Blood Wisp is a 2022 fantasy novel by Sarina Langer. It was released in May 2022 and published by Sparrow Book Publishing. It is the first entry in the Blood Wisp series.
The country of Midoka embraces magic, also known as the gift. Its most powerful order of sorcerers, the Mist Women, teach novices at the coven in Maishi Hou, and their graduates serve as expert advisors all over the world. Magic is every Midokan's undeniable birthright. Except for Yua. An unwilling resident at the Maishi Hou coven, she can't call forth the smallest flame. Her only childhood memory is soaked in blood. The only hint as to who—or what—she is lies in her blackened veins. But they also hide a shadow thirsting for blood, and even the leading Mist Woman fears it. All her life, Yua has fought her Shadow… until she meets Aza, who says there's no darkness without light. Yua is done being scared of herself, but embracing her Shadow could kill everyone. If she tries, she could lose herself forever… Or she could answer its whispers and become something new.
I was somewhat disappointed with the plot of this novel. On the surface, the story seems like a standard fantasy plot, revolving around character exploring their own powers and coming to terms with what they can do. The issue I had was the execution. This is not a long book, so every page counts, and a number of pages are spent not on building a engaging plot, but on filler scenes and telling the reader information that doesn't seem to matter. There are no true surprises or twists in the story, and the stakes within are poorly defined. It was difficult to be invested in Yua's struggle to control her abilities, because there was no sense of the consequences that would follow if she did. I didn't find the story engaging because it felt as if nothing of substance was happening. The entirety of this book would make a great beginning-to-middle of a longer book, but on its own doesn't feel like a complete plot. The stage is set, by the end of this book, for a potentially compelling series, but there is no delivery of that in this volume.
I don't have much to say about the characters in this book. On the surface, each seems like they'd be a compelling and interesting character, but the story doesn't take much time to delve into the characters. Yua believes herself to a danger to everyone around her and is an outcast, but the reader sees very little growth within her or exploration of how her isolation informs her character. Aza is a fierce warrior, and the first person to see Yua as anything other than dangerous, but the reader sees very of her character beyond being a fierce warrior. The other characters, from the Mist Women to Yua's only friend, a kitchen aide, suffer from the same issue. They fall flat, due to having little substance to them. I would've enjoyed this book more, I think, if the author explored the characters, or at least Yua's character, in depth.
The writing in this book was fine. Sometimes, the prose didn't flow as well as it could have. The dialogue and descriptions could be repetitive, but it was easy enough to digest both. Where this novel suffers is with the world-building and pacing. It's my understanding that this author has written another series in the same world, and I think she may have relied on readers knowing that series, and being familiar with the world, already before picking this book up. As a reader who did not read her companion series, the world-building felt barebones and most of what I gleaned came from context clues. The pacing in this book moves slowly, due to issues with how the plot is constructed. The story drags in places, and the conclusion feels like the mid-point of a longer book, rather than the end of a contained story.
Blood Wisp was a book that I felt missed the mark. The author set up some great ideas in terms of characters and plot, introduced a lot of promise, but did little with it. The ideas themselves are intriguing, and the series could go in an interesting direction from where this book ended, but I wasn't able to gauge much from this first entry. In short, this was a book I neither loved nor hated, and I wish there was more to it.
Rating: 1.75 Stars
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