evolving relationships, friends to lovers to enemies to...?, Magic, fantasy exploring real-world discrimination, moody protagonist

I would die for Wyatt and Emyr and Briar and the gang, OK? The characters really did it for me in this one. It dragged a bit at the beginning, but the last 2/3 were super intriguing and fun. Plus the rep was just everything. Give me a fat, bi, ace, Indigenous queen any day!!!! 😭😭😭 

 This was a surprising read! Just amazing and I loved it. 

An interesting book! I think Edgmon is still finding their feet as an author but it's a decent story.

pros:
- there's a lot of description, which does really help with imagining the characters, the setting and visualising the scene, making it vivid. (The beautiful art on the front also really helped).
- although there was perhaps a bit much, I did like how Edgmon included Wyatt's strong sexual attraction to Emyr was brought up repeatedly and centralised. It didn't skirt around the physical side of Wyatt's attraction and that was neat.
- Wyatt's friendship and closeness with Briar was nice.
- the setting of Asalin, with the dragons, Boom the hellhound, the magic, was all pretty cool.
- and of course, the diversity of characters was excellent.
- oh and I liked Wyatt's backstory; that was original and dark and cool.
- i appreciated also that Wyatt's deadname was never given. I thought at one point that it had and was gutted, but no. It makes sense a trans author would get this but I was glad all the same.
- oh and I appreciated how Wyatt wearing a binder and his feelings about his body were described and handled. The issue wasn't dealt with too heavy-handedly but it got the point across and that was cool.

cons:
- somehow the book didn't *quite* work. It was disjointed, a bit slow, a bit amateurish. The plot didn't come together neatly enough, with some plot points coming out of nowhere

like Clarke orchestrating things

whilst the other main reveal, I guessed from like, page 10 or whatever

that faery was inhabitable and Leonidas had lied

- I'm not sure if there's due to be a sequel (there's no mention of one) but it feels unfinished and the ending a bit rushed.
- the plot was also just a bit weak.

I didn't understand why Wyatt agreed to help Derek in the first place (though him influencing Wyatt does explain it a bit) and then none of Wyatt's attempts to 'get thrown out' work at all, even slightly. The whole thing seemed a bit weak and yet that was what Wyatt was meant to be doing for most of the middle of the book. The riot came out of nowhere and didn't seem well integrated... idk I can't articulate it exactly, but there wasn't enough tension. The stakes weren't clear and it all seemed like a lot of Wyatt monologuing until I got a bit fed up with him.
- then there was Wyatt's character development, which wasn't too bad, but it wasn't the best either. Somehow, he didn't seem to really connect deeply with Emyr. I got the sexual tension between them, but why Emyr put up with Wyatt's shit so much, I didn't really get. Also, Emyr forcing Wyatt to come to Asalin at the start was pretty out of character compared to how he was in the rest of the book.
- OH, so this is more of a personal thing, but Wyatt was grateful several times for Wyatt getting his pronouns right, even when talking abt a past story and,, I think this should be taken for granted?? I don't know, I understand that people can mess up, but in an ideal world, everyone would get the right pronouns and that wouldn't need to be appreciated i guess is what I'm saying.
- finally, I thought a lot of uh,, message? political stuff? was too on the nose. I understood the link between the guards' brutality and police brutality, about witch discrimination and queer people's discrimination, etc. just fine without it literally being spelled out on the page and I thought Edgmon could've given the reader more space there, rather than assuming the reader had exactly zero critical thinking skills. Maybe a me thing though.

Overall, I did enjoy it. I feel like Edgmon has some growing to do as a writer, but they have a lot of potential and I loved the descriptions. I would compare this book to Out of Salem in themes and tone, but I would say that I think Out of Salem did it better overall, with more originality, better writing and more engaging characters. But this was still a worthwhile read. It's always good to see more lgbt writers and stories being told and this definitely felt like a very contemporary, 'right now' story.

I understood the concept of book boyfriends because of this book. it was the perfect relaxing fantasy queer read and I can't wait for the sequel.