Review – Spells for Forgetting by Adrienne Young (3.5/5 stars)
Reading Level: Adult
Genre: Magical Realism
Length: 351 pages
Publisher: Dell
Release Date: September 27, 2022
ASIN: B09KXHWTFR
Stand Alone or Series: Stand Alone
Source: Borrowed ebook from Library
Rating: 3.5/5 stars
“Emery Blackwood’s life changed forever the night her best friend was found dead and the love of her life, August Salt, was accused of murdering her. Years later, she is doing what her teenage self swore she never would: living a quiet existence on the misty, remote shores of Saoirse Island and running the family’s business, Blackwood’s Tea Shoppe Herbal Tonics & Tea Leaf Readings. But when the island, rooted in folklore and magic, begins to show signs of strange happenings, Emery knows that something is coming. The morning she wakes to find that every single tree on Saoirse has turned color in a single night, August returns for the first time in fourteen years and unearths the past that the town has tried desperately to forget.
August knows he is not welcome on Saiorse, not after the night everything changed. As a fire raged on at the Salt family orchard, Lily Morgan was found dead in the dark woods, shaking the bedrock of their tight-knit community and branding August a murderer. When he returns to bury his mother’s ashes, he must confront the people who turned their backs on him and face the one wound from his past that has never healed—Emery. But the town has more than one reason to want August gone, and the emergence of deep betrayals and hidden promises spanning generations threaten to reveal the truth behind Lily’s mysterious death once and for all..”
Series Info/Source: This is a stand alone book. I borrowed a copy of this on ebook from the library.
Thoughts: I am a big Adrienne Young fan. I really loved her “Fable” series and her “Sky and Sea” series. I wasn’t a huge fan of her stand alone book “The Last Legacy”. I also did not enjoy “Spells for Forgetting” nearly as much as her previous books. It was very slow.
The story goes back and forth between Emery and August. August Salt left the island of Saoirse as a teen after some mysterious events happened. Emery stayed on the island and took over her mother’s tea shop. Saoirse Island is dependent on the yearly tourist traffic to its orchards but also has some dark secrets. August is forced to return to the island when his mother passes away (his mother has requested to be buried on the island). August’s return has Emery questioning events in her past. The arrival of August on the island also seems to bring focus back to some events that happened when Emery and August were teens around an orchard fire and the death of one of their friends.
This story was really slow. I enjoyed the atmospheric island and the idea of the island itself having secrets. At times there is a bit of magical realism feel to the story, some witchcraft and things like that and those parts were decently done. However, this story is more of a murder mystery than anything else and it just takes forever to get going. The question of what really happened during a pivotal night on the island does propel the story forward some but the whole thing felt a bit thin to me.
The characters are somewhat intriguing and the island is full of a bunch of quirky characters; however, you don’t spend much time with anyone aside from August and Emery and they feel distant from the reader. There were some unexpected twists and turns but I found them anti-climatic. I thought the ending was a bit abrupt and did appreciate the prologue so we could see where the characters ended up, but even the prologue felt forced, with a twist that had me rolling my eyes.
My Summary (3/5): Overall this was definitely not my favorite Young book, I think it was one of her weakest. Part of this is most likely because I expected more of an adventure fantasy type read from Young and what I got here was a deliberate murder mystery with hints of magical realism. This took me forever to get through because it just didn’t hold my interest. I loved the island of Saoirse but found the characters and plot lacking. This is definitely something different from Young and it is okay but not great. I am hoping her upcoming Fallen City duology is more in the direction of her previous fantasy books.
