This was another atmospheric read from Saft, whose A Far Wilder Magic is one of my favourite books of all time. A Dark and Drowning Tide leans heavily into folklore and mythical creatures whilst also serving on the world-building and characters.

An academic mission featuring a rivals-to-lovers Sapphic romance, murder, and mystery kept me engaged and interested, though the pacing could be uneven at points. The main characters were rich and well-crafted, and the secondary characters were handled well, even if some of them didn’t really carry this through to the end. The core romance reminded me a bit of Divine Rivals, just more angsty and with a much more irritable grump. The book attempts to tackle some challenging themes, such as colonialism, racism, and oppression, and I can see where Jewish horrors and histories have influenced the story. That said, Saft’s writing is beautiful and lyrical, and there are some amazing moments where I was thoroughly lost in the magic of it all.

I received an e-ARC from the publisher, Daphne Press, through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you, NetGalley, for the eARC of this book.
As an avid fantasy reader with a love for all things sapphic, I knew I would enjoy this book, especially after reading the synopsis on Waterstones. It was an immediate pre-order, and I was happily going to wait for the book to come out. However, I was fortunate to be approved for an eARC. While I wanted to start it immediately when I was approved, I was going through an incredibly prolonged reading slump: I’m a mood reader and couldn’t begin reading “A Dark and Drowning Ride” by Allison Saft. But once I overcame my blip and lack of reading, I was drawn into the magical and emotive world Saft creates brilliantly.
We follow Lorelei as she is chosen to lead a challenging group of individuals, each an expert in their field, on an even more challenging expedition. Add in an academic rival who Lorelei verbally spars with daily; it’s no surprise that everything goes wrong from day one, especially after Lorelei’s mentor, Zieglar, is murdered. Angry and incensed by King Wilhelm’s threatening letter, Lorelei swears that she will find out who murdered her mentor and find the Ursprung, a magical spring full of untold power.
Each chapter is embedded with metaphors and beautiful language that create an atmospheric novel; the book fits brilliantly into the fantasy and romance genre and is a delight to read. I mainly read fantasy and have found that there are many books in the “romantasy” genre that I didn’t enjoy reading but this one I liked. It felt more like fantasy, especially with the heavy hints of Jewish folklore and political intrigue.
Saft creates an engaging world that immediately drags the reader into the narrative. I was intrigued from the beginning and loved reading about Lorelei’s longing/hatred for Sylvia. Saft immediately shows the rivals to lovers from the very first chapter through scathing and snide comments that eventually lead to a sweet love where they would willingly die for one another. There weren’t many romantic moments in the first 60%, but I found myself kicking my legs into the air for some of the cuter moments. Despite those moments, the novel has moments of darkness and mystery that make it an interesting read.
I really enjoyed the book. The main character, Lorelei, a Jewish folklorist, was my favourite character. She was rough around the edges but showed an incredible aptitude for survival. She was loyal but only when it suited her, and I loved that she grew out of that habit for Sylvia.
This was my first time reading an Allison Saft novel, and I plan to pick up another. I’m happy I pre-ordered this one and absolutely love my physical copy.

Oh. Wow.

Full of folklore and fairytales, dark academia and politics, this story encapsulates it all.
Lorelai has been studying to be a folklorist her whole life, hoping to finally be accepted by the kingdom as good enough to be a free citizen. Paired up with her academic rival Sylvia and four other eccentric nobles, they begin a quest to discover the Ursprung, a spring with unlimited power and magic - for those considered worthy.

The writing flows and the characters are so incredibly distinct in personality and quirks. The majestic nature of Sylvia’s affinity with magical creatures is evident from the beginning, as is Lore’s intelligence and wit. It took a little while for me to initially get into the story, but once I was, I couldn’t stop reading!

Tropes/themes:
🌊 rivals to lovers
✨ murder mystery
🌊 folklore
✨ kingdom politics/race wars
🌊 sapphic love/ LGBTIQA+ rep

A gorgeously atmospheric tale of folklore, self-discovery, and the strength of human bonds.
Lorelei Kaskel, a sharp and determined folklorist, ventures into a misty coastal village searching for a mythical spring, only to uncover secrets that threaten to unravel her world.
The prose is as simply beautiful, immersing readers in a tale that feels timeless yet intimate. Perfect for those who enjoy richly drawn characters, eerie landscapes, and stories where the lines between myth and truth are tantalizingly thin.

this was so gorgeous!! i cannot emphasise enough the beauty of allison saft's writing (though that surprises no one, she's never let us down). this was such a stunning fairytale type story, with a really unique mythology and magic, and the most insane academic rivals to lovers sapphic relationship.

