The wheel turns.
Laurence figured he'd be planning his wedding as soon as he got home from the desert; instead he's pulled away from his fiancé to track down Rufus' missing mom. Worse, the last person he'd ever want help from is on his side, and Laurence can't afford to say no.
Surrounded by strands of fate that rapidly became a web, Laurence's only hope is to aim for the spider at its heart, but Vincent Harrow has been weaving it since before Laurence was born.
Trapped between two evils, neither of which are lesser, Laurence is about to discover that there really are fates worse than death.
PUBLISHER: Ravensword Press
YEAR: 2024
LENGTH: 450 pages (13 hours, 19 minutes)
AGE: Adult
GENRE: Fantasy, Romance
RECOMMENDED: Highly
Queer Rep Summary: Lesbian/Sapphic Secondary Character(s), Gay/Achillean Main Character(s), Bi/Pan Main Character(s), Genderqueer/Nonbinary Secondary Character(s), Ace/Aro Secondary Character(s).
*I received a free review copy in exchange for an honest review of this book.
WHEEL OF FATE is the culmination of the second season generally, and Laurence's deal with Rufus, specifically. The warlock who has been manipulating things in the background and was identified in SPELLS OF SUMMER has finally made his move: demanding that Laurence and Rufus provide him with a particular spellbook from Rufus's sanctum. It's great, excellently crafted and just the right level of intense for this point in the series. Because it starts less than a week after RUNES OF FALL, there wasn't much time in between for anyone to get to a significantly different emotional state than they were after those climactic events (except to be exhausted from healing, or still processing some combination of killing and dying just a few days ago). Quentin, in particular, still has a broken shoulder and it's very difficult to get him to rest.
As a sequel, WHEEL OF FATE wraps up the tangle of storylines related to Laurence learning magic from Rufus. Things changed quite dramatically at the end in a way that means that even if this isn't actually the disagreement that severs their connection, Rufus is in no position to keep tutoring Laurence for the foreseeable future. The specific storyline is mostly new, with Vincent Harrow finally making his murderous moves and forcing Laurence into action, rather than just glowering in the epilogues as he has been so far. Technically an issue related to an arrest is both introduced and resolved, but that is more of a tactical distraction and a character moment for Laurence where he behaves in a way that surprised Vincent Harrow.
This is not the end of the series, and the epilogue sets up some of what is to come either in the next book or in the third season more broadly, I won't know which until those books are available. Many loose ends were wrapped up, at least one going back to Laurence's vision in the very first book. While there were some narrators joining Quentin and Laurence, all of them have narrated parts of at least one earlier book, so there were no wholly new perspective characters.
The basic stakes are dramatic and well-described enough that the specific story could make sense to someone who hadn't read any of the series before now, but much of the emotional payoff and certain aspects of who uses what magic and when are much more meaningful with the context of the earlier books. The series structure means that if someone had started with PAGE OF TRICKS (book six) rather than JACK OF THORNS (book one) they would know all the important characters and enough of the relevant setup to appreciate the resolutions found here.
I discussed a bunch of things this book accomplishes structurally in my ongoing essay series, but the short version as it relates to WHEEL OF FATE is that it brings back together the characters who clashed with one another in the previous season finale, PAGE OF TRICKS, except now the Duke is willing to help for his own gain, with Freddy and Michael providing support. Everyone wants to spend as little time as possible in his odious orbit, but he's not the current threat and so they accept some level of help from him as they deal with a much messier and more immediate danger.
Things I love, in no particular order: magical trigger phrases, Windsor, Laurence finally using his visions tactically.
I had been waiting for this to come out so I could write my essay series, and it was everything I wanted and more. I love this series and I'm excited to find out where it goes next!
If you like this you may like:
- HOW TO BITE YOUR NEIGHBORN AND WIN A WAGER by D.N. Bryn (magical guys)
- PALADIN'S GRACE (fantasy romance with a rather high number of severed heads)
- A POWER UNBOUND by Freya Marske (Frikey vibes, if Freddy didn't have powers at the moment)
Graphic/Explicit CW for confinement, blood, torture, murder, death.
Moderate CW for cursing, vomit, sexual assault, rape, pregnancy, abandonment, ableism, disassociation, kidnapping, gore, violence, gun violence, injury detail, medical content, slavery, animal death, child death, parental death.
Minor CW for sexism, racism, classism, homophobia, fatphobia, ageism, bullying, alcohol, excrement, drug abuse, car accident, abortion, war, genocide.
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