Lori's stuck in a fay realm decoding ancient scrolls for a sketchy fay Queen, but Lori also thinks the captain of her elite mercenary squad, the Silver Ravens, is super hot. The problem? Lori cannot convince Tamsin that the Queen is anything other than a bastion of goodness, despite the mounting evidence otherwise.

The Good
– Two good twists
– Passable prose

The Bad
– Lori is supremely unlikable
– First half is tediously slow
– Nothing meaningful happens
– The fat-shaming
– Weird pacing
– Allllll the telling over showing

There are expectations, y’know? If a character is decoding ancient scrolls, you expect clever puzzles. If a character is sent to a fantasy realm, you expect them to use magic or at the very least, TOUCH a sword. If you read a romance, you expect SOME romantic tension. Literally ANY AMOUNT.

I won't lie: Silver Ravens was a struggle to get through. It’s full of characters, situations and lines that add nothing to the story. Lori decoding the initial puzzles on earth? Boring. The ~10% dedicated to Lori meeting and travelling with the Silver Ravens to the castle? Boring. (Referring to them as “crazy drug addict cultists” wasn’t a great move either, Lori really sucks.) Lori decoding scrolls at the castle? Boring.

The second half is chaotic. After the Queen's nephew steals the scrolls, Lori joins the Silver Ravens and they are constantly on the move, harassing the slave race (oh yes there’s one of THOSE) and shooting at things. With guns. Modern guns. Lori has sniper training.

But most of it is simply taking up space. Rarely meaningful, rarely interesting, rarely entertaining, rarely contributing to the “romance” between Lori and Tamsin, which is mostly Lori thinking, “Ah yes, Tamsin is hot, but too bad she’s loyal to the probably secretly evil fay queen.” The pacing is off, and it feels like wall-to-wall "and then THIS HAPPENS" without any rhyme or reason. What was the point of having Lori, Tamsin and Shorty—was it Shorty? the Silver Ravens are all so forgettable—navigate the maze, set off the pressure trigger trap, and kill a bunch of dragons? It could be swapped with Lori taking a shit and we'd have the same outcome.

However, I'll give credit where it's due: the twist with the Queen and the Silver Ravens was interesting, as was the one at the end.

Any attempt at a diverse cast is outweighed by Lori's comment on how as a cult, the Silver Ravens are "doing well on multicultural credits," and also the boggarts, who are basically a slave race to the fay, and who the Silver Ravens, besides Lori, treat like cannon fodder.

It helps none that Lori is so unlikeable character. Mind you, I don’t think “likeable” is a strict requirement for an protagonist , but those characters have a specific role, and also, the author is purposeful and in control of their characterization. Lori is simply unpleasant. She is weirdly judgy from the start. Right away she is mentally judging the dentist’s receptionist: she’s fat, she’s a fake blonde, she's wearing too much make-up, she's stupid. This isn’t a character I want to spend any time with, let alone ~100k words with.

Silver Ravens is written in third person, past tense from Lori's point of view. Fletcher's style is a bit scrambled. Her paragraph and sentence structure is fine, but she focuses too often on unnecessary details and uses too many weak or filter words. Characterization was weak. But the killer is Fletcher's telling-over-showing: there's no between the lines, everything is spewed out onto the page with no thought to order or usefulness. And the reverse: showing when the subject matter is boring and skippable.

The reality is that, when you write a book, every word needs to contribute to something—multiple things, if possible—be it plot or character development, foreshadowing, etc. At the same time, it needs to remain interesting enough to keep the intended audience's attention. In Silver Ravens, very little—if anything—contributes to those end goals, and besides a few throwaway lines, it's not entertaining.

Story—★★☆☆☆ (1.5 Stars)
Characters—★★☆☆☆
Writing Style—★★★☆☆ (2.5 Stars)
Themes and Representation—★★☆☆☆ (1.5 Stars)
Enjoyment—★☆☆☆☆
Overall—★★☆☆☆

Recommended For...
Unfortunately, Silver Ravens was supremely unenjoyable, and I struggle to recommend it unless you’re desperate for f/f fantasy novels.

