Book Review: All’s Fae in Love & War

A few months ago I was sent a copy of All’s Fae in Love & War by Lee Nichols and I just got to finally read it this week.

The novel follows Pandora and Leo. They grew up together on a small island off the coast of Maine and are faerie-kin, meaning they are descendents of the faeries that lived long ago. They don’t have a lot of magic, but most faerie-kin will develop a gift like Pandora’s dad has the gift of growing crops and flowers really well and her mom can make any place cozy and well-decorated. Leo can sense important texts, which has helped him in his career as a rare book seller. Not everyone on the island is faerie-kin though, but if you are you only have until you turn 30 for your gift to present itself or else you lost all memories and understanding of magic! So if you grew up knowing about magic and you don’t develop a gift by the time you’re 30, then you won’t remember anything about it or that your family has it or anything. Pandora is approaching 30 and hasn’t developed a gift yet. It is one of the reasons her and Leo broke up as teenagers years ago. And although they both live in Boston now, they avoid each other as much as possible.

When they both decide to go home for the summer unbeknownst to them that the other would be there, they are forced to interact. And when Leo is drawn to a book they find in the library that is an ancient magical text, he needs Pandora to help him with it. The book ends up unlocking her gift at long last, but with it ancient magical creatures like pixies and gnomes are unleashed as well as other, more sinister creatures. Is this a good thing or bad thing? And can Pandora and Leo set aside their issues to figure out where this magical text came from and figure out their feelings for each other?

I liked this book and really liked the premise. What stopped me from loving the book is that I found Pandora and Leo (but mostly Pandora) to be a little annoying haha. While Leo definitely has his faults, I felt like Pandora was a little selfish and wouldn’t see things from any other perspective besides her own. And Leo kept apologizing for his mistakes but then kept making the same ones over and over again! So that got kind of old quick. But overall, I did like the book and the world created in it so I’d be interested in reading the next book in the series!