"back in the days when wishes still held power..."

i really enjoyed this world with all its heavy folklore aspects - it was well formed, interesting, and such fun to read. the plethora of fascinating creatures and clever little stories were so well interwoven into the novel, and i honestly wanted to know more about all the unique beasts and critters. please write a little compendium, allison saft!

"this place had made lorelei into a viper, and if she should go down, she would go down hissing like one."

i also adored these characters. lorelei was angry and sometimes rude, she was brusque and trusted no one, but she had so many reasons to be that way. it broke my heart to see her and her people beaten down time and time again, and i thought her character was really well-written. i loved seeing lorelei slowly open up and begin to trust people (sylvia) more, she deserves the world!

and sylvia... my little angel. just a ball of happiness and fluff - sylvia always looked on the bright side, and trusted in everyone, to almost a concerning level. get this girl some street smarts! some suspicion! she always tried to treat lorelei with kindness, despite sometimes receiving... not kindness. and honestly, i loved her full obsession with lorelei. their obsession with each other, really! their rivals to lovers relationship was so gorgeous and all-consuming, and i want more of it!!

"that night, as she did every night, she dreamed of drowning. only that time, in the exquisite and unbearable sweetness of sylvia von wolff's eyes."

thank you so much to netgalley, and the author and publisher for the arc copy!

A Dark and Drowning Tide combines a slow burn romance, political/ academic intrigue, a touch of magic and a murder mystery that must be solved before more fall and the academic mission falls apart.

Filled with atmospheric world building, magic and creatures from folklore the setting itself will captivate you. The academic elements were intriguing with scientific ways in which magic could be measured and plotted, combining well with the more traditional such as studying folklore and mythology in order to chase down magical locations. The slow burn romance is full of angst and tension, with a sunshine v grumpy element which was one of my favourite elements of this tale.

I do wish this book was longer as I believe some of the side characters could have been further fleshed out in order to heighten. the tension and the stakes. Sadly on a couple of occasions I mixed up characters or had to turn back a couple of pages to figure out what was happening.

Sadly ,I've had to do a soft dnf for now and come back to the book in the future. I think the writing was very good. Based on what I've read so far I would still recommend this to people I know would love this type of story.

It's not been long since I finished this book and I'm honestly struggling to remember any details about my feelings on it, which says a lot in itself. I didn't enjoy the experience at all. The characters were confusing, whiny and unlikable. For the majority of it I felt like the main character actually properly disliked the love interest so I don't see the appeal of their love story*.

*I will say that the confession scene was executed very well and made me miss my bus stop and I wish the entire relationship could be as strong as that one scene

It's also not very often you find a corrupt fantasy world and leave it exactly as is. Is the ending meant to feel satisfying or joyful? I was just thinking how grim it is we did nothing about the prejudice, incompetence and inequality of the ruling class. But hey, the MC is doing better so I guess that is enough.

It's also impressive that a mystery book was so profoundly uninterested in solving a mystery. Like girl do some sleuthing if you're gonna mark yourself as murder mystery.

I think from the premise I wanted this to be Voyage of the Damned, and it didn't come even close which left me feeling disappointed.

Oh hey look I did have things to say in the end.

The atmosphere and character relationships were beautifully written, but I felt like it definitely could have packed more of a punch at the end

My feelings towards this book started out aprehensive and remain mixed after finishing it. The cast of characters and their backgrounds seemed really cheap to me, and although I found myself really invested in the story and the romance, I feel like the ending was weak and lacking in consequence. With the political plot, it really feels like the story would benefit from a sequel (which appears to not be the plan), and without it it's just dissapointing, especially with how much fun I've had around the middle of the book and how invested i got in the world.
While the romance was really good - the pining! - some of the choices in pacing were weird to me, especially with how Lorelei would entirely change her mind in the span of a couple of chapters. Also, with a perceivedly butch/masc main character, it unfortunately didn't provide on the front of intersecting experiences of a butch/masc ethnic-religious minority, which i found really dissapointing.
Two of the more interesting characters from the expedition's crew were also kind of stripped of their own stories, personalities and reactions by the end, which was also just a real bummer.

