This book got off to a promise start and would have been a strong 4 stars if it had only reached its fullest potential. This is one of those books that has everything going for it except the execution. It could have been so, so fantastic judging by the synopsis alone, but unfortunately it felt somewhat slow. It didn't have a big enough impact quick enough.

Setting
Washington DC during the 1920's. I do enjoy a good 20's story, especially if it involves gangs *cough-Peaky Blinders-cough* (can you tell I'm a big fan? ;p)

The 20's was such an extravagant and indulgent time (Gatsby? What Gatsby?) and simply divine to read about. This book doesn't focus a whole lot on the time period and the feel of the 20's is lost a little, unfortunately. It lacks the ostentatiousness of the 20's, which could have created such an outrageous, sordid, delicious atmosphere.

Characters
Joan wasn't particularly remarkable, but she had motives, which is more than most YA heroines have. Her only goal is to provide for her family and see that the rent payments of their cabin are made each month. She harbours a morbid secret and a guilty conscious, giving another dimension to her character.

I perhaps found it all a little too convenient that, considering she was the least skilled sorcerer there having never practiced magic before, that suddenly she was the most powerful sorcerer in the whole story. I get that she practiced a lot, but a few months of practice shouldn't surely make much difference when all the other sorcerers were older and had years of experience behind them.

Alex was actually my least favourite character. He also had plenty of reasons to be doing the things that he was doing, but somehow he felt a little two-dimensional. I don't know what it was about him, but I really didn't take to him all that much, and never understood him as Joan's romantic interest.

I know Gunn was the bad guy, but I really liked him. Not even sorry.

Plot
This had such an interesting plot line. Marketed as Peaky Blinders meets the Night Circus, I was naturally drawn in (mostly by the Peaky Blinders part) I love anything involving gangs, antiheroes and unreliable narrators so I went into this expecting those things.

Set in DC in the 20's during Americas prohibition in an alternative world where alcohol is legal but magic isn't. Instead of moonshine, we have sorcerer's shine, an illegal drink brewed by sorcerers that gets the drinker high.
Joan is a powerful sorcerer but doesn't realise it, so when gangster Harrison Gunn approaches her financially struggling family with the offer of great fortune in exchange for great magic, she volunteers herself to travel to DC with him to prove herself worthy of working in his illegal magic haven, the Red Den.

Enter Alex, also a talented sorcerer and under-cover cop planted within the gang to bring down the organisation (getting real Peaky Blinders feels here) It's there that he meets Joan, and the romance dwarfs the main storyline.

This is one of those stories that didn't necessarily need a romance but has one anyway. In some cases the romance aspect adds to and builds on the storyline, however in this case I feel like the romance is actually holding the story back from reaching its full potential.
Imagine if Alex wasn't in this book; it makes me giddy just considering it. If this was purely about Joan working for Gunn's gang, getting over her head and then fighting back, I probably would have given it 5 stars. It would have given her room to grow as a character and give the story and overall dark, grittier vibe. Alex's character does nothing but suffocate Joan's and makes her appear needy. I know this is my cynical side talking, I just don't like when a romance overwhelms a great story.

This book absolutely held my full attention until about halfway through. The story was great, the pacing great, Gunn was a fascinating mystery. But then everything thing seemed to slow to a stop. Not much happened for far too long and the story started to get a little stale.

Something I really enjoyed was the gang politics. I would have liked to have seen more of that. Joan getting involved in Gunn's shine operations earlier would have been a good move, allowing us more time to explore the prospects and dangers of what she was really involved in, creating tension.

One thing I can say, I found the plot very creative, original and interesting.

Writing Style
The writing style in general was fine. I had no issue with the writing. It was actually very good. I did, however, get confused at times which chapter was which. So let me explain . . .

It's written in present tense first person (the direct opposite of what I prefer but I can deal totally deal with that). The chapters alternate between Joan and Alex, getting both their stories, but the problem was for me, I'd be reading an Alex chapter thinking it was a Joan chapter. They both read in the same way.

I strongly believe that if you're going to write in first person dual-perspective, each character needs their own voice, otherwise they become indistinguishable from each other, causing mix-ups.
Other than these mix-ups, I enjoyed the writing style.

Final Impression
I enjoyed this book, but I still stand by what I said earlier: This could have been so much better if it focused a little less on the romance. This is possibly one of those books where the idea is better than the content, but a solid 3 stars nonetheless.