(Thank you to Boldstroke Books and Netgalley for providing an eARC in exchange for an honest review!) (Annnd I’m sorry!)

Not really my bag but the book was well written and had an unusual storyline which kept my interest most of the time. The world was particularly interesting and well drawn. The romance seemed a bit of an afterthought, it could have been woven into the story earlier.

A great book with a good plot and interesting characters. There are turns and twists to keep you geussing and good amount of action. The addition of a romance is the icing on the cake. I thoroughly recommend this to any fantasy fan and lesbian romance fan

It took me a good while to get to this book, but overall I liked it. Jane Fletcher is a new author to me so I was intrigued to learn how I would feel about her and this work.

I wish there were more fantasy than it provided, but it was a good foray into some light fantasy. I always like these type of stories where someone from our world is teleported to a fantasy world so Fletcher already won bonus points for that. Adding some English lit references was a nice treat to me as an English major; I was pleasantly surprised. The relationship between Tamsin and Lori was truly a slow burn. This novel's focus isn't really the romance but the world and other characters involved, which isn't a bad thing, but I was hoping for much more into the main characters' relationship. I did love the dark and creepiness of the fae and magic involved in this world and how it weaved together the destinies of Tamsin and Lori. It was well enough that I want to try to check out more of Fletcher's other fantasy books, at the very least. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to read this.

Definitely worth a read - 3.5 stars

I particularly enjoyed the start of this book. The blend of IT professional, cryptic clues and the whole other world of Annwyn was like a good cup of tea and a biscuit.

Lori and Tamsin as the main characters were interesting but I would have loved more depth of both characters and their relationship.

I don’t normally read fantasy but I always make an exception for Jane Fletcher as the worlds she builds are always unique and exciting. I really enjoyed this book and couldn’t put it down. Lori’s inner voice was really funny and I found myself laughing out loud at her musings many times. The storylines about the scrolls and the challenger to the throne were engaging and well written, although I found the plot a little confusing at times, and with so much action packed into a single novel the two leads didn’t spend as much time as I would have liked so the romantic storyline wasn’t particularly prominent. However, I very much enjoyed this book and look forward to reading the author’s next book.

Sometimes I ask myself if I have lived under a rock the past years. Also while reading this book: why haven't I heard of Jane Fletcher before! Obviously, because you tend to read what you know. But I must say I had a great time venturing out from the known!

Fletcher did a great job with creating her world: Annwyn. Lot's of details that make it a lust for your minds' eye. Annwyn is flat and when you go off one side, you come back in the other. This made me think of a video game, which is funny as Lori is/was a game developer. Sentences like "The castle looked as if it had grown, rather than been built." gave me the ultimate fantasy feel while reading.

In the prologue, we meet a young Tamsin as she seems to go up in smoke. A very cool scene to start the book with. Later we meet Lori in the present day and the way she says goodbye to her old life with Jess. I loved the way Fletcher made you be part of Lori's thoughts. It made me instantly like Lori because of the way she still trusts her ex on certain topics despite what she has done to her.

The connection between the two worlds is brilliantly made. The decoding challenge Lori has to face when on Annwyn could have been more detailed for me. But I can imagine that other readers think the level of depth is just fine as Fletcher did it. Not everybody likes decoding games, but don't let that hold you back, you won't be bothered by it while reading.

The inner voice of Lori in this book is witty and funny, a delight to read. Characters are diverse and all have their role to play. The plot-line is well thought about and not an open door. There is romance in this book, secondary to the story-line but nice.
I can recommend this book to any fantasy lover.

