Half a Soul

Actually a pretty enjoyable YA fantasy/romance romp set in an AU Regency England where elves and magic are recognised part of everyday life. There's something very whimsical and different about the vibes of this one compared to other similar types of stories in its category and genre, and I'm pretty interested in trying out the rest of the series.

After a chance encounter with an elven lord in her childhood when she inadvertently offends him, Theodora Ettings is left forever more with only half a soul. She is unable to properly feel what she calls “long-tail emotions”, and can also be clueless as to social cues and how to properly express whatever emotions she does experience. Dora is set up to be her cousin Vanessa's wingman during the latter's Season in London. When forgotten at home one day, Dora decides to take a walk and wanders into a magic bookshop where she accidentally meets Albert Lowe and his friend, the Chief Magician of England, Elias Wilder, the Lord Sorcier.

Things I really liked about this one:

There is a believable set-up and chemistry behind the romance. Unlike so many other books in this genre where the main characters very quickly feel all tingly in the right places when they first lay eyes upon each other, Dora and Elias start off more than a little grumpy with each other before they very slowly, and through a series of realistic interactions and events, get to know each other better and build up some kind of trust and rapport. Whatever big romantic moments there were actually worked for me. I'm quite picky with chemistry in romances so the fact that this one was satisfactory to me counted for a lot.

Dora is a protagonist I could get behind. I know a lot could probably be said about the real-world parallels of the fact that she is unable to articulate emotions or read social cues, but that's outside of the realm of this review. Dora as she was portrayed in the story was someone I could get behind, even though she supposedly only had half a soul. Her bluntness with everything was refreshing in terms of the story and went a long way to circumvent the awful miscommunication tropes in the genre that I really do not enjoy reading. In fact, (spoiler for ending) when I had some suspicion that she might actually reunite with the emotional Dora in Faerie at the end, I was kinda sad and rejoiced a little when they found a way to have Dora stay the way she had always been.

The story was interested in some larger social issues beyond the romance. Not all romances or fantasy stories do this at all, and I always appreciate when there's an overarching cause for the characters to get involved in. Undoubtedly the issue was rather more simplified and painted in more black and white terms than it would've been in real life, but I still appreciate that it was even added in in the first place and not just simply tacked on. It really was woven quite intricately into the whole plot and just a lot of kudos for that.

Albert Lowe. Possibly my favourite character in the book, not really sure why.

As usual, my thoughts about the ending:

The whole confrontation between the two Doras and Lord Hollowvale almost felt a bit anticlimactic, although I guess this book isn't meant to be super epic so I doubt there'd be anything big-scale happening. The whole ending set-up just all seemed rather convenient somehow. Everything up to that point had been splendid. Although it wasn't unsatisfying, I feel like we could've had a more dramatic ending. I couldn't believe that that was the end of Lord Hollowvale, just like that, and that the emotional Dora would be happy to just be stuck in Faerie forever and sacrifice herself for the other Dora to go back to England.Also, plus, I really hadn't expected Albert to end up with Miss Jennings. I was kinda rooting for him and Vanessa tbh, or was hoping for him to be the main character of the sequel in this series. I really liked his character!!