The answers lie within.
Boarding school student Talia Morris has no idea her boyfriend, Nathaniel, is a Mystic, let alone second in line to the throne of a secretive, aspirational magical community―one no mortal has ever been allowed to step inside. Until now. Nathanial’s cousin is about to be married in the biggest wedding the magical world has ever seen, and Nathaniel is allowed to bring a date. Talia is the lucky recipient of the golden ticket every Mystic wannabe in the world would kill for―only she doesn’t want it. Talia thinks Mystic worship is lame and stupid and unnecessarily aggrandizes people for being born a certain way. When she finds out Nathaniel is “one of them,” she almost jumps ship. But Nathaniel loves her, and she loves him. So when he begs her to give his family and their community a shot, she reluctantly agrees.
Enter the most fantastical world any mortal has ever seen, and the coolest magical wedding ever. After a few days of bonding with Nathaniel’s family on the island, of seeing how beautiful their magic is and how peaceful their community, Talia’s about to be won over―until the entire wedding party suddenly falls into an unexplainable coma and the community goes on lockdown. Talia, the outsider, is pegged as the culprit and has to do everything in her meager non-power to prove her innocence. As she embarks on a journey to find the truth, Talia soon discovers reality is not all it seems, and her past may put her in more danger than she ever imagined.
In this captivating YA fantasy, Talia must solve a multigenerational mystery and break a curse, all the while being torn between making her family proud and regaining the trust of the boy she loves.

Talia has a heart condition that she inherited from her mother which killed her. Talia takes all of her money out of her savings to go to Mystic Con and have a Mystic, magic user, heal her. When she gets there the mystic accepts her money but says there is nothing wrong with her. this enrages Talia and now she hates mystics. Fast forward a year later and she is happily attending a boarding school and has a wonderful boyfriend that wants her to come home with him during spring break. The only problem is, he's been hiding that he's an island mystic, a type of mystic that can only use magic on their island. Talia accepts with reservations. The rest of the book unravels some intricate family drama that Talia had no knowledge of because of unknown memory loss from magic performed on her.

I was wary at some points in the story but the end really brought me around. This title was extremely compelling and I had a lovely time reading it.

Talia hates mystics. Born with a heart condition she visited a magic convention with the idea that a mystic could cure her. He didn’t. He took her money and tricked her. A year later she’s dating Nathanial the most popular boy at their boarding school. Right before fall break, he breaks the news to her, he is a mystic. She doesn’t know how to feel about that, but agrees to go to his family home for a wedding during break. Her black outs have returned and she’s starting to have visions of memories she doesn’t actually remember. Nathanial and his family are mystics connected to their island, so his mother askes the island for help with Talia’s headaches and memory issues. Marni Penning is a great narrator for this book. Landers does a good job of explaining the different types of mystics, without bogging us down. Good read.

This was a fun standalone (I assume) that was a look at an alternative present, where magic exists in the world but not everyone has access to it. While it was fun to have the different types of magic and the rules governing its use set out in the story, at heart it's really a coming-of-age story that deals with some weighty topics, most notably grief over the death of a parent. I very much enjoyed listening to my first ALC, and I thought the narrator was pleasant and did a good job conveying all the emotions in the story. I'd recommend this for any YA fan, including those who think they don't like fantasy books, as this is a good contemporary overlaid with a light fantasy plot/setting that could get them to feel differently about the genre.

Lumara was a great listen and the narrator really brought the story to life. I was intrigued and interested in the story all throughout, found the characters to be inviting and realistic and really enjoyed everything!

Thank you to the author, Net Galley and the publisher for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.
I enjoyed listening to Lumara. The narrator was fantastic. The story kept my interest. There were a few parts were I was like, what just happened and wished things would have been explained/clarified a bit more. I loved the world building and felt all the elements of the story fit together well. I really loved the ending scene. I will be purchasing this book for our library.

This is definitely meant for middle schoolers and early high schoolers. It over-does the explanations and repeats a lot to get the point across, and the protagonists are quite immature. I ended up listening to the whole thing in one sitting, though, and I enjoyed the overall arc of the story.. I can see it going over well.

Thank you to NetGalley and Disney for the ARC.

I adore Landers writing and I really enjoyed Lumara. This story had some big twists and turns and I was so here for it. Towards the end I enjoyed the moral of the story and then I felt it got a little more over complicated. I wish this was flushed out a little better but overall this was a fun read that is packed with Magic and surprises that make it even more unputdownable!

Wow! I just got blindsided by an unexpected twist!

This book starts off as the tale of two adorably over-achieving students at a posh boarding school who adore each other. The girl, Talia, has a debilitating heart condition and her mother died early from another illness so she just has her father, aunt, and cousin in her life. She attempts to get a cure for herself from what is essentially a magician, but when he can't help her she turns into an anti-magic social media influencer while staying top of her class. She then finds out her boyfriend has been concealing the fact that he is a magician from her, everything goes sideways, and it turns out this book is not at all about boarding school. This is magical murder mystery was a quick read and the ending was open enough there could be a potential sequel, although it wasn't a cliff hanger.

Great narration.