The Mask of Mirrors, first book in the Rook and Rose trilogy, follows Ren, a con artist hoping to con her way into a noble house having them believe she is the daughter of an estranged aunt.

I went in to The Mask of Mirrors with high hopes. M.A. Carrick is the chosen name for two authors writing this together, one of whom is Marie Brennan, of who I am a big fan. So I went it expecting similar writing that I’ve experienced before from previous books. While I don’t know the second author, Alec Helms, I still had an idea in my head of what I wanted to get from this.
Unfortunately, with the two authors writing together, it wasn’t the writing style I expected, and it wasn’t a writing style that worked for me.

The synopsis hints at nightmare magic, and a city filled with secrets. This is true, but it took more than half of the book to fully get going with that storyline. I found the pacing incredibly slow for the set up. There is nothing wrong with a slow build, but a lot of the first half of the book doesn’t really feel pertinent or like it advances any character development. There is a lot of politicking, and setting up the noble houses as Ren makes her way through the city, tying herself to her chosen household, which should have helped created this city filled with secrets, but instead it just felt like it dragged on. You can see that there are many secrets to come, and there could be many interesting people involved in the nobility, but it never fully engaged me into caring about them or what was to come.

This is very much a personal view of the book, that I ended up skimming the last half. Despite this being where the magic came in, and things should have been getting very exciting, I just found that I wasn’t interested anymore and just wanted the book to be over. Again though, that is my view, because I’ve seen some people fall head over heels in love with this. It’s definitely a a polarizing read, as some may love the slow meandering start, and they’ll have a chance to feel more of a connection to Ren and the other characters than I did. While it wasn’t for me, if you think the synopsis is intriguing, it’s definitely worth checking out!

The world-building and writing of this book are extremely well-written. However, it's really hard to get into this book. There is not enough real plot happening during the first 300 pages, and the many names of people, places, and things are a little confusing without context. It is the type of book you can only read so much of at a time because it is slightly dense. The plot itself is really interesting and intriguing, as are the characters.

I requested a digital copy in order to sample the prose on my phone (since I don't have a eReader) before requesting a physical copy for review. I will update Netgalley once I read & review a physical copy.

My review will be based on the physical ARCs I read.

Rep: LGBTQIA+

This is another book that I wanted to love so much but just couldn’t. There are some good elements to this novel, but it was also a very frustrating book to read. For one thing, the story moves along very slowly; the authors (this is a joint-author work) spend a lot of time describing settings but forget to describe the key elements of the world itself. I’m still unsure of the hierarchical system in place and I don’t understand the magic system at all, even though the authors included a glossary. The actual con is interesting and I would have liked it if the story had focused more on the heist because it was the one thing that I could actually follow along. The characters are interesting but I needed more from them to actually form a connection. All in all, this wasn’t a terrible read but it took me ages to get through it, and frankly, it wasn’t that memorable.

FINALLY an adult fantasy that balances story and worldbuilding!

A few minor mentions;
1. Yes, the story does tend to have a slower pace than many readers may be used to, but this is pretty standard for adult fantasy, as the world has to be built from scratch and explained to the reader in digestible chunks. Pacing was not a hindrance to my enjoyment, but those not used to fantasy (especially adult fantasy) may not be expecting this.

2. There are a LOT of characters. (Also pretty standard for sweeping fantasy series.) The authors do a great job of balancing the POV characters, but I do wish there were some indicator at the beginning of each chapter/section/part that let me know whose perspective I was getting, especially as the character arcs started intertwining more and more.


I received this ARC from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

I received a copy of this book for a fair and honest review. This is the kind of books that grabs a hold of you and does not let go. It has you thinking what is going to happen what mystery or lie is around the next corner. The world in this book is clearly split in two. The upper crust and the underbelly. Ren is no prepare for what she was getting herself into when she went to get herself into a noble house. What she discovers is a lot going on behind closed doors and under the surface and the grandeur of the world she has now enters. It is a great start to this new trilogy.