I received an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I enjoyed this book it was different it had some time traveling , traveling to other worlds. The fae in this book were interesting , blended some new ideas and some traditional ones. I love a book with heroines that are strong and take no crap but can still be soft and approachable. I also enjoyed the fact that geeks could be ass kickers and not just someone to do the computer work. I would recommend this book it was very good and well written.

I spent a lot of my early teens devouring portal fantasy, so I've retained a big soft spot for that particular sub-genre and am chuffed when authors try their hand at it despite it having fallen somewhat out of fashion since. I also love Celtic mythology and various interpretations of fairyland, so between the two, this book hit quite a few of my buttons. Throw in an f/f romance and gimme!

There were some refreshingly unique concepts in here, especially when it came to the merging of modern-world tech and fay magic. Sometimes these worked, such as when the computer programmer protagonist finds her way into the fantasy realm via decrypting coded messages or when parts of a quest are made that much easier by the use of radios - I mean, can you imagine how many super-involved fantasy quests could just be simplified by radio-ing your buddies on Mount Wherever to tell them you've got the magic thingamabob and need a Giant Eagle airlift? (...ok, maybe just as well you can't). At other times, these were more questionable - I kinda flinched at how proud they seemed to be of having working modern guns to kill creatures with in fairyland and all I could think of was what Elliot Schafer from In Other Lands would have to say about that nonsense. But overall the story had an interesting take on straddling the worlds and blurring the boundaries a bit.

Most of the story itself is heavily quest-based, which is fine; for the most part, it was good fun and the world an interesting place to explore. There was at least one slump, though, where the characters basically go off on an unrelated quest for what felt like way too long and I lost interest for a bit. Also, where were all the dragons?? Hello, cover, you promised me dragons! There are some, but it's like a half-page scene. Don't put dragons on the cover if you can't deliver on them!

My primary issue, though, and the reason I'm not rating the book any higher, was its main character, Lori - computer programmer, video game designer, newbie to fairyland, and one of the inexplicably crankiest, snippiest and stroppiest fictional sourpusses I've ever encountered. I'll avoid major spoilers but she starts off, in her very first scene, sitting in a dentist's waiting room and casually describing her appearance to readers (as you do) by way of idle comparison with the receptionist, who apparently looks a bit like Lori, but 1) wears way too much make-up, 2) is clearly not a natural blonde, 3) looks like she never goes to the gym, 4) PAINTS HER NAILS, EW and 5) is having computer trouble so must be dumb as a post.

...okay, lady. Starting off establishing how hot you are by putting another woman (a complete stranger, no less) down is not a great way to score reader points with me, but hey, she had a toothache. Maybe she was just cranky from pain.

But nope. As the book unfolds, it quickly becomes clear that Lori has absolutely nothing kind to say or think about anyone, ever. She runs a constant inner monologue disparaging others - their appearance, their choices, their relationships, the things they enjoy - and while I quite enjoy a complex bitchy character, the problem with Lori was that she had nowhere near enough reason to be quite such a stroppy cow 24/7. Even when people were being perfectly pleasant to her, she'd automatically run a snippy response in her brain even if she didn't say it out loud - someone would say something like, "Hey, you're up!" and Lori would immediately mentally snipe, "<i>No, I'm still in bed sleeping.</i>" Good morning, Lori, have some of your cranky flakes! It was incessant and so over the top I was mostly amused rather than annoyed, but I was definitely laughing at her, not with her. It didn't help that she had no sense of humour whatsoever, so what might otherwise have passed for witty snark just came off as boorish and needlessly mean.

Her attitude kind of hindered some of the plot developments for me, too: there's a point early on where she instantly dislikes a character and it's pretty obvious from the writing that this is meant to be a good intuitive assessment of someone non-trustworthy, but because she <i>constantly</i> makes snap judgements about everyone she encounters, it didn't come across as believable. (I mean, Lori, you like NOBODY, why should I believe you this one deserves it? lol). Throw in a generous helping of casual slut-shaming and shallowness about others' appearance, and I just wasn't a fan. Which is a shame, because I have a feeling the whole thing would have been even more engaging with a relatable MC you could root for.