This fantasy, dark academia, slow burn, sapphic romance was a joy to read and had me turning pages in anticipation of what happens next. This 'enemies' to lovers tale follows two FMC, grumpy Lorelei and little ray of sunshine Sylvia who embark on a fantastical adventure as a dangerous duo in Brunnestaad! I was mesmerised by the characters and world building and loved the botony and wildlife backdrop entwined with a enchanted shifting forest. I love the way Saft pens her characters and I felt such a pull towards Lorelei and Sylvia as their emotions heighten and feelings towards each other blossom.
I look forward to reading more from Saft as this was the first book I've read so will be picking up some of her previous work.

A very interesting take on dark folklore mystery. I enjoyed Lorelei as a sceptical grumpy character and the contrast of Sylvia to her. Their dynamic was one of my favourite parts of the book, both of their characters complemented eachother well. Each character had an interesting backstory that I was excited to learn about and all had their flaws and different motivations. The magic system and world were refreshingly different to some books I've read recently and the folklore behind it intriguing. This was an engaging darker sapphic fantasy mystery.

It had a weirdly pro-colonial message to it which is uncomfortable enough but then you add in that this is based in a fantasy version of late 1800s/early 1900s Germany (the story seems to be a fantasy retelling of the colonisation involved in creating a consolidated Germany in 1800s under Wilhelm I and the oppression of Jewish people in Germany during 1900s) and it just gets worse. The book frames the people who we are expressly told have been starved, discriminated against, and/or had their culture repressed after their country was invaded and colonised as the villains for wanting to get rid of the explicitly tyrannical and antisemitic emperor who colonised their country.
What's weird is that this message doesn't feel intended for part of the book given how many times we’re told how bad the emperor is and how horrific the antisemitism Lorelei experiences is - it just feels like a very underbaked idea that the author didn't know what to do with after she'd written herself into a corner, so we end up with this pro-colonial message to wrap everything up quickly.

If anyone was looking to scratch that dark academia itch and loved A Study In Drowning - this book is for you!

This was a great short read (for myself anyway) that had me hooked from the start. The storyline is unlike anything else I have read and I really enjoyed how the characters developed. They seem like polar opposites but as we all know, opposites attract.

There is just the right amount of world building to help you understand what is happening but not bog you down. And it contains some of my favourite tropes such as grumpy/sunshine dynamic and rivals to lovers.

Definitely recommend to anyone looking for an addictive sapphic, dark academia read!

Unfortunately I DNF this book after about 20%. Whilst the story itself seemed really interesting , I instead struggled with the writing style and found it hard to understand.

Lorelei is an expert on folklore, which would make her perfect for an expedition to find the mythical fountain of youth, but being Yevan sets her apart. She has never been able to move past the whispers that she steals children, or that she and her family are unclean because of their religion. Now, forced to cooperate with lords and princes who have always looked down on her, Lorelei must decide who she wants as her ally, and who she can't afford to trust.

I should have loved this book. It had all the makings of a 5* for me, but unfortunately, I found it difficult to connect to many of the characters. Partly, I think this was a characterisation issue. I found a lot of the dialogue clunky and unbelievable, especially when the other characters decided to monologue at Lorelei about their pasts. Why would they be so willing to discuss difficult and often personal topics with someone they don't trust? I also struggled with the pacing, particularly with the weaving in of some of the folklore and tales. It often became exposition, and broke up the pace of a scene rather than supporting and lifting it.

Lorelei herself was an interesting unreliable narrator (and the way her reliability was undercut by the other characters was very nicely done). Her rage was well-integrated into the plot and her interactions with other characters and the political system. Ultimately, however, I found I didn't believe enough in the characters surrounding her to really connect with the book.

Straight away I was drawn into this book by the slightly too serious main character Lorelai as she navigated a world of politics that did not have her interests at heart. This book has it all, folk tales come true, magic, a locked room mystery, betrayal, yearning romance and a happy ending.

