Thank you to the folk over at Net Galley for an early release of this book in exchange for an honest review.

IM GOING TO NEED A MINUTE TO PUT MY THOUGHTS TOGETHER FOR A FULL REVIEW, but what I can tell you right off the get go is Allison Saft's writing is only getting better. I think she really went out of her comfort zone for something more Sapphic, but damn does her talent really shine in intermingled folklore, imaginative magics, and spell binding story telling. It's got that perfect blend of slow burn romance and heart gripping plot that really keeps you invested.

A immersive and fast paced fantasy filled with folklore, nature, and sapphic love, A Dark and Drowning Tide is everything I love in fantasy. It is dark and atmospheric with beautiful fairytales woven in. I particularly enjoyed the discussion about why fairytales and myths are so important and how they impact society. Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group for the e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I huge thank you to netgalley, Allison Saft, and the publisher for this ARC.

I adored Allison Saft's A Far Wilder Magic, and just recently purchased Down Comes the Night, so you can imagine how much I squealed when I got this as an ARC.

I loved it. I give it 4.5 stars, I rounded up for on here because I really would recommend it to everyone! The characters so real, with fleshed out backstories. It touched on some things I loved, like found family, and people sticking together and trusting each other because they have been together / friends for years, but finding that just because you have known someone forever, doesn't mean that you know them at all.

The main characters I adored. I fell in love with them as they fell in love with each other. Sylvia was my absolute favorite.
I also loved the little whodunnit plot inside the main story.

My only wish was that the ending didn't feel so rushed to me. As much as I love a slow burn, I'm sad we didn't spend more time with them in love. What a pair!

More of a review on my Instagram - @bookish_starry_skies

Ms. Saft, if you are reading this - please approve me for A Fragile Enchantment! I would love to spread my love of all your books.

An amazing and compelling story with beautiful writing to go along with it. I found the writing a bit dense in the first part, but after I sped through this book, I couldn't put it down—full review on Goodreads.

I absolutely devoured this book. The first couple of pages pulled me right in with the characters and the bickering and kept my attention until the end. Lorelai Kaskel is a folklorist who is sent on an expedition, along with 6 nobles, to find a mystical body of water for a King. While on this expedition Lorelai is tasked with solving a mystery and she is forced to work along side her academic rival, Sylvia von Wolff. The story that unfolds is an angsty tale of sapphic loved intertwined with beautiful and poetic folktales that seem to call out injustices. The tension and slow burning build of the relationship is so delightful. It is grumpy/sunshine done in a gothic dark academia way. *chef's kiss* The adventure and action is sprinkled throughout and keeps the reader on their toes. And the mystery is perfectly drawn out and solved in such a satisfying way. A perfect combination.

Thank you to NetGalley, Random House Publishing Group, and Del Rey for this advanced copy! You can pick up A Dark and Drowning Tide on September 17, 2024.

I really enjoyed this one! The magic system and world were fascinating, especially learning about all the legends and creatures in Brunnestaad. I appreciate the level of detail Allison Saft went into to paint this picture for us.

The academic rivals to lovers was really well done! Lorelei's attention to Sylvia was perfect, though I did see Sylvia's feelings from miles away. I wish they'd gotten together a bit sooner, but the payoff was worth it when they finally acknowledged what they are to one another.

At times, Lorelei's self-sabotaging nature did grate on me, but it also felt realistic. People don't change their nature overnight, and I shouldn't expect Lorelei to be any different. She was an interesting character to root for, especially when sometimes I just wanted to grab her and shake some sense into her.

Overall, a great read for people who want a bit of a darker, fairy-tale-esque fantasy with some in-depth cultural ties and great academic rivals to lovers sapphic romance.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC! The cover of this book is what first drew me in first - it’s beautiful.

This standalone fantasy involves a group of individuals that embark on a journey to find the Ursprung (a fabled source of all magic and the King’s current obsession) with an emphasis on two academic rivals, Lorelei and Sylvia.

The writing in this story was beautiful. So descriptive with a flourishing vocabulary (highly recommend reading on Kindle so you can have a dictionary at the tap of your finger) that made it easy to visualize their magical world.

Standalone fantasies can be hard to execute, especially when it comes to world building. But, I felt that Saft did well with giving information when it was necessary.

If you want a to be immersed in a world, but for a quick read, then give this one a try.