Much to my delight as a reader, I find myself in an era of stories that combine history-evoking settings (“big skirts”), fascinating systems of magic, and women who are powerful in deep and unexpected ways. The Women’s War (Jenna Glass) and The Midnight Bargain (C.L. Polk) are two recent examples. The newest addition is a complex tale marked by superb characters and intricate, well-thought-out world-building in a world that resembles Renaissance Venice. My introduction to the book was the guest appearance of the authors, Marie Brennan and Alyc Helms, on Juliette Wade’s program, Dive into World Building, in which they discussed the tarot-like system of divination cards. That would be enough for an ordinary fantasy, but here it’s only a small part of the whole: political history and current power struggles, magical systems and curses, poisons and hallucinogenic drugs, a long con, simmering revenge, and a generation-spanning Robin Hood-like cult figure. Friendships and feuds, masquerades within masquerades, romance in every sense of the word, and most of all, a heroine who is at once conflicted, determined, vulnerable, and resourceful. There are occasional echoes of Dickens’s London, as well as other, familiar worlds, but the whole is fresh and original, a page-turner that left me hungry for more. It’s long and that is a very good thing.

I found this to be a sluggish read and disappointing. I love a good fantasy book and excellent world building, but this was so much! It became overwhelming and overshadowed the story. It wasn’t really fir me.

3.5/5

I finally finished this!

It took me a while to get into this, but once I finally did, I really enjoyed it! It reminded me a bit of The Lies of Locke Lemora but more queer.

Once the fantasy elements started to show up, the book found it’s footing. The slow start definitely put a damper on this book for me, but I ended up really liking it and I will be reading the sequel!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher, Orbit, for providing me with an eARC in exchange for an honest review!

Very intriguing premise but doesn’t exactly deliver on the promise. The world building was equally lacking and too much, all at the same time. You’re thrown right into this one without enough background, but then the book goes very slowly providing the details. I wasn’t the biggest fan, and slugged my way though this one, sometimes skipping over extraneous information. Likely won’t pick up the next one.

This book has a lot going on, and with so many threads and characters and ideas to pull together, pacing can be difficult. That difficulty wasn't overcome in The Mask of Mirrors, a slow-plodding book weighed down by the bloat of its own world-building. I love epic fantasy when it's done well, so I promise I'm not just overwhelmed by the number of characters with fantasy names and complicated world-building detail and all that, but it was just a *lot* that wasn't woven together as well as I wanted it to be. It felt like the inventing of a new fantasy world, with all the names and political factions and geography and whatnot, was at the sacrifice of keeping the reader buoyed along on an engaging story, rather than being for that purpose. I prefer my fantasies to toss me into the deep end, rather than infodumping the history and culture at me right off the bat, but you have to *care* about the world for a story to work. Don't describe the culture at me, if I don't care about the people that make and experience said culture. Don't tell me about how people live, let me live it through them. I don't just mean the trite adage 'show, don't tell', I mean I have to care about the world for the sake of something more than just being impressed by a complex world. Let the reader extrapolate more rather than showing off all the detail you planned. This level of detail should deepen your book, but in this one, it felt superficial, without enough to the story underneath all the ornamentation.

I can easily imagine the kind of reader who will enjoy diving into a book like this (and who might be reading this review thinking "Um, that sounds great??"), but it didn't work for me at all.

Thank you to NetGalley and Orbit Books for the advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

This book has so many things I love: con artist main characters, subtle yet intricate worldbuilding, multiple and complex point of views, a charming vigilante character with a secret identity. It’s everything I want in an adult high fantasy book. I had a hard time keeping all the different cultures and names straight in my head, but as the story goes on you are able to piece it all together. The prose is so snappy, and you have to pay attention to every single sentence because it’s packed with so much, whether it’s plot or worldbuilding or just witty comebacks. The whole book was so clever and complex and I cannot wait to read the next book when it comes out.

Intriguing concept and characters, though I did actually have to refer to the character chart to get everyone’s names /family relationships straight. I was invested enough in the story to read it to the end, but at times my interest lagged. Overall, I enjoyed it and would recommend it to fantasy readers. I’d be interested in continuing the series, too.

I received this audiobook from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

The Mask of Mirrors is a dark fantasy adventure following Ren, a con artist who tries to insert herself into one of the noble houses. Unfortunately, Ren isn’t the only one wearing masks in this city. The Mask of Mirrors is full of political intrigue and house warfare.

I gave this book 3 stars simply because of the dense politics in this book. You are basically thrown into this world with no real explanation, having to figure it out as you read. There are multiple different types of magic. Patterning is a type of fortune telling that I equated similar to tarot cards. People can also imbue items and draw numinats (magical circles).

