The Last Magician is one of those fantasy books you can’t put down. It’s well-written, fast-paced, and there’s a lot of intrigue and morally gray characters that keep your attention all the way through. When I say morally gray, I mean you won’t be able to tell which characters have good intentions and which ones are in it for themselves.
Everyone is suspect until the very end, and there are some shocking discoveries in the last pages!
I generally enjoyed the writing, though it was a bit overwritten. You’d read the thoughts of the characters and then see how they act and what they say, showing the same thing. The author has fallen into the ‘over-explaining’ trap, but it’s not so bad that it gets you out of the story.
I thought the main character, Esta, is an extremely satisfying strong female character, as she and the other main character Harte, keep playing each other and seeing who will outsmart the other, which results in a very authentic and very fun enemies to lovers, but without the cliched parts of modern books. I didn’t roll my eyes at them once and there was a point toward the end where I almost cried at the lovely ‘moment’ they had, which only lasted a second. Don’t expect some kind of epic love with romantic moments, this is not fantasy romance. This is a fantasy book with a bit of romance in it, but the focus is on the heist and on the secrets everyone is keeping.
I thought the characters were fascinating, even more so than the team in Six of Crows. This is a book about magical heists after all, so I can’t help but draw the comparison. However, I must give it to the author – they kept me at the edge of my seat, trying to guess who is genuine and who is a saboteur. Not to mention, I did not see the shocking twists at the end.
The conflict was sky-high. Between Esta being torn between the past and the future, between her trying to constantly outsmart the Magician, and the Megeus being stuck in the city and slowly dying because of the actions of the evil Order. Between those who genuinely want to help others and those who honestly don’t care and just want to help themselves… this book will keep you guessing.
Overall, this is one of the best fantasy books I’ve read, and I recommend it to anyone who loves – magic heists, ragtag teams, found family, alchemy, secret societies, morally grey characters, female strong character, enemies to lovers, and addicting fast-paced reads.
-Reviewed by Violeta Nedkova