I love me a good book with gothic sapphic romance with a rival to lovers in an academic setting!
This proved to be an absolute gem that swept me away with its eerie, spooky yet hauntingly beautiful writing.
The story centers around a murder mystery. The plot twists and turns in unexpected directions, kept me on the edge of my seat.
However, it's the romance that truly stole the show for me. The slow burn - it's a slow burn that's delightfully unhurried, allowing the tension between the characters to simmer and build with anticipation. The romance aspect of the book was my favourite, slow burn was really slow burning for sure hahaha. But the tension is what I lived for! It was adorable!

Thank you, NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group – Ballantine for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

sapphic slow-burn academic rivals to lovers gothic folklore? I did not think I could possibly love this more.

Wonderfully written! The murder sub-plot felt rather whodunnit-esque, which was interesting. As for the romantic build up had me giggling and kicking my feet in the air at the possibility of holding hands.

The cover art is absolutely stunning as well. I can’t wait to purchase a physical copy and highlight/annotate accordingly!

(Thank you Netgalley for sending a copy in exchange for an honest review!)

This is the atmospheric, gothic romantic fantasy/murder mystery of my dreams. It is quite possibly the most well-written book I’ve ever read, and I think it’ll live in my head forever. It was absolutely riveting from the very start, and I wish it hadn’t ended!

Tropes:
Opposites Attract ✨
Forced Proximity 🤌🏻
Tending to Wounds 😍
Rivals to Lovers 🫶🏻

This book was eerie. The descriptive imagery had me a little spooked at times in the best way possible. Allison Saft’s ability to turn this haunting fantasy world into something believable was incredible. Her use of metaphors had me highlighting basically the entire book. She’s an incredible author.

This is a murder mystery of sorts, and I genuinely had no idea how it would end. There were several times that I just wasn’t sure this would end positively, and I was NERVOUS. It wasn’t predictable at all.

The ROMANCE….wow. The tension was palpable throughout the entire book. It’s slow-burn, but reading Lorelei’s internal dialogue had me BLUSHING. The yearning, the longing, and the wanting (yes, I did say basically the same thing three times) was incredibly romantic. I found myself really rooting for her happiness, and wow, was it satisfying.

I was prepared to wait until September to read this, but I am so grateful to Netgalley and Del Rey for allowing me to ARC read this. It’s one of my all time favorites now!

Words cannot describe how much I loved this book. It drove me insane. It made me go feral. A Dark and Drowning Tide is utterly enchanting and dripping in folklore. I deeply enjoyed the folk stories, all the different creatures, and the divine atmosphere. The romance was very slow to develop but oh so worth it. This is a romance that will leave you gasping for air. You will feel the yearning and desire coil around your heart and seize it violently. This is by far my favorite Allison Saft book to date, which is quite impressive because all her books have been 5 stars. Officially an auto-buy author for me.

i just read a book where it had sapphic rivals to lovers with a mix of folklore and adventure in it and u want me to be calm after?? yeah, as if. this was such a magical experience for me. i'm out of words. oh how i adore lorelei and sylvia. my precious dark hair x light hair duo, we love u. they were stunning and brilliant, their banters are an absolute delight. i highlighted sooo much, saft literally has a way with words. and god help me when i read some of these sentences it made me want to go to a corner and just sob for hours (in a very good way). i'm so extremely grateful i could meet them earlier, a big thank u to the team for making my wish come true. i'll be here contemplating what to do now.

one thing's for certain is that this is a big win for sapphic nation. thank u allison saft.

3.5⭐️ - I was initially drawn to this book based on the description and it did not disappoint...not to mention the beautiful cover! Sapphic enemies-to-lovers, gothic vibes, with a murder mystery. It did take me a minute to get into and keep track of the characters, but once I did I flew through the remainder of the book!

Thank you NetGalley, Random House Publishing Group, and Allison Daft for this digital ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This book was a solid 4.5 stars for me. There is something so intriguing about a dark academia setting with magic that also incorporates queer love. It was a dark read with mounts of betrayal and secrets with so many twists and turns. I thoroughly enjoyed this read and will be recommending it to anyone who enjoys the aesthetic.

Lorelai is embarking on a quest for the king of Brunnestad with her professor and a group of other naturalists to find the Urspsung, the well of all magic. On the first day of the quest, however, their professor is murdered and Lorelai must work with her academic rival, Sylvia, to uncover the murderer while searching for the Urspsung and fighting off fair folk at every turn.

