There are many ways to start a novel that can hook a reader's attention. For me, starting it with a serious religious debate of how women are weak, impure, and likely to be damned by God isn't the best way. I think it's certainly possible to have a religious society in fantasy that looks down upon "pagan" rituals, but here it seems very divided amongst gendered lines, which just makes me angry.

I really hope the author set up these expectations with the purpose of showing how women are in fact strong and amazing by the end of the book, but I won't finish reading this to find out. Just in the first 15%, the parts covered by the provided synopsis, the male MC rats out his "pagan" female best friend, resulting in a massacre of women, and a male priest essentially brainwashes men with disgusting patriarchal nonsense. If I wanted to read about how women are inferior to men, and how men must "save" women for "their own good," I'd read a history book or honestly just watch the news.

I received this novel from net galley and the publisher. Thank you!
This novel was a good read. Discovering one's true destiny is a long and difficult path. However, both Marta and Jayme have their own destinies ahead of them. Marta and Jayme has been friends since they were children, and it has evolved into something more. Jayme has gotten involved with the priests, who have different views of women, believing they are not intelligent and only good for cooking, cleaning, and breeding. Believing he is trying to save Marta's soul, Jayne inadvertently betrays Marta and the other young women, Jayme is able to save Marta, but feels the guilt at what he has done and seeks the true motives of the priests. Both Jayme and Marta continue on a path towards a LightWarrior and a LightWalker, where they undergo training separately under those who wish to stop the darkness from consuming the world. Both need to embrace the magic and overcome their own fears to understand what it truly means to be part of the Light and save the people who need it.