There are a lot of twists and turns in this book and moments that leave you guessing.

Thanks to NetGalley and Daphne Press for the opportunity to read the ARC of A Dark and Drowning tide.

Strong premise and I like the dark acedmia vibes, I just found I didn't connect with the characters and the overall execution. I think its target demographic is slightly younger than I was hoping for/am, but a more YA audience might enjoy it more.

Thank you to Netgalley & Daphne Press for the opportunity to read this arc. I am immensely grateful & had heard a lot of things about this book prior to reading it but have been left dissatisfied.

Unfortunately, I made the difficult decision to DNF this book at 57% which I have contemplated on doing since I would say around the 40% mark. I will discuss a few reasons why, primarily I have a large tbr pile and ultimately I’d rather spend my time reading something that interested me. I will go into why this didn’t in further detail. I definitely could have pushed through and read this I think, however I just didn’t have the energy to do so. My main issues with this book are both the main and side characters & the structure of the world building.

Firstly, an issue I had and have seen others deal with is the fantasy lore dump in the beginning and throughout of the book. I found it really confusing and hard to keep up with, I wasn’t able to ease my way into it and often I found myself lagging behind the book in situations. It almost felt like I needed to keep up with it but it was purposefully leaving me behind. I honestly couldn’t keep track of all the information between the different regions, ethnicities and history between them all. It also jumped locations while info dumping which was a difficult combination whilst trying to get into the story, sometimes I thought I missed a page and would look back to see I didn’t even though it read like I had missed something.

Secondly, and my biggest issue, was that I didn’t care. I don’t mean that in a rude way: the characters were difficult to care for therefore there wasn’t high stakes for me because of this. The main character was incredibly hateful, spiteful, and I immediately could see that it was meant to be an enemies to lovers but it was almost trying to convince me that she secretly liked this person (but was so spiteful whilst doing so¿) when the reality was that their tension wasn’t romantic to me. It was more like two people from different cultures skirting around the awkwardness and the intenseness of their histories and places in the world and were forced into proximity of each other. I usually love enemies to lovers but I knew that it couldn’t convince me of this one within the last 43% of the book, especially when it was painful reading the love interest obviously liking the main character despite their horribleness. The other side characters were not likeable and felt very flat for me, and I do not care about their shared histories and romantic tension between them. It unfortunately just didn’t do enough to get me to be interested or care for them: I think if it spent less time of the side characters and more on fully immersing us into Lorelei and emphasising with her plight and building on her determination then it would of been better.

I also think it is important to mention the colonial elements to this story and the influences of Jewish & Nazi histories embedded into it. There are multiple 1 star reviews that discuss this in immense detail that I would implore you to read as I believe a few others have put it more eloquently than I could. But, ultimately my own opinion is that the side characters read as privileged colonialists (unsure if this was purposeful- perhaps we really weren’t meant to like any of them except for Ludwig?) and the overall colonial arch of the story felt too shallow and not fleshed out enough. I think more care needed to go into this aspect of the story despite the authors background, I think maybe more sensitivity readers could have helped? It did not read well.

Overall I think that this book was trying to do too much in too little time. I think the structure of events were too simultaneous & sporadic for me to really get a feel for this book. I did enjoy the magic system elements but ultimately the main character was not likeable and the romance felt too forced for me to have any desire to continue.

I enjoyed reading this haunting tale of mystery, betrayal, and dark allure with a splash of romance.

The mystery was gripping enough and I liked the appearances of creatures from folklore as well as the introduction of stories here and there. However, I wish there was more world building overall and more information about the magic system.

It took me a while to get into the story at first because of Lorelei, the main character. Her attitude appears as quite antagonistic, but we get to know her throughout the story and can empathise with her attitude and wariness towards others, given their view of Yevanisch people.

Sylvia was an interesting love interest, I can understand Lorelei’s fascination with her. She is an intelligent, kind, alluring, and beautiful woman who comes from a different world than Lorelai. Her compassion for all the creatures was so strong and I loved seeing her interact with them.

This book was overall an enjoyable read and I would recommend it if you like sapphic romance, dark academia, and folklore based stories.

Thank you Netgalley, the author, and publisher for the free copy of this book. As a disclaimer I received this book after publication and I had a few other ARCs to finish first, hence the late review.