Matcha & Motifs Book Review: 4/5 

Iris Winnow returns home with her brother to a city that pretends war isn’t happening. Despite authorities trying to silence their voices, Iris and Attie are determined to continue reporting the truth about the war, and decide to venture westward closer to the front. Meanwhile, Roman wakes in Dacre’s domain, without injuries and without his memories. He becomes a correspondent for Dacre, writing about the war from Dacre’s narrative. That is, until Roman receives a mysterious letter from someone he doesn’t know, but feels drawn to. 

***CONTAINS SPOILERS***

Plot 

I liked this book as a follow up and conclusion to this magical duology. Some components that were cute, but didn’t necessarily work out for me was that the correspondent between Iris and Roman felt like a recap of book one. Despite this, I do think the plot itself was pretty solid. Ross has a way of creating a natural flow of events. The pacing in this book felt nice, and the action kept me on edge. For example, when Iris learned where Dacre’s army was planning to attack, they warned Enva’s army and almost got caught by Dacre and his hounds. 

Additionally, even though I didn’t enjoy our protagonists being separated, I did enjoy seeing Roman play spy. It definitely added a lot to the war and action aspect of this series.  

I wish there was more world building amongst the gods and their myths. For example, more myths to deepen their story and give us more context. It was cool to see how Dacre was a tangible character and not some god who was mysterious and make-believe. I actually thought that Dacre’s war methods were very devious and cunning. It’s a strange gift that this parallel god to Hades, the ruler of the underworld and dead, would have the power to heal. Of course with his character, this healing comes at a cost. Then as readers, we get hit with the amnesia trope which I hate but this book did it well. Dacre’s methods of attacking towns, taking in the injured, and tricking them to join his side is genius. Even the way he had his offers written, or the way he promised safety for the last town standing was all executed well. In my opinion, his character outshines Enva’s. 

Romance 

I liked the romance in this book. I just wish there was more of it. For example, I was smitten by the idea of Roman falling in love with Iris all over again, as well as Iris’s unwavering faith and loyalty. It was comforting to know that somehow in this magical world, Roman felt a connection towards Iris, even without his memory. He knew she was special to him. 

I loved how they ran into each other, so coincidentally, but also like fate. For example, when Iris went back into the town to find a wrench and Roman found her hiding upstairs, and they had a moment, that made my heart stop beating. Also, when Iris met him at the cafe, they had to play the roles of coworkers again even though he missed her so much. There was so much tension in this scene that had me holding my breath. All of these moments, when she snuck into his room and they spent the night together, and Roman’s speech about why he betrayed Dacre, were all so wonderful.

But man, I felt unsatisfied. I am yearning for more build up like book one. I felt more heartache in this one, like all these little moments were stolen time. It really felt like the end of the world. Having our protagonists separated the entire book took a toll on me, it felt like I couldn’t win as a reader.

I do want to mention that I enjoyed the development of new relationships in this book, like Attie and Tobias, and Forest and Sarah. I thought this was cute because it felt like everyone was finding their person even as a war was happening. This leads me to my last point, the ending. 

Ending 

I’m not sure if this is an unpopular opinion, but I felt that Forest dying did not cause me to like the book less. Yes, this was a sad heart wrenching moment and I did cry, but I felt like he was destined to die. I do wish there was a little more significance to his death though. Perhaps it was to connect Iris with Roman better since Roman did lose a sibling too? Or maybe, it was hammering the idea of loss and grief in war?   

Additionally, I was curious about the route that Ross was going to take to end the war, was it going to be an all-out battle. That didn’t seem feasible since Dacre’s army was huge, and Enva’s was on its last leg. Or would it be some sort of scheme to kill Dacre? An inside job perhaps since Roman is so close to Dacre? The war was beginning to get political, with the rebellious group The Graveyards, who were anti-Enva, but also felt anti-Dacre too? So I wondered if they would make a move and if we successfully won, what would post-war look like? 

Iris’s and Attie’s plan to lure Dacre to sleep long enough to kill him with the magical sword felt like such a good plan. Plus, all the information like his wyverns dropping bombs meant that he was underground was integrated so seamlessly into the plot. But I think it’s so dumb that Roman doesn’t play a role in the final battle against Dacre. I get that Attie’s gift is music and Iris is the main character, so together fighting Dacre made the most sense, but it felt like Roman was robbed of his moment too. Why did the author decide to let him get caught at the end??? I guess to prove that he didn’t have the main character immunity but still!!! I did not like that, especially because he played such a crucial part in gathering intel that allowed the last standing army to evade and survive Dacre’s wrath. I was sad for Roman. 

Another thing that felt disappointing was that if Dacre was so open with his tangible self, I wish Enva was a little more present too. It felt like she was hiding in the shadows except when in a dire situation, she would magically appear like a guardian angel. Despite this, Enva felt drab, and world building felt a smidge lackluster. It was okay in the first book because there was still a lot of mystery, so I thought we would get the grand reveal in book two, but we didn’t. In fact, I would’ve loved to explore the idea of Enva being more morally gray. She is painted as the “good” guy in the myths and even in the war, but yet she killed the other gods and stole their power all so that Dacre wouldn’t get them. That feels kind of dark to me. 

Final thoughts on the final “battle”, it was good, go girl power, but I felt that it could’ve been better.

Overall, this series was wonderful. I think the first book is incredible. This one falls a little short but is still a good end to the series. Please let me know what your thoughts are on book two of the Letters of Enchantment series!