Dr Walden is the Director of Magic at Chetwood School and one of the most powerful magicians in England. Her days consist of meetings, teaching A-Level Invocation to four talented, chaotic sixth formers, more meetings and securing the school’s boundaries from demonic incursions.

Walden is good at her job – no, Walden is great at her job. But demons are masters of manipulation. It’s her responsibility to keep her school with its six hundred students and centuries-old legacy safe. But it’s possible the entity Walden most needs to keep her school safe from . . . is herself.

Published May 2025 | 416 pages | Adult Fantasy | Storygraph Page

Review

The characters and relationships in this book are really good – all of the characters have nuance and dimension, even the smaller side characters and antagonists. The characters, especially our main character, also have a decent helping of growth and development.

Equally importantly, because our main character is not a coming-of-age protagonist (she’s late 30s… maybe 38? I can’t remember exactly), Dr Walden has already sorted some of her shit out. She’s undergone character development in the past and can reflect meaningfully on it, but she’s also not a perfect person and she recognises her room for continuous growth as well. I really liked this element. Apart from the fact that I find characters starting from 0 in terms of character growth a little annoying and grating outside of YA (where it’s still not my favourite, but is kind of a given because of the charcters’ age), I think it gives her character credibility as the magic PhD-holding, premiere invocation specialist, Director of Magic at the boarding school for magic learners. She’s earnt that position and you can tell.

What’s more, the relationships also have nuance that I really appreciated.

Some people call the romance subplot in this book enemies-to-lovers but it’s not; it’s two people with a similar goal but different approaches to achieving it and a great deal of mutual distrust learning to overcome prejudices and understand each other’s perspectives. A lot of the relationships are like that in this book – romantic or not – and I love how it shows that each human thinks they are right, and most of our relationships are, to some extent, about deciding whether other people’s “right” fits into our version of “right” – and if not, whether we can expand our version of “right” to encompass theirs as well of not.

Some of the side characters also provide a nice amount of humour, as well as helping to flesh out the world (for example, with the subplots surrounding issues some of the students are facing etc.).

In terms of the plot, if you’re interested in the summary, then it’s worth giving it a shot. There’s a good balance of internal and external conflict that is explored and the side plots (such as issues different students are having etc) add to rather than detract from the main plot.

Some elements of the main plot are quite obvious – either because they fall into well-known plot lines or have heavy foreshadowing – but this isn’t a mystery book, so this doesn’t completely undermine the plot, and if you’re looking for something with some tension but not so much tension you can’t sleep, then this might be a good choice.

I will say the romantic plot line was not as fleshed out as I might have liked, but this is only minor, as the plot line itself is quite minor and is definitely a subplot – this isn’t a fantasy romance. Apart from that, it’s also a standalone rather than a series so room for development in that regard is rather limited anyway.

I usually don’t particularly like magical school settings in books – I think they’ve just been done to death a bit. However, I really enjoyed this one because the book focused on the school’s faculty rather than the students. This was a nice, refreshing twist that I find better suited to adult fantasy than focusing on the students of a school. It’s also not really a magic school, but rather a school in world where magic is a fact of life, and therefore one of the subjects you can choose to study, just like we might choose to study French or music.

The closeness of the school system to the actual English school system also gave a lot of room for the author to reflect on and shine light on the difficulties and issues faced by teachers in current English schools. My mum’s a teacher (albeit not at a fancy boarding school) and a lot of the issues and concerns that the teachers in this book had echo the sorts of issues my mum talks about. The treatment of teachers and their utter lack of work-life balance (and awful pay – although that’s less of an issue here), as well as the disparities between private and state education are all really important issues in the UK at the moment, and I thought this book included them in a really effective way – they were there enough to make the world feel real and invite thought about the issues, without overtaking the fantasy plot and making the book feel like a didactic essay disguised by demons.

Also, the world and setting were incorporated well into the building of characters and their relationships, as well as suiting the plot. The setting was thus well utilised and integral to the story, so everything feels very cohesive.

Finally, there is just enough fun in the world to give it an element of whimsy, whilst still being grounded. For example, anyone who has ever relied on a printer or copier for important work knows that they tend to break down a lot – well here, the copier has a minor demon infestation that may need to be bribed with brownies in order for it to agree to let the copier copy. This is just one example, but I think it shows how well Emily Tesh was able to imagine what a world that is similar to ours would look like if we had magic as well – what sort of small changes to daily life that would bring about.

Verdict

Read this book! If you like fantasy with a touch of romance, interesting magic systems, complex relationships between characters that aren’t just black and white, and reflections on contemporary issues wrapped up in a magical parcel, then definitely give this book a shot.

Question Time

Have you read this book?
If so – what did you think? If not – do you want to read it now?

Keira x