Thank you to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the eARC!

Another one of my favorite books of 2024, my new obsession.

Dystopian world that you can compare to ‘The Handmaid Tale’ and ‘The Pawn and the Puppet’. Society with levels of oppression, violence, paranoia, inequality, and suffering.

We had destroyed the world, we the ancient Light People, we had set it on fire with firefuel, gone to the stars, and failed, almost completely wiping out the human race from the planet of Earth. The survivors rebuilt the society, lived in harmony with nature, appreciated Torches, people with special powers of telepathy - called songlight. Until it was noticed that they were corrupt, limiting people and progress, and humans took to arms. They raised the army that took over and now Brother Peregrine leads the country of Brightland. Boys are taught to be soldiers, girls are taught how to be good wives. The council of elders pairs the veterans and teenage girls barely of age to marry and repopulate the world. Women are to be polite, kind, opinion-less good wives. Men will think for them, fight for them, and punish them. Women have no rights. And then there are the unhumans. They are to be beaten, castrated, with surgeons cutting out their songlight and personality, turning them into mindless husk to serve those in power. Because there is nothing worse that the unhuman. Women are to be obedient, men straight, and unhuman destroyed.

It’s a grey, oppressive world. If you’re different, have an independent thought, you’re in danger. There is no one you can trust. Your father, brother, the entire town will turn on you, betray you to the executioner.

Elsa is a fisherman daughter, hiding her unhuman powers of Songlight even from her family. In love with Rye, another Torch. When the boy is caught using his powers and sent to the capital to be abused and mutilated, when her own brother betrayed his best friend and renounce any ties with her, Elsa is forced to finally face the world she lives in. She has choices: to fight for what’s right, for freedom and equality; to give up to despair and sorrow; or to quietly accept the horrid society and lose herself in oblivion of following the village’s expectations. A fierce and defiant girl, slowly grows into a determined soldier. Brave enough to reconsider her preconceived notions, acknowledges propaganda for what it is, embraces the unlikely companions and stands up to the cruel and hateful government.

Kaira, a sickly child of an Inquisitor, knows she must hide her songlight power from her own father. He’s a loving, dotting parent, who would sacrifice everything for his baby girl, except he may never forgive her for being a heinous monster. She discovers pain and suffering hidden in the least likely places, and decided she is ready to take charge. And the queen of court politics is about to be born.

It’s a huge risk to trust anyone in Britghland, and to trust with songlight is a matter of life and death. Throughout their experiences, the girls discover each other’s loyalty, love, and courage. They journey through the world and fight for their kind, whilst having no rights and no power in the society. How do you oppose the tyrants when the world wants you to sit quietly in the kitchen cooking dinner for your husband? How do you save your friends and family; how do you keep your freedom and sanity?
Through loving another Torch, fighting with your brainwashed brother, peering into the mind of an abused manipulator, appreciating the enemy culture, and digging into the soul of your war beaten husband.

The world is oppressive, depressing, hopeless. But these two young extraordinary women never give up. They keep each other going through all the tumultuous disasters, and always emerge fighting, biting, and kicking. Some men finally see their own mistakes, for some it’s too late. Some women pay the ultimate price of survival, the conscience stained irreparably. People will die, people will fight, freedom and equality is the goal and it’s worth the price.

I cannot wait for the next book! I know the rule, it has to get worse, to get better, and I can only imagine the destruction and desolation the second book with wreak.
Moira Buffini became one of my favorite writers and an insta buy.

YA is something I thought I had loved and then left behind as my tastes matured and moved onto pastures new…

How very wrong I was!!!!!

This is everything a YA fantasy should be and was gripping from start to finish.

The writing is so smooth you find yourself drifting through pages with ease and the before you know it, you are flicking back and forth with the final page desperate for more.

The characters addictive even the nasty ones, the FMC is just an absolute stunner. I wish I had the brazen energy she puts out with her attitude and her strong headed personality. If I did I would probably be the prime minister by now.

All round excellent read and I would highly recommend, if you loved the hunger games and the like when you were younger give this a go it will bring you straight back to that escapist happy place and more.

