Review: Long Grows the Dark

Title: Long Grows the Dark

Author: Catherine Labadie

Rating: 4 Stars

Format: eBook

Publisher: Self-published

Date Published: 10 November 2018

Goodreads Description: Before
Glenna, court sorceress in service to Princess Jael, struggles to hide her feelings for her best friend’s betrothed. Yet even as the realm approaches its golden age, an unforeseen enemy rises to corrupt the princess and take the land for himself. Fate may lead them down a path too painful to contemplate, but are Glenna’s choices enough to dispel the inevitable darkness set to veil their future?

Now
Gwendoline Hallewell, a Starford University student in a world where magic is commonplace, has always been unusual. When her casting book summons a man from the past to interfere with her dangerous new present, she has no choice but to trust him. As she and her friends Colt and Everleigh reconcile what happened before with what must happen in the present, Gwendoline must decide what it means to make her own choices, suffer her own consequences, and if free will is really within her grasp.

General Thoughts

Listen, I will SHAMELESSLY plug ANY New Adult novel because the fantasy genre is desperately LACKING good NA fantasies. I don’t want to go off too much, I’m writing a separate blog post for my thoughts on NA and YA fantasy. But you all have to know, as a 23-year-old semi-adult, it’s wonderful reading about someone the same age as you, going through the same things.

Long Grows the Dark is an excellent NA fantasy. I wished we could have gotten a bit more story in terms of being at a magical university, but I wasn’t disappointed. Labadie’s writing is amazing, it flows so well and reads easily.

I loved the plot, like seriously. I wish this story could happen to me. I want to be studying at a magical university, fighting monsters with my sentient book. My love for this story will literally never end.

There were some editing mistakes here and there, but not enough to detract from the story. The worldbuilding could use some work, some explanation of the modern magical world would have been great, but I can live without it. Overall, this was an amazing read and I would definitely recommend this.

Characters

I love Niles. He’s totally swoon-worthy and I loved his story. I would love a novella or something about him being stuck in Gwen’s book. I just love him so much.

One thing that I didn’t love about this book was the (SPOILERS) cheating angle. I will never approve, and cheating is one of the worst things anyone could ever do. So I didn’t like that storyline, but it doesn’t detract from the book.

Other than that I connected pretty well with all the characters, especially Gwen. She’s hilarious and I love her character introduction in the first chapters. This was a truly great book.

Let’s Chat

What are your thoughts on NA/ Long Grows the Dark?

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