Tessa Gratton is an amazing writer. Her words and her world building leave me re-reading lines and paragraphs again and again. In Strange Grace, we see a fairy tale come to life, but it's not a retelling that we've come to expect. This feels like a whole new tale full of gruesome choices and an impossible foe.
It would be hard for me to pick comparable books, but Margaret Rogerson's An Enchantment of Raven's or Roshani Chokshi's Star-Touched Queen left me feeling similarly enthralled and wanting to immediately reread once I finished.

I like every other Tessa Gratton novel, but I couldn't get into this one. I didn't give up because I was hoping it would get better, but it just wasn't for me.

This book was well written. The plot was intricate and had twists. The characters were well developed. I actually liked this better than "Queens of Innis Lear", This was another great novel.

A bewitching (literally) story. Lies and betrayal and misunderstanding...a recipe for a great story! An excellent YA recommendation for fans of fantasy.

In this dark fantasy tale, a small town lives in quiet prosperity-but at a price. Every 7 years, they must offer a tribute of sorts, a "Saint", who must survive the night in the Forest. If he can outsmart the Demon who give the town all of its boons, he may live- but most are never seen again. The "Grace", or with in training wants to go into the forbidden forest and save her beloved, but it is forbidden. This fascinating plot could have a prequel or related short stories, which would happily read. An unusual love triangle and plot twists make for a page-turning read.

Strange Grace is an interesting story that was hard for me to follow. I couldn't' connect with the these characters.

With this title not having a Kindle download option I tried to read with the PDF version via BlueFire reader but the file only keeps closing out at around 10 pages in. First time I've had this problem when a Kindle version is not available and only seems to be this particular book so I won't be able to read/review.

In the village of Three Graces, everyone is prosperous and healthy but in order to ensure their good fortune, they must sacrifice a young man to the Devil's Forest when the Slaughter Moon rises. The man to be sacrificed is seen as good and pure by the people – practically a saint. So when the Slaughter Moon rises early, three friends are thrown into turmoil and each chapter switches between each of them as they deal with that this means. There's Mairwen, a young witch tied to Three Graces and its rituals but finds herself longing for the forest she's not meant to enter. Then there's Rhun, expected saint, who truly is a good person and probably my favorite character in the book. And lastly, there's Arthur, an outcast with a complicated history with the village and who struggles to define who he is. In terms of world-building and the story itself, I found it to be just okay? It's dark and mysterious but lacked clarity. It was hard to picture what was being described and truly immerse myself in it. Instead what I found the most interesting was the dynamic between Mairwen, Rhun and Arthur. Aside from their collective friendship, the relationships between Mairwen/Rhun, Mairwen/Arthur or Rhun/Arthur were equally complex and I wish more time had been spent on that.

Do I recommend? It wasn't for me so I can't personally recommend but as always, if you're interested you should check it out.

I absolutely loved this book. In fact, I don't have enough words to describe how much I loved it. I was hooked from the very beginning. Strange Grace is a dark, gory, magical tale that will mess with your mind from start to finish and will leave you wanting more!

The author weaves magic throughout this entire story. The build-up leaves you turning page after page, staying up way past your bedtime, reading well into the night, unable to put down the book or close your eyes. This is a book that will really get under your skin.

I loved the elements of black magic, sorcery, folk tales, and overall witchcraft in this book. The entire story reads like spiders crawling up your spine. A gentle tingle you're almost unaware of at first, but which eventually builds up into a terror inducing sensation that you simply can't shake off.

I loved the imagery, the characters, the relationships between the characters. Our three main characters struggle with so much internal conflict throughout the book, at times some of them seemingly alternating between extreme love and extreme hate for each other. Underneath the cold, hard words and thoughts they throw at each other, it is clear that the characters love each other deeply and ultimately will risk everything to save each other. The relationships are diverse and natural and fluid and beautiful and I fell in love with these characters and the simplicity with which the author allows them to love each other no matter their gender(s) or social standings. They just are. They just do. I love them for it. I appreciate this book so much for it. I would love to see more bi/pan characters in fantasy books that just ARE, without the author needing to explain or justify or explicitly be label them in the stories. This is probably one of the things I loved best about this book.

Of course, I also loved the pacing, the language, the scenery. This is my second Tessa Gratton book and I am eager to get my hands on everything else she writes/ has written.

The synopsis of this book had me intrigued but sadly the story didn't live up to the hype. There was a lot going on and absolutely nothing going on at the same time. Confusing right...that's how I felt. A sacrificial offering every 7 years to a devil in the woods, a twisted love triangle, witches, monsters, and a town with an eerie back story. This book has all the elements of a great horror story but it's lacking the thing that should bring all of this together. It's slow paced, predictable, and the quirkiness of the MC's was downright annoying. I did like the ending but it was just too much of a struggle for me to get there.

