Reviews and Comments

This book is a darkly incredible foray into abuse that has trickled down from past generations to the future ones. I couldn’t help but identify with Devon’s struggle to break the cycle with her own son Cai, especially with her lamenting when she fails to live up to the person she wants to be—a role-model she never had, trying to create a better world for her son than the one she grew up in.

This is a contemporary fantasy that takes place in England, but it’s split storyline. While the present-day Devon’s storyline takes place in or near present-day, there’s also another storyline with her younger self in childhood, and the way the two are woven together is absolutely masterfully done. Dark, terrible things happen to Devon bringing her to her present-day quest to save her son, but they aren’t lingered on or described in detail. Instead, the reader is distanced from the events as Devon distances herself from what happens, as a way to survive.

I loved the way the culture of the Book Eaters was explored and revealed, with its struggle to stay unknown in a modern world that moves increasingly fast. I also appreciated the way dark subjects were dealt with, neither glorifying or shockingly, but also without shying away from them: things like emotional abuse and its effects, sexual assault, and physical abuse.

Devon was raised as a princess, punished only by being forced to eat dictionary pages instead of fairy tales, but with the full expectation that once she was grown she would fulfill her duty and give two other Families a child each, after which she could come back home and do as she pleased.

But Devon’s son is a mind eater. To the Family, mind eaters are monsters who must be shut away and quelled firmly by Knights who are trained in how to break their spirits and “train” them to obey. Devon’s not about to let that happen to her son, though.

The only way to save her son is to secure him a drug that will allow him to eat books instead of minds. A drug that has become impossible to find in recent years. Impossible, however, is merely a suggestion for Devon.


CW: physical abuse, emotional abuse, sexual assault, body horror, gore, explicit violence, domestic abuse, violence against children


I was given a copy of this book, but that has not affected my review to the best of my knowledge.

Justine's left me with so many feelings--again! Coming off the back of The Order of the Key, though, it's really no surprise. This is the perfect pairing to the Order, like bread and butter, coffee and coffee cake, or chocolate and anything. We have more geeky comic book references filling the pages, which I adored to no end.

Jacklyn and Kyp are as amazing as ever, even though now we see them broken around the edges, trying to hold on by their fingernails. When they do finally truly come together, however, the way they hold each other up is simply gorgeous, and the strength they bring to their pages kept me hooked all the way through. Like the Order of the Key, I barely was able to set this book down at all. I love where the story went, and while it was a wild ride, I was all in, all the way. I especially loved the way Justine dealt with mental health and trauma with such a deft hand. And frankly, the way the word "adorable" is fit in 100% organically so many times in such a dark, grief-and-pain filled novel is downright inspirational. The ending made sense even though I'd have preferred (personally) a different one--but it fit perfectly, so I still left feeling fulfilled, especially after the Epilogue!

If your geeky heart needs a sassy heroine of its own, grab The Order of the Key and the Skeleton Key and read them back to back if you can!

This is an incredible debut full of intriguing worldbuilding and protagonists who are very different from one another. One of the dangers of this type of story is that often I’ll connect more to one character or not at all to another, or one of the storylines will drag. That didn’t happen at all for me here. I did have some trouble keeping track of all the political machinations going on, especially as I tried to translate that to what it would look like from Nasha’s point of view, but I understood things reasonably well I think. The religious layer worked really well for me—it’s not just a disguised Christianity even though they talk of “the Seraph”. It felt fleshed out and new and interesting, and it meshed in with the politics well I thought.

Adrian is super sympathetic as he tries desperately to be worthy in his father’s eyes like his older brother was, even as he arranges deals his father would never approve of in a bid to save his wife. His journey is heart-wrenching and I couldn’t wait for his plot line to tie in with the others.

Nasha is a hard character, a hunter who keeps away from others in her community partly because she’s worried they’ll look down on her for her slum-like background and partly because she’s hiding magic from them— magic that would get her killed if they found out. Her journey is incredible and awe-inspiring.

Then there’s Lynn, who’s trying desperately to save as many good people as she can find in a prison filled with corruption. But her actions are constrained in large part by the risk of her past coming back to haunt her if her old companions find out she’s still alive. The evil that nearly killed her rises again, though, and her hand is forced, pushing her to confront her past and oh my goodness, what a past it is! I loved Lynn’s storyline.

The world is a fairly typical medieval-fantasy-type world, with griffons and griffon riders. The magic is a softer magic system but there are definitely rules there, and it was super cool to see it from multiple sides. And the evil that Adrian and Lynn run up against was compelling and definitely kept me engaged. There’s huge battles, risk, sacrifice, loss, betrayal, all the wonderful epic fantasy stuff. Nasha’s line is more separate from the other two but it was still very cool trying to see how it and the other two plot lines impacted each other.

In short, it’s a remarkable epic fantasy that I fully expect to take off. I highly recommend it!