Thank you to the publishers and net galley for this ARC I cannot wait for the next

Songlight is set in a post-apocalyptic and divided world where there is a gift called 'songlight', hence the title of the novel. We have governments that are against the existence of those with the gift and bond over it. And men who have to go to war.
This is the first instalment in the series. You might also be familiar with Buffini's screenwriting.
Songlight is a worthy read. Although I am not the exact and ideal target audience for this (YA, first person POVs and multiple of them), I enjoyed this book plenty.

Elsa and all others with the gift live in constant danger.
Elsa's love for another character must also be kept hidden like her gift.
Then she encounters someone like her, and together they bring a bit of hope to each other, and those around her.

I found the opening and the worldbuilding gripping, ideally-paced and cinematically told.
I quite liked Elsa and reading Rye's perspective was thrilling.

I kept in mind that this is aimed for YA readers while reading and reviewing Songlight and here is a breakdown of my thoughts in bullet points.
- Concept 3/5: The political context is a nice addition. Overall, the concept at its core is not entirely fresh, though the gift of songlight and the solidarity between particularly two female characters provide a nice and nuanced layer.
- Characterisation 3.5/4: The characters are mostly likeable, relatable and complex (for a YA novel)
- Prose 3/5: The multiple POV narrative was both a strength and at times, a minor weakness of Songlight. The cinematic quality (also, a bit of dramatic quality) is engaging and gives the novel a good pacing. Though, I would not mind it being more literary.
- Pacing/structure: 4/5 (the length of the book is great for this topic)

Overall, 3.5 stars for me, rounded up to 4 because I recommend the book to YA audiences and readers.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for granting me free access to the advanced digital copy of this book.
4 stars book from me. Loved the plot and the stories in this book. Loved every single second reading it.

Thanks, NetGalley, for providing me with an ARC for an honest review.

The world is divided, and those with the gift of songlight need to hide their power. If they are discovered, they are sentenced to a life of mindless servitude.

Elsa and Rye both have the gift of songlight. They have kept each other sane and become each other's home in a world that would destroy them for being different. When Rye's songlight powers are discovered, their lives change forever.

I went into this book blind, and it was a story with a lot of depth, good world-building, layered characters, interesting politics, and unique magic.

There was a lot of character development, and I loved it. All of the characters have interesting individual stories and go through so much growth. I didn't love all of the characters. I actually kind of hated two of them, but they were written in a way that had me understanding and sympathising with them.

This is a thought-provoking and, at times, emotional book that deals with difficult themes (check your trigger warnings). By the end, I'd laughed, cried and wanted to punch a character (or two) in the face. I was emotionally invested in the story and the characters and I'm so sad that I have to wait, who knows how long, for book two.

If you're a fan of YA dystopian/fantasy books, add this to your TBR!

4.5 ⭐️

📖 Thank you Netgalley and Bloomsbury for the ARC and the opportunity to read this book pre-release. All thoughts are my own.

I have spoken so much about this book with my friends that I was so convinced I had already reviewed it, and surprise, I did not 🤡

Songlight is a post-apocalyptic, fantasy, a little bit sci-fi story that follows multiple character that live in a world where people with magic are demonised and killed for their gift. It’s a story of friendship and love and adventure and honestly it had me hooked in pretty fast.
It is so beautiful, I am so obsessed I cannot wait for the sequel!

Full disclaimer, I was a bit overwhelmed and weirded out at the beginning, for the first few chapters I wasn’t sure if I liked the pace/characters pov.
And I couldn’t be happier to have kept going because I soon became very obsessed and HAD to know what was next.

As many of you know at this point, I am a sucker for a good, unexpected and unguessable plot, and this book has them all!
My only (super) mild negative note is the overwhelming beginning and we got a bit of insta-love, which I am never the biggest fan of. The escalation from enemies to lovers was too quick, they burned too fast, I barely even realise it was happening.

But genuinely will be eagerly waiting for the sequel because I MUST know what happens next!

A good dystopian read. Set way into the future, after everything has gone wrong with the world, we find a society formed after an uprising. With shades of the Handmaid’s Tale and Animal Farm the setting is a patriarchy, where women are gifted as wives as reward for service to the state in war and anyone who has ‘songlight’ (telepathy) is shunned as unhuman and lobotomised. Not a promising start for our main character who is a female with songlight. It is told through multiple viewpoints, but that didn’t detract from the story and helped build a fuller picture.There is a bit of romance, there’s adventure and plenty of plotting. A great start to the series.