This is a dark fantasy. It was truly creepy but captivating. This book will have you thinking about it once it’s over. There is also LGBT representation and self-discovery.

Thank you Netgalley for this ARC in exchange for an unbiased review.

WHY’D I PICK THIS BOOK TO READ?
Strange Grace by Tessa Gratton is the kind of book that makes me think of fall. The storyline looks dark. The setting and writing is quite atmospheric. Also, there are witches. I thought I would enjoy this because a long time ago, I liked Gratton’s Blood Magic book. Unfortunately, it just did not pan out with this book.

WHAT’S THE STORY HERE?
Strange Grace, from what I gather, is about three young adults – Mairwen, Rhun, and Arthur. All three are in love with each other. They live in this magical valley where no one ever gets sick and where there’s always a plentiful harvest. It is blessed because of a bargain with the devil. Every seven years, the best boy goes into the forest for the night. He either comes out at the end or doesn’t, but the devil is satisfied. Mairwen and her mother are the Grace witches. Anyways, the forest calls for a sacrifice only three years out from the last one, thus there’s concern that the bargain is broken. And, yeah, that’s about the gist of the story.

HOW LONG DID I LAST?
I got to page 110 out of 400 per my Kindle.

WHY DID I DNF?
Honestly, I was B O R E D. BORED. It isn’t like I did not want to try to finish this book. It gets some really great reviews. One even compares it to books by one of my favorite authors. However, I just could not bring myself to care. You know how some books are so slow? You find yourself doing things like reading all of social media until the bottom where it says, hey no more posts to read. That happened. I got to the end of Instagram while reading this book. I had not attachment to any of the characters. Also, while the prose is very pretty, I just felt so bogged down with it. It just seemed a bit overwritten. And you know, I gave it the old college try. I had every intention of finishing. However, now I am reading a romance novel and feel much more driven to keep reading.

IS THERE ANYONE THIS BOOK WOULD APPEAL TO?
People who like a good turn of phrase that happens to be super poetic and pretty. Also, people who are into dark, lush stories. If you’re a patient reader obsessed with witch books, give it a shot. Also, I will say that this book is cool because it explores different types of sexuality and gender. I won’t discount that at all — I think it’s great to see representation in a book and would recommend to anyone looking for pansexual representation and I guess also possibly non-binary representation.

“They made this bargain with the devil: every seven years their best boy is sent into the forest from sundown to sunrise, on the night of the Slaughter Moon. He will live or die on his own mettle, and for his sacrifice the devil blesses Three Graces.”

Strange Grace is a unique read. Dark, atmospheric, with a dreamy wildness not normally seen in YA Fantasy. It’s full of pagan, witchy elements; charms made from bones, sacrifices on altars, forest gods..and devils. It drifts towards horror and suspense at times, otherworldly surrealism at others, but at all times it’s firmly rooted in teenage relationship angst.

“A Grace witch began this bargain with her heart”, her mother says, “and your heart could end it.”

The isolated village of Three Graces has had a bargain with the devil of the forest on its boundary for two hundred years. Their village is free from illness, premature death, famine, bad weather, and general hardships. But in exchange, every seven years they must send a boy into the forest for the night. The bargain survives even if he returns at sunrise, but only four boys in 200 years have ever been seen again. It’s a sacrifice the village is willing to make for the idyllic life, and they find comfort in the reliable rhythm of the bargain. But only three years after the last slaughter moon, the bargain is failing. A baby is born far too early, wounds won’t heal, and crops are blighted. Dread mounts as the characters struggle to discover why the ancient bargain is failing and what they’ll have to do to resume it.

Our main characters are Mairwen, Rhun, and Arthur, teenage best friends with a lot of convoluted and confusing feelings for each other. Mairwen is the daughter of the village witch, descended from the original Grace witches who struck the bargain with the forest devil. Rhun Sayer is beloved by all, and believes it’s his destiny to be the Slaughter Moon boy and offer up his life for the others. And Arthur is an angry, hard boy with fire in his blood. He was raised as a girl for the first seven years of his life by his mother, who hoped to avoid him being the Slaughter Moon sacrifice. This has left him with some serious psychological hurdles as he tries to prove that he’s a tough guy who can survive a night in the devil’s forest.

Some people are going to love this book. I was not one of them. It started off really strong, creepy and suspenseful, but the whole middle of the book had a dreadfully slow pace as it seemed more character driven than action driven. And because I felt the main characters were written very opaquely, their actions and motivations rarely clear, it made for frustrated reading. Sometimes the author’s use of metaphors and descriptions were spot on, but most of the time they were utterly bewildering. I also felt that the magic system was not well defined...charms and witch magic/customs were just kind of thrown in willy nilly, and none of it made sense. This might not bother some people, but I like to understand how and why the magic works, so the “less is more” style leaves me confused. Some descriptions at the end, which could have almost been creepy-cool magic a la Pan’s Labyrinth, were too bizarre when you tried to picture them.

