having read the first book in the series, i had a feeling of what to expect. this book takes work to read though. there is a ton of slang I am not used to . the basic story plot is fun , and adventurous, but it is as disjointed and all over the place as the Library of the Dead was. I am not sure if that is just the way Huchu writes or if I just struggle with it. All in in a fun book though once you get past the idiosyncrasies,

I sure do enjoy the personality of Roja, the protagonist of Our Lady of Mysterious Ailments and of The Library of the Dead. She has this foul mouth but a tremendous intellect, way past your average 15-year-old or 65-year-old for that matter. She knows history, philosophy, science; she knows Occam's Razor for heaven's sake. I wish I knew half the stuff Roja knows. (I'm jealous of a fictional character. Sad.)

I admit I miss her ghost talking and playing the mbira to help understand the ghosts. Even though her magic is now beyond ghost talking, I liked the personalities of the various ghosts and the way they always said, "Booga Wooga!" (Disclaimer: As a child I used to play ghost--I was, um, that kind of child, and I always said, "Booga Wooga!" Who knew I could speak ghost when I was a mere tyke.) Maybe in future books we'll see more ghost talking.

Roja, her family, her friends, and her boss are likeable. The badies are nasty, foul, and super unlikeable. And, I got to learn some super cool Scottish phrases and terms. Now I'm going around saying "I dinnae know that."

Thanks to Netgalley and Tor for allowing me to read and review an eARC of Our Lady of Mysterious Ailments.

I was SO THRILLED to be approved for this sequel to one of my favorite books of last year! Ropa is back, and as practical, funny, and fiery as ever. This novel brings us to Edinburgh locations old and new: I particularly liked getting to see into the eponymous Our Lady of Mysterious Ailments, where Priya works as a healer. Priya, Jomo, and Ropa are an unparalleled trio, and while in the last novel we usually got to see Ropa interact with them separately, Huchu upgrades them to squad status in this sequel.

This novel also sees Ropa coming up against some serious classisim, both within the Society and in the old-boy club of the private Edinburgh Ordinary School. I began to better understand the differences in treatment and perception of rich, privileged magicians compared to home-trained magicians such as Ropa, and the way in which certain types of magic are disregarded simply because they are not understood or practiced by the wealthy white elite. I am still enormously curious about the oft-referenced but ill-explained Catastrophe, and OLMA coquettishly drops hints about what happened while tying the situation into a deeper tale of insidious English imperialism that goes back hundreds of years.

Really, my only complaint is that I wished we'd gotten to see more of Gran and Izwi, but I'm crossing my fingers that they play a larger role in books to come.