The f/f romance, though promising in its set-up, was unfortunately also pretty luke-warm. There's not much chemistry, and at multiple points, we are explicitly told at what point the characters are in their relationship (I believe there was even a line in there somewhere that literally stated that this was a slow-burn thing) and, eh, I just didn't really buy it.

That was probably a lot of griping about a book I did find genuinely diverting. It's got conniving fay, fun portal magic, excellent geek rep, a flurry of quests, scheming and betrayal and flying horses, so as long as you can live with a super-stroppy protagonist, it's definitely a fun, reality-cancelling fantasy romp.

<i>Thanks to NetGalley and Bold Strokes Books for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.</i>

Silver Ravens is a fun mix of fantasy and slow burn wlw romance. It features games developer Lori Cooper, who reads a magazine in a dentist's waiting room, solves the puzzle page and gets sucked into a strange world with ciphers to solve before she's allowed to go home. She meets Tamsin, who leads a band of warriors for the fay queen, and who she thinks is insane, dangerous, and very, very attractive. Lori's goal is to solve the puzzles and go home, but things are never that simple.

I really enjoyed this book. I liked the contrast between the modern world, where Lori starts off, and the fantasy world of the fay, where most of the story takes place. The fairy city of Annwyn, and the rest of the magical world, is mysterious, creepy, beautiful and, at times, scary. I loved the weirdness of it; the mix of ancient armour and modern weapons, for example. It really makes sense in a place that's outside time.

The plot is great. The romance is super slow burn, but it's also unambiguously wlw from the start which is good. And to be fair on the characters, there really is too much going on for a romance to develop quickly! The beginning of the book immediately sucked me in with a mystery, and I was gripped from then onwards. Things are dramatic and exciting, and a little bit culty at times. I loved the instructions hidden in puzzles, and the codebreaking of the ciphers. There's nothing super technical though, so it doesn't get boring.

And the characters are great too. I liked how Lori's experience as a game developer comes up in the plot, and helps her deal with being thrown into a fantasy setting. I liked all of the side characters, although there were quite a lot to keep track of. The villains of the story are great, and at times disturbingly evil and manipulative.

Overall this is a fun, fantasy, slow burn romance novel which I found enjoyable to read.

3.50 Stars. Good but not great. I’m a big Jane Fletcher fan. Her Celaeno series is still one of my favorite fantasy series of all time. I am always really excited when a new book of hers comes out and I just want to savoir it. Maybe because of this my expectations where a little too high, but I didn’t love this like I was hoping for.

For starters while I love the cover, I think it threw me off a bit. There were dragons in this book but because of that cover I thought we were going to get DRAGONS!!! Trust me you will get my meaning after you read this. I think another problem for me is that the world seemed very small until exactly the half way point. I am so used to Fletcher’s amazing world building that the first half didn’t fit so well for me and I felt a little claustrophobic almost. And that was causing me to have trouble connecting with the book. Luckily, that changed and the second half of the book became so much better. This new world grew and it felt more classic Fletcher so I finally got in a good reading groove where the pages were flying by.

I found both mains to be a bit up and down. Lori started off really judgmental and off-putting. She mentally went after some women just because she was overweight and wore too much make-up. I mean, I’m personally not attracted to women who like to wear a pound of make-up but I don’t ridicule their intelligence because of it. It was just weird and I didn’t see the point in it except to have us think poorly of Lori? Once the book went on Lori seemed to be one of the only people with a conscious (making her more likeable) so I had to wonder who the real Lori was. Tamisn, the other main, is the kind of character I would totally swoon over. The problem was that her character had some faults I didn’t care for either. Most of it is explained why later on, but again it left me wondering how much of the real Tamisn did I know and connect with as a reader.

