Hemlock & Silver blends sharp wit, dark fairytale elements, and cozy cottagecore charm into a story that feels both familiar and refreshingly new. At its center is Anja, a plant witch who poisons herself in the name of research. She is a wonderfully unconventional heroine who relies on intellect, perseverance, and unorthodox methods to navigate a world where cures are elusive and magic is dangerous.

There are quite a few Snow White motifs in this lovely retelling. This tale shifts the focus to original characters: a brooding guard, a dying princess (Snow White), and most memorably a dramatic, scene-stealing cat who adds both humor and heart.The book starts off a little slow but it builds tension and the world-building is so fascinating especially with the magic mirrors.

I've read a few books by T. Kingfisher before and this is a great read!

I absolutely loved this story! It had such a great plot with the princess and the poisons, with an older fmc who is such a well developed character I really greatly enjoyed her story. I honestly kind of feel stupid for not picking up on the Snow White parallels (found out about the inspo after finishing the book), but it really shows that this story is really able to stand on its own and have some really interesting twists. Would 100% recommend it!

I really enjoy T. Kingfisher's fairytale retellings, and this was no exception. This take on Snow White was so unique, dark, and interesting. I really liked following Anja specifically in this story. She's smart, in her 30's, and doesn't fit into the expectations placed upon women in her world. I really related to her feelings about children because I also don't know how to interact with tiny humans. She's confident in herself though and will try to do whatever she can do to heal someone, even if that means poisoning herself while she's at it.

This is also a darker take on the Snow White story. As someone who enjoys fantasy and horror, I really loved this dark fantasy story. I also thought that the narrator did a great job, especially with the pacing.

Thank you to NetGalley and Tor for this ARC!

This was a really fun twist on Snow White full of poisons, mirrors, a talking cat, and two awkward MCs in love with each other but too embarrassed to tell the other. Anja was such a cool older FMC with her knowledge of poisons and antidotes. I had a lot of fun with this one and definitely recommend!

Thank you to Macmillan Audio & Tor for an ALC/ARC in exchange for my honest review!

Kingfisher always has such a creative, and slightly twisted, approach to fairytale retellings, and I adore them every time. This is a wonderfully unique take on Snow White, with a focus on the poisons and magic mirrors in this tale.

The mystery of Snow White’s illness kept me hooked from the start, and I loved the unfolding of a mature romantic subplot and backstory for the characters. Kingfisher does a great job of making her characters relatable and realistic, and I particularly enjoyed the pacing of solving mysteries alongside our protagonist, shown through the countless tests to learn how the mirror world works.

I hold Kingfisher's other retellings a bit closer to my heart, but this one is still the perfect autumnal mystery read!

“Hemlock & Silver” by T. Kingfisher is exactly what I’m looking for in a dark fairy tale retelling. Anja was a great main character. The world building was excellent and quite creepy! The audiobook added to this spooky atmosphere. This story does venture into the horror genre which I was not prepared for, so more sensititive readers should be aware. Overall, this story was very creative and a fun new take on a classic tale.
Thank you to NetGallery and Tor Publishing Group for an advanced copy of this ebook and audiobook in exchange for my honest review.

Hemlock & Silver is the story of Anja, a poison expert who is tasked with healing the king’s daughter. Anja has focused on learning everything she can about poisons since a family tragedy. She’s an expert in her field and willing to try things no one else will. Princess Snow should be the most protected person in the kingdom, but somehow she’s wasting away. The king is desperate to save her and recruits an unusual ally in Anja. As she tries to uncover whether poison is the culprit, Anja must race against the clock to try and save Snow.

Hemlock & Silver is an incredible new fairy tale from T. Kingfisher with a brilliant magic system and lovable characters. T. Kingfisher is one of my favorite authors and I loved this fairy tale retelling with a twist. I especially loved Anja and her passion in searching for antidotes! Anja’s relationship with Javier was very sweet. I also loved Grayling the cat, what a fantastic magical beastie! T. Kingfisher crafts a hauntingly beautiful magical system of mirrors, which I found it impossible to look away from. The secrets of the creatures in the mirrors were delightfully horrifying. The pacing is excellent, there’s lots of magical adventures with a strong undercurrent of racing against time to save Snow. T. Kingfisher’s writing is so witty and crafts a satisfying fairy tale adventure. I would highly recommend Hemlock & Silver to anyone!

Thank you to T. Kingfisher, Tor Books, and NetGalley for a free ARC in exchange for an honest review.

For publisher: My review will be posted on Goodreads, Amazon, Storygraph, and Barnes & Noble etc.