I found this a struggle to get through the first 30%, I wasn't bonding with the characters, struggled to understand what the songlight was all about and I just wasn't able to see where this was going. However after I hit that mark more of the story started to unfurl and the pieces started to fall in place for me. Bear in mind I had just finished an incredible fantasy series so my initial stuggles could have been caused by a slight book hangover!

The concept of the book is really interesting, I began to like our FMC Lark more and her impulsive decisions. The plot is fairly slow to unravel, but in a good way, as it keeps information a surprise later on in the book. As you progress through the book you also get introduced to more character POVs which bring in a good balance. Overall you follow 5 different POVs, but mainly we follow Lark and Nightingale - I did find them both naive but when they work together they are much stronger characters and I liked following their development (I did have to remind myself this is a YA book though as naive characters aren't typically my favourite!). I actually would have liked to see a little more from Rye in this latter part of this book as his story just kind of drops off, but I can see this will likely be a large part of the second book instead and I will definitely be intrigued to carry on the series.

I enjoyed the politics, but you do have to work to get to this in the book. For the majority of the story we are on the Brightland side of the story and only see this perspective, but once you get introduced to the wider picture it really opens this up to be an interesting trilogy. It's hard to say much about the politics without giving away some elements of the storyline I don't want to ruin. For me I would say the world building is minimal, but again I think this typical first book establishing the overall story and we'll see more of the world unravel in the next book.

Overall an enjoyable read which was different to my recent epic fantasy reads. It feels almost like a fantasy WW2 type setting and I really enjoyed this mix of historical elements with fantasy/magic infusion. My review is also on goodreads (linked below).

Caveat first: I am absolutely not the target audience for this book by many, many years, but I love great YA (Hunger Games, Chaos Walking, Divergent) and I like Moira Buffini's screen writing work. Second (weird) caveat: I also don't love books written in the first person present, especially from the POV of multiple characters, so this took a while to settle in to. But settle in I did, and whilst there's nothing wildly original here, it was an enjoyable, rich and exciting page-turner of a book, with good, strong female characters (extra points from me), and I finished it slightly grumpy that I'm going to have to wait a while to find out what happens next, which is always a good sign!

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

This is my book of 2024! Okay. So I appreciate that is a bold statement to make in July but I loved everything single thing about this book (maybe with the exception of having to wait for the next instalments!)

The story is a very strong opening book of what is going to be an amazing trilogy and focuses on a group of characters in a dystopian future where some characters have a special gift called “songlight”..

Torn apart in a war, Elsa’s home town and those in the surrounding areas treat anyone with songlight as an “Unhuman” so Elsa is forced to hide her secret from all but her lover Rye who shares the same gift.

When Elsa’s world starts to unravel, a young girl appears in Elsa’s songlight - captivated by her grief. The world has to change to make it safe for those with songlight but the pursuit of freedom often costs lives.

It is told from different character viewpoints per chapter which I always enjoy as it allows me to understand the characters personal drivers and opens them up to understanding. The characters are stalwart, tenacious and imperfect. Each of them fighting their own personal battles which nearly costs some of them their lives.

This book is advertised as a YA book but reads traditionally older than the average YA book and the pacing, especially towards the end, is fast paced.

Thank you Faber and Faber for providing this ARC via Netgalley in exchange for my honest opinion.

This book surprised me in a good way! A dystopian post-apocalyptic universe, magic with a twist, endless intrigue, and characters I wanted to throttle and hug at the same time. I felt like I should know where the plot was going but oh hell was I wrong. The richness of Moira Buffini's writing meant every new element added ever more complex layers of depth to her world-building. This was an excellent YA adventure/fantasy debut and I am so excited that this is book 1 in a trilogy! Add this to your TBR pile immediately and you will not regret it. Fans of This is How You Lose The Time War, Incarceron and Sarah J Maas will feel right at home.
Thank you Faber & Faber for providing this ARC for review via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.