While this is fantasy, it is not heavy fantasy. I think a reader who is newer to the genre or only dips their toes in once and a while could read this with no issues. Like I mentioned before, once the book hit the half-way point the pace became upbeat and it was much more enjoyable for me. There is a WLW romance but it is not a major beat of the book. I actually think the book could have stood fine without a romance but I consider it just a little reader bonus.

I would still recommend this read but I think it is my least favorite Fletcher book I have read so far. I think Fletcher fans and fantasy fans still should read this but if you are new to Fletcher, I would suggest starting with her Celaeno series or one of her other standalone books instead.

Surprising and enjoyable. This was a fun fantasy adventure that tackled dark subjects with wry humour and intelligence. The world building was excellent and the characters were engaging. Will have to read more from this author.

IT-specialist/programmer accidentally travel to a different world where she is held captive by a fay queen in order to solve ancient puzzles. She quickly realize something isn't quite right and wonder who she can trust in this weird world.

Lori: A down-on-her´-luck programmer who recently lost her job and has to move back to her parents. She's very intelligent and has a natural talent for deducing things.

Pro:
Well described, rich and unique world - The world and the social constructs is well described and consistent throughout the book.
Balance between history, fantasy and computer science - Fletcher has balanced science and fiction perfectly in this book. I also enjoy the small tidbits of history which helps the book feel anchored in reality.
Intelligent (s)hero - It's refreshing to read a book with a "nerdy" protagonist who stays true to herself and wield logic and empathy as her weapons.
Puzzles!

Con:
-

This is an adventure book, with a slow burn romance. Whilst it isn't explicit nor filled with gore it tackles dark subjects such as segregation, both mental and physical abuse and characters who can mess with minds. This book is not a cute and fluffy fantasy.

This review is based on NetGalley ARC provided in exchange for an honest, unbiased opinion.

I am very much conflicted about this one. I love the tie ins to early English literature and the different coding, but I thought the story sagged a little here and there. I know that Fletcher takes her time with things, but usually her stories are much more tightly paced than this book. Most of the time, Fletcher makes sure that every plot point acts as a build up to the next, to the culmination of the story, but there is a slow section here in which our leads are forced to go after a macguffin for the sake of going after the macguffin. Macguffin quests are fine, as it allows our leads to grow closer, especially in romantic fantasy, but I felt like in that section of the book, our plucky outsider, Lori and buff dreamboat Tamsin don't get a lot of meaningful time together to really interact. They do stuff together, but it doesn't really feel like they're connecting. And Lori telling us that she really likes Tamsin doesn't count at all.

I love portal fantasies - especially with a character who is as quirky as Lori. She's almost too smart, is highly independent, but seems to resent that her parents often left her behind when they traveled the world. Her romantic partners are the opposite of her parents - women who are less likely to leave her. But once she meets Tamsin, she starts to learn that being with a person who is as intelligent as her is not that bad, even if they are risk takers like Tamsin. Tamsin is your typical enchanted warrior, a person who is competent, but just slightly unattainable because she is in love with her liege lord, or in this case the fey queen Rianna. I really wanted to enjoy Tamsin and Lori's growing to enjoy their time together, but they lack chemistry. They're supposed to click, but most of their scenes just feel more like plot set up, or Tamsin ordering Lori around. I didn't think there was any real emotional growth between them. So when the payoff happened it didn't quite land for me.

That said, I love this fantasy adventure, even through some of the slow parts. It is so detailed, and doesn't pull its punches when peeling back the layers of the cruel nature of some fey. I just wish there was more confrontation between the outsider who sees these cracks in Lori, and the loyal Tamsin. It is such a big theme of this book, especially with the decoding plot, and Lori's whole personality is about looking past the veneer of this new world she is in, but that conflict doesn't get much weight. I think Tamsin's and Lori's relationship would have more chemistry if we got to see them hash some of that out more than they did.

