The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo
From the New York Times bestselling author of Ninth House, Hell Bent, and creator of the Grishaverse series comes a highly anticipated historical fantasy set during the Spanish Golden Age
In a shabby house, on a shabby street, in the new capital of Madrid, Luzia Cotado uses scraps of magic to get through her days of endless toil as a scullion. But when her scheming mistress discovers the lump of a servant cowering in the kitchen is actually hiding a talent for little miracles, she demands Luzia use those gifts to better the family’s social position.
What begins as simple amusement for the bored nobility takes a perilous turn when Luzia garners the notice of Antonio Pérez, the disgraced secretary to Spain’s king. Still reeling from the defeat of his armada, the king is desperate for any advantage in the war against England’s heretic queen—and Pérez will stop at nothing to regain the king’s favor.
Determined to seize this one chance to better her fortunes, Luzia plunges into a world of seers and alchemists, holy men and hucksters, where the line between magic, science, and fraud is never certain. But as her notoriety grows, so does the danger that her Jewish blood will doom her to the Inquisition’s wrath. She will have to use every bit of her wit and will to survive—even if that means enlisting the help of Guillén Santangel, an embittered immortal familiar whose own secrets could prove deadly for them both.
For the Reading Challenge(s):
2024 Audiobook Challenge
2024 Library Love Challenge
The Reason
It’s one of my most anticipated books this year and the audiobook finally became available on Libby, so I read it!
The Quotes
“Language creates possibility. Sometimes by being used. Sometimes by being kept secret.”
“You think you know hardship, but men have a gift for finding new ways to make women suffer.”
“It is a danger to become nothing. You hope no one will look, and so one day when you go to find yourself, only dust remains, ground down to nothing from sheer neglect.”
“Writing is the closest thing we have to real magic. Writing is creating something out of nothing, is opening doors to others lands. Writing gives you power to shape your own world when the real one hurts too much.”
The Narrator(s)
Lauren Fortgang. She was pretty good. There were some parts I couldn’t make out very well, and names and pronunciation of certain words were hard to get too, but that’s not unusual for sci-fi and fantasy stories.
My Thoughts
I’m a fan of Leigh Bardugo, but I don’t always enjoy all her books. Some I love, some are just okay, but they are always worth reading to find out! As a story, I loved this one. I thought the premise was very interesting and I didn’t expect the book to go where it did. That’s one of the things I enjoyed most about this book, that it was not very predictable. Some of the elements are familiar, but told in such a new and different way.
My Feels
To be fair, I read this book during a tumultuous time and wasn’t paying a hundred percent attention to it, so I think I didn’t get immersed into the emotional aspect of it as much as I would’ve been. Even so, there were parts where I did get hit in the feels, and they were great, but I think if I had been paying full attention, I might have been more affected by the story. It’s still a great read and I believe I’ll come back to it again one day when I can be more present. I also plan to read it on print so that I won’t get confused by the names and characters!
My Rating
⭐⭐⭐⭐/5 stars.
Have you read this book? Would you read this book? Did you like the book or do you think you would like it?
I love Leigh Bardugo’s books! I haven’t been as big of a fan for her adult as her other books. Ninth House was a little too dark for me, but I might listen to the audiobooks once book three is out. I enjoyed The Familiar but wouldn’t consider a new favorite. 🙂