Truly struggling to figure out what is going on inside my brain... I liked it well enough, but not nearly as much as I thought I would.

- The POV of this book was honestly part of why it ended up being so hard for me to follow and care about. We get an omnipotent narrator, who can give us perspective into multiple characters at once, but the whole point of the story is that Luzia is discovering her own abilities and seeing how that affects the trajectory of her fate. I think this would have been MUCH better if it had been first person from Luzia's POV, and then some first person from a few others sprinkled in would have been fine.
- This is set during the Spanish Golden Age, of which I am entirely unfamiliar (ha, familiar, get it?) so this took a long time for me to grasp
- I was bored for like most of the first half of the book. Like truly, I struggled. And I read this in literally two sittings... sooooo
- The second half picks up, basically once the torneo begins and things begin to unravel
- I do appreciate the way the story is formatted so that we do not get a lot of world building info-dump right at the beginning, but rather we see things as Luzia discovers them, because the world of magic and spirits and god-given gifts is still rather new and unknown to her too
- The Luzia x Santagnel relationship was VERY cute, I loved the build up, the considerations of "is what I'm doing really the best choice" and ultimately... THE ENDING oh my god I loved it. Like the actual last chapter. YES.