As many of you may know by now, I’m not generally a fan of high fantasy. I actually try to avoid the genre whenever I can. There are certain exceptions to this, however, and one of those exceptions seems to be the fantasy novels that Jane Fletcher writes. Silver Ravens is the second novel I’ve read by Ms. Fletcher, and just like the first one, I thoroughly enjoyed reading it.

Silver Ravens begins in the real world where we meet the main character, Lori Cooper, and learn a little about her life. The fantasy begins when Lori is lured through a portal into the land of the Fay, called Annwyn. There she finds herself a captive, strongly encouraged (aka forced) to decode several scrolls for the Fay queen. Lori finds that Annwyn is definitely not the fairyland she read about as a child, in spite of the surface beauty of the place. There is evil, intrigue, deceit, and danger everywhere. Lori finds that she can’t trust anyone, not even Tamsin, the attractive captain of the Silver Ravens, the human guardians of the queen. It’s too bad because Lori is also really attracted to Tamsin.

Ms. Fletcher has created a world both beautiful and creepy with an undertone of danger. You can feel the disconnect between the beauty of the land and the sense of “wrong” under the surface. The characters are also well-written, especially the main characters. This is an extremely slow-burn romance. The main thrust here is the action and adventure part of the story with the romance playing a secondary role for a good portion of the book.

If you love a good fantasy with lots of intrigue, action and a solid slow-burn romance added in, then I think you will really like Silver Ravens.

Thanks to NetGalley and Bold Strokes Books for allowing me to read and honestly review this novel.

Exceptional high fantasy adventure! As with any Fletcher novel, amazing world-building, awesome intrigue, and heroines who grow into the challenges awaiting them. Filled with magic, malice, betrayal and revenge. Two leads from very different backgrounds must join together to right the wrongs of the Fae kingdom and, ultimately save Earth. I couldn't put it down!!

Lori has been having a bad few weeks. She's lost her job, her girlfriend and her home. Sitting at the dentist waiting to get her tooth drilled, Lori - a computer/games programmer - randomly picks up a games trade magazine. While completing the puzzles in the back, she begins to uncover a secret code. After three months of puzzles, Lori finds the code leading her to an old churchyard in rural England to find and circle a menhir three times counterclockwise on a feast day. Why not? It's not like she has anything to lose, right?!

Adventure, alternate realms, fairy magic - and treachery, ensue. As Lori meets, Tamsin and the rest of the Silver Ravens - human mercenaries for the Fae queen Rianna.

3.75 stars out of 5.
This ARC kindly provided by NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.

While I enjoyed interactions between others, and the chase of getting into the fey world which did not seem too contrived (a remarkable difference in comparison to others which shall not be named), there were a few things which took me out of the escape into Annwyn.
While it might be a bit of worldbuilding, the quick reminder of how to tell males from females of different species felt... off to me (though this might be as it's been all too recent since a prominent transphobe threw herself out of the cupboard) as something that did not need much explaining. I also found it mildly irritating how right the protagonist usually was in her snap judgements of people she's just met. It felt mildly annoying to wait for everyone else to catch up to agree with her.

What I enjoyed: the different look at fey creatures, with efforts going to show worldbuilding going into effort, and not quickly forgotten, the descriptions, and the humor.

She was a captive in fairyland. Mum and Dad would be so jealous.

I did like this, so I can't really say I'm disappointed with it, but just going by how much I enjoyed the previous works of Fletcher that I've read (I think about the Calaeno series so often)... I expected to like it more, and I'm a bit bummed that I didn't!

I loved the premise for sure. I adore fantasy and stories where people get sucked into other worlds. I'm not the hugest fan of fae specifically, but this was fun in a lot of ways. Fletcher offered her own unique take on some classic fairy stuff, and she took her world-building into interesting places. Re: the ciphers: I thought it was clever, and a neat thing to base a plot point around. Idk jack about codes and ciphers and whatnot, but googling a few of the terms used served me just fine, and I was more or less able to follow along.