So many times I felt this book was really close to being fantastic, where you’d get a glimpse of a perfect and wild and dark story, but there were too many things that tripped it up for me. Like I said though, I know there are a lot of readers who will like this style. And if you’re looking for LGBQT rep, this book is full of it. Like, 75% of the main and secondary characters are Bi- or pansexual.

Overall I give this 2.5 Stars, rounded up to 3.

While I enjoyed Ms. Gratton's United States of Asgard series, I have to admit I had a hard time connecting to the characters in this book. I felt like it was taking too long for the plot to develop, even when it seemed as if the conclusion was already foregone. The revelations that came up should have been exciting, but even they weren't enough to pull me in. I'd already planned on purchasing this book for my collection, so I may give it another try, but, sadly, this just didn't measure up to her book The Lost Sun, for me.

[Review will be posted on Reader Voracious Blog on 9/13/18]

This is such a weird and beautiful book. Friends, I am struggling to find the words to articulate how much I adored this book. While the premise of a hundreds-year old pacts that provide prosperity to a town in return for sacrifice isn't new, I found Strange Grace to be refreshing and captivatingly written and is one of the best witch stories I've ever read. 4.5/5 stars

Three Graces is an idyllic town: there is no disease, the weather is perfect, injuries heal overnight, and crops grow in abundance. Provided that the bargain is upheld every seven years on the Slaughter Moon, everyone is safe. Everyone except for the town's best boy, who volunteers for the honor of being named the next saint and ensuring that the bargain continues. Everything has gone smoothly for two hundred years, but something is wrong with the bargain and the Slaughter Moon has come four years early.

"He will live or die on his own mettle, and for his sacrifice the devil blesses Three Graces."

The book is told in the alternating perspectives of our three main characters, each of whom are tied inextricably to the bargain as well as each other. Their love for one another, as well as their town, is absolutely endearing.

-Mairwen Grace is the daughter of a Grace witch and a saint
-Arthur Couch was raised as a girl, Lyn, because his mother didn't want him to be named saint and run for the bargain: "to have a son in Three Graces was to live in terrible fear" . Unfortunately his secret was discovered, and has made himself hard to prove his "manliness" to the town, wanting to be named the saint but no one really taking him seriously.
-Rhun Sayer comes from a line of two saints and has almost been raised with the expectation of his fate, to the point that he assumed that he has no future after his run. He is good, pure, and kind -- just the characteristics that would make him the best boy and saint.

This ways that the book tackles the society's expectations of gender is nuanced, from Arthur's genderfluid identity to the gender reversal of the "sacrificial lamb." Three Graces is not without its gender roles, and it was heartbreaking to watch Arthur struggle to fit into either of the worlds but falling in-between. My favorite character is by far Arthur - watching his arc and coming into himself was such a breath of fresh air. I struggled a bit with his homophobia early in the book, but that was as much about himself than a product of the society - there are a number of queer relationships in this book, including a polyamorous one, and the representation is heartwarming.

I truly adore books where both the plot and characters drive the story forward, and I can say that this is the case here! The characters bring a heart to the story and humanizes it, but the lore of Three Graces and the bargain are interesting on their own. The prose gripped me, the characters tugged at my heartstrings, and the plot had me devouring the words - I read this book in one day because I was absolutely engrossed by it. I do wish that the magic system was explained a bit more; we do not learn how it works or what the limits are. We know that the female descendants of the original Grace sisters inherit the practice, but I wish it had been fleshed out a little more!

Gratton's writing is poetic, descriptive, and absolutely captivating. The characters are full of life and each experience development, and I truly enjoyed reading each of the perspectives. Often times multiple perspectives wind up being jumbled, but the way that the story develops it just flowed. Melanie said that reading this book is like reading a lucid dream and I cannot think of a better way to describe it. It's weird, and you will likely be a bit confused in the beginning with the character relationships, but I sure you will settle in and fall in love.

Overall, Strange Grace is an amazing atmospheric and poetically written story that celebrates the found family, the love people feel for one another, and the sacrifices they are willing to make for the people they love. I totally wholeheartedly recommend this book and I hope that you pick it up.

cw: animal death, bullying, death of a parent, gore, human sacrifice

Many thanks to the publisher for providing me an electronic advanced reader copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. Quotations taken from an uncorrected proof and may change upon final publication.

Strange Grace is a quick fun read that hits all the high points. An intriguing read that is sure to stay with you long after reading.

