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Mererid is only 18, but she has already spent years running from the prince who bound her into his service, as well as the prince’s spymaster who took her from her family in the first place. Her power as a water diviner made her valuable. When she located the wells of the prince’s enemies, she wasn’t to know he was going to use that information to poison them and kill hundreds of innocent people.
Now, the spymaster has found her and has a proposition: they will use her powers and his years of training to ruin the prince who was so cruel to both of them. Mer isn’t eager to join Renfrew, but his proposal is sound. A magical well protects the country, but if they can find it, they can remove the protection. A cruel prince will be removed from power, and they will have riches that can free Mer to live her life as she wants.
Mer and Renfrew need others on their team to enact their plan, and that ends up including a young man cursed by the fae to work for them. He has special powers granted him to do what they need him to do — and a devoted corgi who doesn’t belong to him but follows him around devotedly.
The Drowned Woods is a kind of heist story, where one person assembles a team of misfits with special skills to help him pull off a seemingly impossible task, set in ancient Wales. It has a few of the fun elements that come with a heist. (The dog provides some cute moments in particular.) But it’s mostly dangerous, dark and magical, and there are mysteries and secrets that are revealed a bit at a time throughout the book. There’s even a little romance.
I dove right into the world of this atmospheric young adult fantasy book and enjoyed the whole thing.
Rated: Moderate. Profanity includes a handful of instances of moderate language and four or five uses of mild language. Sexual content is minimal; violence includes fights, torture and mistreatment, and killings.
*I received an ARC in exchange for my honest review.