I love the way Fletcher writes; I don't know how helpful it is to say that her style is very readable, but I mean, I've been having trouble finishing books at my usual pace these days, and I sped through this one. Even when I had my nitpicks, I always wanted to keep reading and moving forward, to see where the story was going to go next. I also really liked the aspects of found family in this, which is one of my favourite tings to read in any type of book ever, really. Silver Ravens for life! There were a couple moments that were very moving. And I have to say that Tamsin was one of THE most swoon-worthy love interests ever.

My first small let-down is that I wanted there to be more romance! IMO, Lori and Tamsin should have spent more time together, or there could have been just a little more focus on their relationship. It's only a small let-down, because as I said, I did like the plot elements, and I was never bored with anything, but I just wanted more kissing lol. Sorry to be shallow. Another little let-down was Lori's character. It happened a lot in the first parts of the book, and less so as the book went on, but I just found her to be super, unnecessarily judgemental, and it's one of my most hated character traits. In her VERY first scene she mentally rags on a receptionist for being 'stupid', not knowing how to work a computer, wearing ugly makeup, her body type... all this at a woman she has NO reason to have any bad feelings towards. And it happens more (again, mostly in the first half), in other little ways that really annoyed me and made me not want to root for her as a character.

But hey. The whole boggart thing was very uncomfortable and the fact that at least Lori gave a shit about them was one of her redeeming qualities.

SOME STORY SPOILERS BELOW

I don't think we were given a good reason to believe why Lori would actually not only decode the magazine puzzle, but also just... arbitrarily follow it word for word? At the beginning of the book she's still staunchly looking for a normal life, wanting to distance herself from the life of adventure that her parents created. I know the book is about her realising that she likes adventure, and unpacking some stuff from her childhood, but we didn't get enough of a journey with that. It more felt like moving abruptly from one stage to the next.

Also, I think it would have been better for the story in general, for pacing and mystery, if Lori HADN'T known right off the bat that something was up with Rianna. I think it would have made it more interesting, added a little bit of intrigue, if she slowly came to the realisation that the queen was a sinister dictator, instead of just knowing immediately.

Just as an aside: I really like the cover, but now that I've read the book, Idk how much it actually fits?

A solid fantasy f/f read; I had trouble enjoying it all the way because of a few issues, but I'd still rec it. Might have enjoyed it more if my expectations weren't so high going in. 3.5 stars.

This was my first book by the author, and I'd heard so much about her, I had high hopes.

The book's beginning disappointed me. I couldn't connect with the character, and although I normally find ciphers and puzzles enthralling, the ones Lori solved never did click, either. Her ex was shallow, her roommate's boyfriend had the personality of a dry cracker and what followed was a series of ill-considered decisions and foolhardy choices.

My apologies to Ms. Fletcher. Sometimes readers connect with books, but this one just never clicked with me.

‘Silver Ravens’ is a fascinating story of puzzles, magic, folklore and adventure. I.T. professional Lori Cooper has had a rough time and needs something to take her mind off relationship and job problems. Coming upon a set of interesting puzzles in a computer magazine gives her the distraction she needs. But there’s more to them than just a bit of fun. Leather-clad stranger Tamsin tries to tell her she commands a troop of warriors working for the queen of the fay. Unsurprisingly Lori’s having none of it. That’s until her puzzle-solving skills mean she’s in demand – and Tamsin won’t take no for an answer.

Jane Fletcher’s excellent world-building and knowledge of folklore really made this book for me. Her imaginative writing never fails to drawn me in. I loved finding out about Annwyn through Lori’s eyes. Her descriptions of the strange world were beautifully written and it had a few twists that ensured the story had an originality and flair of its own. A wonderful book, full of fantastic magical mythology , well-drawn characters and puzzles galore. I really enjoyed it.

I was given this ARC for review.