Thank you @torbooks + @macmillan.audio for the ARC & ALC ♡

🍎 T. kingfisher has become a fave fantasy author.
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✍🏽 Read if you love: smart, snarky, + eccentric women.
Here’s to the misfits, the ones who won’t hold our tongues; who appreciate a good wit and don’t fit the mold.
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Anya is a healer, but not of the motherly soothing variety. She’s awkward and outspoken, with a pet venomous snake, and a curiosity for poisonous plants (and their antidotes). Using the scientific process of course. 🙈🐓
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She’s called upon to cure the King’s daughter who he believes to be slowly succumbing, Belladonna-style, to an unknown poisoning.
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With a charming slow burning (closed door) love story and an absolutely hysterical talking cat, I rolled with laughter. The banter between Grayling and Anya!

“𝙳𝚘 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚑𝚊𝚟𝚎 𝚊 𝚗𝚊𝚖𝚎?”
“𝙸 𝚑𝚊𝚟𝚎 𝚖𝚊𝚗𝚢 𝚗𝚊𝚖𝚎𝚜,” 𝚜𝚊𝚒𝚍 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚌𝚊𝚝. 🐈‍⬛
𝙰 𝚋𝚒𝚝 𝚘𝚏 𝚏𝚞𝚛 𝚌𝚊𝚞𝚐𝚑𝚝 𝚞𝚗𝚍𝚎𝚛 𝚘𝚗𝚎 𝚌𝚕𝚊𝚠 𝚛𝚎𝚚𝚞𝚒𝚛𝚎𝚍 𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚊𝚝𝚝𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗. “𝙷𝚒𝚜 𝙶𝚕𝚘𝚛𝚒𝚘𝚞𝚜𝚗𝚎𝚜𝚜, 𝙶𝚘𝚍-𝙺𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚘𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝙳𝚎𝚜𝚎𝚛𝚝𝚜, 𝙻𝚘𝚛𝚍 𝚘𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚁𝚘𝚘𝚏𝚝𝚘𝚙𝚜, 𝙺𝚒𝚗 𝚘𝚏 𝙼𝚒𝚛𝚛𝚘𝚛𝚜, 𝙷𝚎𝚒𝚛 𝚝𝚘 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝙼𝚊𝚗𝚝𝚕𝚎 𝚘𝚏 𝙷𝚊𝚛𝚊𝚛, 𝙷𝚎 𝚆𝚑𝚘 𝚃𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚍𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚂𝚎𝚛𝚙𝚎𝚗𝚝’𝚜 𝚃𝚊𝚒𝚕, 𝚆𝚑𝚘𝚜𝚎 𝙲𝚕𝚊𝚠𝚜 𝙷𝚊𝚟𝚎 𝚂𝚌𝚊𝚛𝚛𝚎𝚍 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝙱𝚊𝚛𝚔 𝚘𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝙶𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚝 𝚃𝚛𝚎𝚎.” —the cat who will later be knowing as Grayling
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It’s a Snow White retelling 🍎 that I actually felt was that plus Alice in wonderland combo.
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This was really well done. It’s a high recommend from me!

▶︎ •၊၊||၊|။||။‌‌‌‌‌|• 🎧 Jennifer Pickens was a great choice for Anya, giving her a certain gravitas while still imbuing humor and charm.

There was very “fun” parts of this book I enjoyed; the humor, internal dialogue of Anja and the element of Snow White. I really enjoyed the first 40% of the book but then it really fell flat. While the idea of this mirror was incredibly unique, it left me so confused at times. To the point I had to go back and re-read sections because it wasn’t clicking in my mind.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

🗓️ Out Aug 19 🗓️

A super creative, dark retelling of Snow White through the eyes of the poison healer hired to cure her.

My favourite T. Kingfisher book is Thornhedge, and this really gives a similar vibe. It's dark, it's weird, it's creepy, but our main characters are ultimately loveable and there's a romantic secondary storyline.

Also T. Kingfisher giving us a bodyguard romance?! Yes! Thank you. What an amazing treat for me.

I LOVE our main character in a way I don't usually love main characters. She's so weird and quirky, but leans into it. She's dedicated her life to studying poisons in a world where women especially don't study medicine. While she's a bit of a curmudgeon, she's such an important part of the community she lives in.

What to expect
🍎 Dark Snow White retelling
🍎 Curmudgeon FMC with a heart of gold
🍎 Poison apple
🍎 Dedicated bodyguard
🍎 Magic mirrors
🍎 Adventurous plot
🍎 Horrifying mirror people

If you love
🏰dark fairy tales,
♀️confident older FMCs,
and a touch of poison 🧪 then this is for you!

T. Kingfisher has quickly become one of my go-to authors for fresh, enchanting spins on classic tales, and Hemlock & Silver might just be my favorite retelling in a long time. This Snow White reimagining balances whimsy, charm, and clever worldbuilding in a way that feels both nostalgic and completely new.

🍎 The heroine
Anja absolutely stole my heart. She’s smart, quirky, determined, and endlessly curious, exactly the kind of protagonist I adore in fairy-tale retellings. Her voice carried the story with warmth and wit, and I found myself rooting for her from page one.