This is a very cute sapphic rivals to lovers story. It gives off similar vibes to Emily Wilde but with a younger cast of characters and more politics and religion throughout. I thought the fantasy-Jewish angle was really interesting to see in a novel and really well handled.

Sadly this one wasn’t really for me. I appreciated the dark atmosphere and the elements of folklore, as well as the two main characters, Lorelei and Sylvia. However, most of the time I found it difficult to get through. I think it was more so a case of me not being interested personally, as I can see why people might enjoy this. The rivals to lovers romance was well done with lots of tension, bickering, and secret pining. Lorelei was the epitome of the grumpy to Sylvia’s sunshine.

Aside from that, it took me ages to differentiate the other characters from one another and I didn’t care for any of them, nor did I care to follow any of the politics of the world. I have enjoyed other books by this author such as A Fragile Enchantment, so I would still be willing to read more in the future.

Thank you to Random House for the ARC!

Thanks to Netgalley and Random House Publishing Group for the ARC in exchange for my honest feedback.

This one was hard for me to really get into - the pacing dragged a bit and it was hard for me to feel connected or excited about the story.

With that being said - I absolutely believe that there is an audience for this book and I believe that there will be plenty of readers who enjoy the book, it just wasn't my cup of tea.

Allison Saft is a great writer and I did enjoy one of her characters more than the others - Sylvia. Sylvia has a happy-go-lucky way about her that drives other people mad. She's a fun character who marches to the beat of her own drum and can be unconventional. She's more dreamer than some of the other logical characters, like her rival Lorelai.

I was hopeful that the sapphic love story aspect would be more intriguing, as I'm a sucker for a good romance, but I did find it to be lackluster.

I would recommend this book to those who are interested in gothic fantasy turned murder mysteries - give it a try, you might like it!

Thank you so much to the publisher via Netgalley and the author for providing me with an arc!
I was so excited to review A Dark and Drowning Tide as i'm always up to read a sapphic fantasy romance. I had such a good time following the story of Lorelei and Sylvia. Their hardships and their goals evolving as they got more and more involved with each other and the more they learned about one another had me giggling and rooting for them to have their happy ending. Not only was their relationship developing among a murder mystery written really well, but the hardships and discrimination that Lorelei and her people had to experience was felt and understood. Lorelei and Sylvia had everything on the line riding with the expedition and finding out who murdered their mentor. The gothic setting, the imagery, the atmosphere, and the enemies-to-lovers was an added bonus. I would have loved to know more about the magic system and folklore. Everything that this book set out to do was done and executed beautifully.

3.75

This was one of my most anticipated book for 2024 and I came out of it a bit underwhelmed. I thought that the writing style was too dense to enjoy which lead me drag my feet through the story. I found the characters a bit too generic so I wasn't fully invested nor attached to any of them. But I love the world-building, the mythology, the setting and that cover is to die for. I've read every single one of Saft books at this point and this certainly won't be the last. This was a great adult debut nonetheless, even if it didn't specifically worked for me .

A Dark and Drowning Tide was such an enjoyable read. A great combination of dark academia, murder mystery, a crew on an adventure, and sapphic romance. Some of my favorite things were:

- The world: was really interesting, I loved learning about the different wildeluette, the folktales, and the exploration of it as the group traveled on their journey.

- The characters: I really loved Lorelai and Sylvia. Lorelai I loved from the beginning, but Sylvia was one that grew on me throughout until I was as mesmerized by her as Lorelai is. The rest of the group were also really interesting and it was really fun to try to guess at all of their innocence/guilt and to learn more about their motives and background.

- The plot: was pretty fast paced and exciting. If you like exploration and adventure then you should enjoy this book. Some things I guessed at but some things I had to wait to find out. I think overall it was a pretty good mix of both which made it an enjoyable read for me.

- The romance: this was probably my favorite part of the book. There were multiple times I would giggle and smile while reading the interactions between Lorelei and Sylvia. It was so adorable from the very beginning all the way to that final page (I cried happy tears at a couple of points). They are so good together, the same in some ways and opposites in others. I want a novella with just their adventures together in the future.

Overall I would highly recommend this book and I can’t wait to read more of Allison’s writing, I hope she writes more sapphic romances in the future.

Thank you to the publishers, Netgalley, and the author for the ARC I read.