I couldn't put this book down as I was utterly transfixed by Elsa and her family and the other characters she met - both in person and in songlight. The dystopian feel at the beginning of the book was brought to life with enough touches and references to the modern-day world to hint at a future world that is struggling to survive after near extinction and the ravages of war. I'm already desperate to read the next instalment and I know my teen will enjoy this book when I pass it on.

#faberbooks #faberandfaber #songlight #femalevoices #dystopain #YA #freedomvsvictory

This is a beautiful story of hiding who you are, and finding those who are just like you. And when you help one another, the good can come from it.

Lark lives on an Island, cut off from the rest of her nation, and she has a secret. She is a Torch, she has a gift called searchlight, and in her moment of greatest pain, she cries out with her gift and finds someone just like her. But they are far away, and their nation is at war. Being a Torch is illegal, and the treatment for it will strip her of who she is to her very soul. In this situation, what do you do?

This was a beautiful story, full of loss and love, heartache and longing and coming out to show the world who you are. A must-read.

What can I say about this book. EPIC!!
I know I'm not the target audience for this YA Dystopian, and I going to admit I did struggle with the first half but boy, once I hit the second half of the book I was so immersed and invested in the characters Moira Buffini has created I couldn't put it down.

I'm not going to go into too much plot detail, as I feel you need to take it all in for yourselves. Songlight is a special gift some humans possess. It gives you the ability to communicate telepathically with other Songlights. For many, these people are seen as 'unhuman' they are persecuted and hunted down. This story has multiple POVs, but it mainly follows two female characters, Lark and Nightingale. They are both strong minded young women who are tired of living in fear of being found out that they're Songlights. Their world is at war, and they wish for peace and to live free.

The character development, world building, and the war and politics of this story are so well written and thought out. It also tackles a lot of heavy subject matters that are relevant to the plot but may be hard to read for some.

By the end of this book, I felt every emotion and turmoil the characters had gone through. Beautiful, heartbreaking, and thought-provoking journey, Moira Buffini takes you on. You end up falling in love with the heroes of this story and despising the villains. My only problem is I need book 2!

All in all, a must-read for 2024. An epic trilogy in the making, with touches of Hunger Games, Divergent, and Handmaid's Tale. I, for one, cannot wait for book two in this series.

Loved this book. The intertwined stories of Lark, Nightingale, Sister Swan, Kingfisher kept me enthralled. Absolutely heartbroken that I have to wait for the next two books to continue their stories. Highly recommend this book
Thanks to Netgalley for this ARC

I found this really interesting and enjoyed it. Thank you to the writer, publisher, and NetGalley for allowing me to review this book.

Wow, this was good. I had no idea how much this book would grab me and keep hold till the end. I quite literally couldn't put it down. This has to be on the best seller list surely.

Non spoiler review From the first pages, I knew this book was going to be epic, and it truly delivered! The characters are all incredible, and Moira Buffini does an excellent job of making you understand them and their choices. The world-building is nothing short of amazing. I love how you become immersed in a community you wouldn’t normally want to be part of, and how Moira keeps giving you hope only to dash it again (I really hope everything turns out well after book three, though).

My only issue now is waiting for the next two books to come out!

I enjoyed this book. The characters were drawn out really well giving it an edge on other fantasy books featuring fighting factions. I never lost interest but nor was I completely gripped. Maybe not quite the genre for me but very well written.

Wow! I loved this…and that came as a huge surprise as I didn’t think it would be my sort of thing. I enjoyed the Hunger Games and I think that’s the most similar thing I’ve read…though they’re not the same at all.

Numerous different narrators did not put me off. On the whole I am bored with that narrative device but here it really worked well and I think is vital in understanding the whole idea of Songlight.

The world building was done seamlessly, perhaps because enough is not that different, I didn’t need to plough through too much description. It’s all about the ideologies more than the physical world.

Relationships are strong and totally believable.

As a school librarian I’m pleased that thus isn’t too ‘spicy’! However, there is lots of strong language. It felt legitimate and added to the characterisation, but does mean I’ll need to flag it for younger readers.

Very grateful for the ARC and excited for the next instalments in the trilogy!