"The Familiar" by Leigh Bardugo (2024)

 **So much to say about this excellent, excellent dark fantasy.  But first of all, why aren't more fantasy books set in the Golden Age of Spain???  Amazing**

This was a great one.  I need to read more Leigh Bardugo, don't I?

At its core, the plot of this one is simple, its elements familiar.  A scullery maid, Luiza, has the power to work "milagritos", minor miracles.  Repairing a dish that was broken, fixing bread that was burnt in the oven.  Her powers are discovered by her wealthy employers, and she's thrust into a world she never imagined of court politics and intrigue, where she will find loyal friendship and vile betrayal and sometimes one that looks like the other.  You know how it goes, a classic setup

And yet.  There are so many things that elevate this book, take Luiza's journey and make it something truly fantastic

One thing, I have to say, is Bardugo's prose.  She has an absolute knack for everything from scene descriptions to killer one-liners.  In a passage where Luiza first attends a fancy ball, Bardugo captures the feeling of being lost and utterly out of her depth poignantly:

And now it was as if her working self and her dreaming self were meeting in the quiet of this place, and they had absolutely nothing to talk about.

Every page, it seems like, has a passage that sucks the reader in or a turn of phrase that made me smile.  Like I said up above, I need to read more Leigh Bardugo

Another thing that sets this book apart though, in many ways what makes it truly shine, is the setting.  Setting this book in the Golden Age of Spain, at the height of the Inquisition, is an absolutely brilliant move.  While other authors could have indulged themselves in creating their own world, a fantastic and magical court, Bardugo made the arguably much more difficult task of doing the research to set it in our own (and in the process, learned about her own family history as Sephardic Jews living in Spain--from the book's Acknowledgments:  "Some of my own ancestors fled Spain during the 1492 expulsion. Some remained for a time but were eventually forced into exile. My final thank-you is to the ghosts who kept me company throughout this book’s writing.")

We have so many books set either directly in or obviously inspired by Ancient Rome, Medieval England, Renaissance Italy, whichever era of France you find the most decadent, etc.  How did we all manage to miss one of the most fascinating, deep, and dark eras of European history to set fantasy novels in?  Honestly, I think we're all a bit to blame here

The paranoia and fear of the Inquisition infuses the entire book, to the extent that reading it felt almost claustrophobic.  The cruel men on these pages are even scarier to read about when you know that they really existed.  But the flip side of this is that the heretical splendor of our main characters is all the more rewarding:

“So [Fortún Donadei, another magician's] power is in song too?”

“Yes. He can play any instrument and is said to have materialized a miniature of the marquesa’s childhood pony in the olive trees.” 

“I cannot make something from nothing.” 

“No one can,” Santángel said. “Not even God.” 

“You think he’s a fraud?” 

“Fortún Donadei or God?”

That line put a smile on my face, hah!  The catharsis these characters feel saying things like this is so tangible that we get to feel it as readers.  And if that's not fun, I don't know what is

I loved this book for its setting, but in the end it's the character that truly make this book shine.  Luiza herself is a heroine worth rooting for, her journey--from being shy and bone-deep assured that her place is in the scullery to realizing that she can take control of her destiny--is a pleasure to watch:

"Your ambition will destroy you, Luzia.”

“Maybe,” Luzia admitted. “But let it be my ambition and not my fear that seals my fate.”

But not just Luiza.  Her aunt Hualit, a beautiful woman who does what she has to do to succeed in a man's world.  Her colleagues, fellow competitors in a contest to demonstrate their magic and perhaps win the favor of the King.  Even small side characters who appear in only a few scenes feels as though they have depth and life to them (such as the guard they bribe with a spell to get a woman in his village to fall in love with him:  "'The … incantations won’t work if you’re not clean of mind and heart.' Rudolfo had nodded as if this made perfect sense and repeated back their instructions to wash his body thoroughly every morning, wear only unstained garments, brush the crumbs from his mustache, and use polish on his teeth."  Oh, they also instruct him to talk to her, ask her what her interests are, things like that.  For the spell, of course.  Duh)

The crux of the novel, in the end, is the trio of relationships between Luiza, Don Victor her wealthy patron and "the luckiest man in Spain" (Luiza's aunt Hualit is his mistress), and Don Victor's enigmatic servant Santángel.  And what a joy it is to watch the three of them

Don Victor?  Everything about him can be summed up in Luiza's reaction upon meeting his wife:

Luzia was surprised by how lovely Don Víctor’s wife was. [. . .] Her gown was blue silk, wrought with a pattern of tiny golden ibises. She looked like a ship about to set sail. She looked like prosperity. Somehow Luzia had thought his wife would be plain or shy, that he had sought out Hualit for her beauty and polish. But maybe men like Don Víctor didn’t need to contemplate what they needed, only what they desired.

Yes, well.  Turns out men like that existed back then, just as they exist now

And finally, Santángel.  In many ways, the center of the novel, and in fact he is [spoiler redacted].  Santángel is instructed to tutor Luiza in sorcery, his own powers perhaps even darker than hers.  He appears on the page cloaked in mystery, challenging Luiza and the reader to learn more about this man that everyone fears, Don Victor's dark shadow:

“Why do people fear you?”

“People fear me because I want them to, because their fear makes my life easier.”

I've said as much as I can, without spoilers.  All I can say is that Santángel is a delight to read, in all his blasphemous glory

I can't recommend this book highly enough.  Other reviewers have waxed on about how it straddles the more "serious" literature of historical fiction and the "mere" genre of fantasy, but if you know me you know I hate that distinction.  All I can say is this:  This is a gorgeous book, with a truly fantastic setting, and characters you will be very, very glad you met.  Also hey, no promises, but there might even be a nice little love story tucked in here somewhere.  Read it and find out, I guess

I love this book

She should be ashamed, she knew, frightened. But she wasn’t sorry for any of it. If she was to die, then she would die with memories worth keeping.