Isabel Ibañez is the author of Together We Burn (Wednesday Books) and Woven in Moonlight (Page Street), which was listed among Time magazine's 100 Best Fantasy Books of All Time. She is the proud daughter of Bolivian immigrants and has a profound appreciation for history and traveling. She currently lives in Asheville, North Carolina, with her husband, their adorable dog, and a serious collection of books. You can find Isabel on Instagram @IsabelWriter09. You can find more of my reviews of her work here.
Bolivian Argentinian Inez Olivera belongs to the glittering upper society of nineteenth-century Buenos Aires, and like the rest of the world, the town is steeped in old-world magic that's been largely left behind or forgotten. Inez has everything a girl might want, except for the one thing she yearns for the most: her globetrotting parents, who frequently leave her behind. When she receives word of their tragic deaths, Inez inherits their massive fortune and a mysterious guardian, an archaeologist in partnership with his Egyptian brother-in-law. Yearning for answers, Inez sails to Cairo, bringing her sketch pads and a golden ring her father sent to her for safekeeping before he died. But upon her arrival, the old-world magic tethered to the ring pulls her down a path where she discovers there's more to her parents' disappearance than what her guardian led her to believe. With her guardian's infuriatingly handsome assistant thwarting her at every turn, Inez must rely on ancient magic to uncover the truth about her parents' disappearance—or risk becoming a pawn in a larger game that will kill her. The Mummy meets Death on the Nile in this lush, immersive historical fantasy filled with adventure, a rivals-to-lovers romance, and shocking twists and turns.
First, I want to give a shoutout to the design of the book itself. I got the B&N exclusive edition, so my copy had hieroglyphics stamped on the case, and these fun portraits of Inez and Whit on the endpapers. Combined with the cover, that meant that just the exterior material matched the historical time period the book is set in. On the inside, we have a (albeit simplified) map of our setting, along with doodles scattered throughout the text to help us picture different objects and settings—two particular favorites of mine were the ring illustration, and the illustration of Inez's new year's present to Whit. This all helped situate the story for me, and along with the prose helped bring this world and these characters to life.
The story is full of twists and turns—this book is action-packed all the way until the very end. While I guessed one of the plot twists (which happened earlier in the book), I was absolutely flabbergasted by everything that happened afterwards, and the twists literally don't stop coming until the last page. On top of the action-packed plot, we follow a cast of distinct and flawed characters. I was incredibly invested in Inez from the prologue, and was at turns jubilated, devastated, confused, and triumphant alongside her during the journey she takes. The other characters are distinct, but because we are getting the story solely from Inez's first person point of view, we spend most of the journey alternating between trusting and not trusting them. This is part of the reason the twists are so well done—because, we, like Inez, are unsure of their motivations all the way up until they show their hand. Bravo to Ibañez for this, for sure!
The rivals-to-lovers romance between Whit and Inez took a moment to heat up. Their banter is fun, and because Whit initially underestimates Inez, it gets them into some fun kerfuffles. Once they start to open up to one another, their dynamic changes slowly but surely, and I was always wondering if they were going to act on their attraction or not. I liked how their romance wasn't the main focus of the novel—while it does play a role in Inez's time in Egypt, I still felt that the focus of the novel was Inez going on this journey, discovering who her parents were, and what place she has in all of this. I am very curious to see where their relationship goes in the next book, and how Inez's relationships will be affected by what happened at the end of the book.
My only hope for the next book can be summed up in one word: more! I wanted to know more about the magic system, and how it affects different characters. I wanted more from Whit's points of view—I loved how they were stylized as separate from Inez's main narration, and I wanted to know more about him and his past and his motivations. I already can't wait for more of what Inez is going to do and how she's going to react to the proposition at the end, and how they're going to get out of this dilemma.
If you can't tell, I already can't wait for book two! Until then, you can find more of my reviews of her work here.
*This review can also be found on my Goodreads page*
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