I feel as though I need to reread the book in order to entirely grasp all of the house politics and different magic systems. (Which is not a problem! I enjoy delving deeper into worlds to understand them.)

I recommend this book for fans of political driven adult fantasy with a complex magic system!

While I loved the premise of this book, I found that it dragged in parts and was difficult for me to motivate myself to pick up. I was unfortunately unable to finish this particular title.

The Mask of Mirrors is a slow building heist novel with historical Italian setting and an interesting magic system. Unfortunately, I never got into the narrative. I spent most of the story bored. There were lots of descriptions of clothing, masks, and scenery. Too much, in my opinion. I kept trying to push through to the end, but I just can’t find the will power to go on.

I’m sure that many people will enjoy this story, but it just wasn’t for me.

I received this Ebook from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

4.25 stars. This is an intense and complicated high fantasy. It normally takes me about 4 days to get through a 350 page novel. This is about twice that size, so I figured it would take me about a week. Nope. It took me THREE WEEKS to read. There is just so much jam packed in this book. TOTALLY WORTH IT.

Political intrigue and power-grabbing are not usually intriguing to me in a read, but HOLY CRAP this one sucked me in. There is a lot at play and it is woven together fantastically. So many balls in the air in this narrative, but not a single one drops. It is masterfully crafted.

Expect to be really pulled in and held captive. You will need to move slowly and focus. This is not a breezy read. Hence the reason my read was so long. It is necessary to pay attention to detail and there is a lot of intricate world building. But boy is it magnificent. I love the world that has been created.

The protagonist is a strong and smart female who keeps track of her own scheming SOOOOO much better than I could ever manage. Honestly, EVERYONE in this book has something up their sleeve and it is freaking awesome. There is so much backstabbing and alliances for the sake of achieving something nefarious. Darkness and deception are around every corner and from every angle.

The magic system is super cool and I LOVED the transporting/underworld type scenes. It felt like existing in a mist or a dreamlike state and just added to the complexity in a fantastic way. There was so much darkness and intricate workings at play. I will admit that it was hard to keep up with what was going on now and then, but when it all fell into place it was amazing. This will definitely be one of those books where I read it again to really understand everything going on. And I'm totally cool with that. This world and its characters are fun, intriguing, and just morally gray enough to totally have me hooked.

I'm anxiously awaiting the next installment in the series.

* Disclaimer: I received a copy of this novel from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

THE MASK OF MIRRORS is a Venetian-inspired high fantasy with a richly detailed world, tons of political intrigue, a large cast of characters, and a kind of politically charged mystery involving government corruption and the shadow of ethnic cleansing.

The worldbuilding takes the cake here, though oddly, I found it both very detailed and strangely lacking; that is to say, some aspects were overtly, needlessly detailed, while others, like the religion and the magic system, were glossed over. Like, randomly in the middle of the book, they mention spirits and I was like, wait, what, there are spirits in this world? And then they mention curses and I was like, but wait, how do curses work, exactly? This was the crux of my issue with the magic system: problems emerge out of nowhere and then are just randomly solved out of nowhere by introducing a new element of the magic system. It felt very convenient and so I eventually ended up kind of skimming a lot of plot points to do with the magic, because I was far more interested in the political intrigue and corruption.

I enjoyed the characters, particularly Vargo, but sadly I found our main character Ren to be kind of...flat? It's disappointing, because she's meant to be this clever con artist defined by her ability to scheme and lie, but she was also just so morally upright despite this that I found her really boring. I couldn't connect to any particular aspect of her because it felt like she was just there to move the plot along. Thankfully, I enjoyed her interactions with other characters; she is definitely a linchpin for the plot, which means she interacts with everyone.

Contrary to all this criticism, I enjoyed this book a lot! I finished it fairly quick because I found myself gravitating towards it and unable to put it down. I also like that the main conflict was resolved by the end of the book and most of the questions raised were answered. It was a fun time and I'm fairly certain I'll pick up the sequel.

This is easily one of my favorite books read in 2021. The characters' relationships and their development throughout the book was endearing, and I was so invested in their stories. The magic is really interesting and kept me intrigued. The world building was a bit complex but very well done!

A con artist targets a failing aristocratic family only to discover they need her as much as she needs them. This is a thrilling adventure story with a complex plot in a fascinating world with cut-throat politics, high fashion, crime lords, masked adventurers, and plenty of magic.