Review Detail

"An Enchantment of Ravens" is a great stand-alone YA fantasy/romance about the "fair folk" (fae/fairy) and their relationships with humans in the town of Whimsy. Humans are valued for their ability to Craft or to create, be it art, music, or clothes. For a fair one to do Craft would mean death. The fair folk enjoy Craft so they "pay" humans to create it for them in exchange for Enchantments. If not carefully worded, the Enchantments can be more of a curse than a blessing. Isobel is valued for her Craft of portraiture. She has been frequented by fair folk, particularly from the spring court, to do their portraits. She finds it somewhat awkward to interact with them, not only because of their deviousness and power, but also their lack of emotions and blank expressions. Their immortality removes them from human emotions.

Things begin to change when the autumn court prince, Rook, comes to Isobel for his portrait. As they spend time together, Isobel begins to fall in love with him. Seeing sadness in his eyes, she paints them as she observes them. However, this is viewed as a weakness which makes him vulnerable among the fair folk. After the portrait was sent, Rook returns to bring Isobel to trial for the crime of painting human sadness in his eyes- the penalty of which is likely death. On their path to his court for trial, they begin to learn more about each other and Rook finds himself unable to bring her to trial. They concoct a ruse and travel to the spring court where Isobel begins to paint the fair folk with human emotions (and this has power to give them some semblance of emotions as mentioned in the synopsis).

The Good Law prevents fair folk and humans from being in love, and as Isobel and Rook come to terms with their emotions, they face the penalty of death. Overall, I really enjoyed this book and the pace was great. I felt that their relationship was a little superficial in that we don't see much of the depth to their interactions until later in the book and I would have liked to see their romance building a bit more. The writing was really superb, and it flowed beautifully. The descriptions were really fantastic and brought you into the story. The fair folk really balanced the line between creepy and fascinating (as per design I think). This was a tough book to put down.

I think this will be a huge hit with fans of Maas's Court series! It's a great YA fantasy and forbidden romance that works perfectly as a stand alone.