Had an issue with the file on my phone and wouldn't let me redownlad to finish reading. UGH! What I read, about 25%, was good and now I hope my library gets it so I can finish it! I like the writing style and the story grabbed my interest. Wish had a kindle option vs just the pdf that my kindle doesn't support. *Rating based on what I could read.

4.5 stars. This book is weird and wonderful and dark and I devoured it!

Three Graces is an unusual town. No one falls ill. Crops always thrive. Wounds heal quickly. Life is peaceful. But this peace comes at a price as every 7 years on the Slaughter Moon, the town's best boy is sent into the neighboring Devil's Forest, a dangerous and haunted wood, to spend the night, almost always dying for the bargain that keeps the town safe, but becoming a saint in the eyes of its citizens. However, now it's only been 3 years and the bargain is failing. Mairwen, daughter of a witch and a former saint, Rhun, the town's next saint, and Arthur, burning to make his mark in the world, must solve the mystery, possibly sacrificing themselves and those they love in the process.

I have really enjoyed Gratton's books in the past and Strange Grace exceeded my expectations. The writing is beautiful, poetic without becoming purple, and creates a haunting, dreamy mood for the dark events, mysteries, and passions that fill the story. The story is set in a world that resembles Wales of centuries ago, but is never described past the forest and town, giving the story a timeless quality. The plot moves at a steady pace and Gratton has expertly woven a mystery that keeps readers intrigued until the very end of this unique and original fairy tale.

Mairwen, Rhun, and Arthur are all well-developed characters and the relationships they form with each other are both surprising (especially for a YA novel), and happily accepted and treated as natural. The Devil's Forest itself is also a character, wild, untamed, and unpredictable, dangerous and beguiling, luring the reader with the same pull as it holds over the characters.

I highly recommended Strange Grace for lovers of poetic dark fairy tales such as Angela Carter's The Bloody Chamber, Leslye Walton's The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender, Laura Ruby's Bone Gap, and Anna-Marie McLemore's Wild Beauty.

Strange Grace is a book about a town that made a deal with a devil. Right off the bat I thought the idea for this book was very unique and it was definitely something I wanted to get my hands on. When first starting this book I have to admit that I was sucked in by the atmosphere. The beginning was intense and I liked how dark and beautiful Three Graces sounded to be. Something about witches and saints and devils, I mean how could I possibly resist?

I knew what I was in for when immediately we started following three different characters. Mair, Rhun, and Arthur grew up together and at first, I wasn’t a hundred percent sure how I felt about them. I really hoped it wasn’t going to turn into a love triangle, so I was pleasantly surprised with how their story went. I wasn’t expecting the story to also follow other characters from time to time either.

This book takes place over the course of just a couple of days really, but it certainly doesn’t feel that way at all. Starting off this book, it was fast paced in my opinion, but then after a couple of chapters it almost mellowed out for me. There was so much happening, but yet it didn’t feel like the way I thought it would. There was plenty affecting these characters and this town and I thought I would be able to feel the panic and frenzy that clearly was happening to them.

There were moments when I wasn’t entirely sure how I felt about the characters and then I realized why. This story was more like I was in the audience watching this happened, rather than being apart of the story myself. Which there was nothing wrong with, it was just a completely different experience for me. Overall this definitely was something different and unique and I’m glad I was able to get my hands on it.

5/5 stars

I am seriously blown away by this beautiful book and cannot begin to express just how much I enjoyed it. Of course I knew that Tessa Gratton can write - but this - this blew me away.

Strange Grace is a story of a small town, nestled in the mountains and cut off from the rest of the world. It is a story of three friends: Rhun (a saint), Mair (a witch) and Arthur (an outcast). It all began with a bargain with the devil - prosperity and protection for 7 years in exchange for a saint (who runs into the forest and has to survive the devil). Only this time, something is wrong - the bargain only held for 3 years of seven and now Rhun, the chosen saint has to run into the forest sooner than he thought. Unable to let Rhun run alone, Mair and Arthur run in with him - and all hell breaks loose.

What I simply adored about this book is that nothing is just one thing. The bargain is not as simple as it seems, Grace witches are not what they appear, being a man is not defined by gender, and neither is being a woman. Gratton really digs deep and examines what it is to be a friend, a lover and a family. Not only that, but she digs deep into how we let others define us, when only we can define ourselves. Arthur, who was raised a girl for 8 years and then discovered and thrust into boyhood, finds it hard to identify with one gender and his struggle is so real, so palpable, so confusing (the language Gratton uses is so powerful) that I wanted to scoop him up and just hold him.

Strange Grace is about friendship, family, change, gender identification and love. It clearly shows that love is present in all shapes and forms and we cannot judge it when we see it.

If you loved Uprooted by Naomi Novik - please pick up this beauty - I promise you will love it.