The sheer amount of pure chaos energy this book has! Honestly, the powers of “wing it” were in charge of the plot, which is befitting the kind of protagonists Maud and Violet are. When I reached the scene where a whole menagerie of zoo animals stampedes across the Transatlantic boat where the events take place, I was only nodding sagely, like ah yeah, this is the kind of story where it does not seem out of place. It is up to you if you enjoy these levels of chaos, but it’s definitely a feature in this book.

Things I liked and cheered on:
- the way the book unabashedly embraces sex, and sex-adjacent entertainment. There is simply so much joy and fun and shame-free attitude in the way book speaks about sexual desire, pornographic literature as entertainment, and sex as an act. That in its own right is a pleasure to see in fantasy, but that with two female leads? Hell yes.
- watchinf Hawthorne be elevated-slash-relegated against his will from the role of a hot and depressed bitter ex as we saw him in Marvellous Light to the role of a long-suffering elder brother and an all-purpose get out of jail free card 😆 Can’t wait for him to get his other book.
- and we get to learn more about the society of witches! Cooler older generation ftw.

Thank you #Netgalley for an advanced copy of #arestlesstruth

Thank you NetGalley and Pan Macmillan for the chance to read an arc.

I really enjoyed the first book, A Marvellous Light, but sadly I could only read half of the sequel. On page 209 I came across an ableist slur which was extremely unnecessary and could have been replaced with a variety of different words. I decided to try and keep reading but my enthusiasm had dwindled greatly. Then on page 220-221 I came across a passage which seemed transphobic to me and decided to read no further. I won’t be recommending this book for these reasons.