🍎 The supporting cast
Can we talk about Grayling, the narcissistic, sassy talking cat? He added the perfect dose of humor and chaos, and I laughed out loud more than once at his sharp commentary. The understated romance tucked in the background was equally lovely: sweet, subtle, and exactly right for the cozy vibe.

✨ The worldbuilding
I loved how Kingfisher wove in mirrors, poisons, and a rich medieval atmosphere without ever overcomplicating things. The world felt grounded and easy to slip into, with just enough magical intrigue to keep me hooked.

🍎 Why you’ll love it
If you’re craving a fairy tale retelling that leans more cozy than dark, with no spice but plenty of heart, Hemlock & Silver is it. It’s beautifully written, immersive without being heavy, and filled with the kind of whimsical charm that makes you want to curl up and savor every page.

🍎 Perfect for fans of:
🍄 Cozy fantasy
🐈 Talking animal sidekicks
🍷 Low-stakes but enchanting retellings
🌿 Fairy tales with a clever twist

This one felt like a warm mug of mulled cider on a crisp fall night, and it’s going straight onto my list of all-time favorite retellings.

T. Kingfisher remains an auto-read author for me. This book had everything. The MC Anja is so likable and unique for a fantasy book (yet not unique for real life): over 30, not small and dainty, and this one has a special interest in poisons and antidotes! We love a historical STEM FMC.

The mix of fantasy, horror-lite, romance subplot, and special brand of T. Kingfisher humor that is so comforting to me were on point. This is such a completely original and creative tale, with nods to Snow White, and T. Kingfisher continues to write my favorite fairytale retellings/reimaginings!

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC.

Anja knows everything there is to know about poisons and antidotes. When the king comes to her workroom asking for her help to investigate his daughter's sickness, she finds that nothing seems to make sense about it.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It has a little touch of snow white but not really in it's plot. The girl is named Snow and there's an apple but that's about the extent of it. I love T. Kingfisher's writing style when it comes to fantasy and this one did not disappoint!

Finally, FINALLY, the elder millennials are getting the FMC we deserve. No 19-year-old waifs with perfect bone structure and a hero complex here (not that I don’t love those too, but they are plentiful in Romantasy). Instead T. Kingfisher has graced us, refreshingly, with Anja, a 35-year-old tall and plump spinster who’s possibly got a touch of the ‘tism, and has constant commentary running through her head that had me laughing, or nodding along, being like, “Ok, fair.” Once again, in Hemlock & Silver, Kingfisher has delivered a superb fairytale retelling that looks nothing like the original. Yes, this is technically a Snow White retelling, but it’s so inventive, and goes a bit off the rails, that other than an evil Queen and some poison apples, it’s a whole new story. And I loved it. Did I mention there’s also the slowest of slow burns and a bodyguard trope?! Everyone deserves love—even someone who poisons herself on occasion while trying to come up with antidotes. Yes, our main character is a poison expert, keeps a chime adder she likes to call her ‘colleague’ (like a rattlesnake, but it makes a chiming sound), and she’s been tasked by the King to find out who and what has been poisoning his daughter, Snow. Oh, and did I mention the King killed the Queen when he found her cutting out the heart of his youngest daughter, Rose?! And you thought your family had complications. Anja has no filter, and I kind of love her for it. Oh, and there’s also the most condescending, talking, one-eyed cat, whom I’m obsessed with, and you will be too. Somehow this story feels like a cozy fantasy, that also has the highest of stakes, and some gruesome sights. If you like deep characters, trying to solve puzzles, and dark fairytales that still have a lot of clever humor, I think you’ll adore this book too.

Things to Know:
Standalone
Snow White retelling
Bodyguard trope
Tragedy
35 year old FMC
Talking cat

Thank goodness for another excellent fantasy standalone. T. Kingfisher has become an autobuy author for me since I discovered their work a few years ago. I haven’t read anything I haven’t enjoyed yet, so I had high expectations going into this book. If I really want to nitpick, there are a few times where the phrasing feels a bit too modern for my liking (y’all know this is a pet peeve of mine in fantasy), but not enough that it really pulled me from the story this time.

We spend a good portion of the beginning of this novel getting to know Anja as a healer/poison expert, and traveling to Snow, the sick princess. And of course, nothing is as it seems. The King doesn’t really play a big part in the story, but there are a number of humorous moments with him that I appreciated.

I absolutely adored Javier, the stoic, grunting King’s guard who, along with his partner, Aaron, is set with the task of guarding Anja. And she realizes with a bit of panic, that her life may now be in danger, since she’s there to thwart a murderer. She exasperates Javier because she’s constantly getting herself in trouble. And no big spoilers, but let me just say, there’s a hair braiding moment, that is literally everything I’ve ever wanted. 100% written for the female gaze.

Now I might have nightmares from the mirror-gelds, but I’ll let you read the book to find out about those. If you’ve read Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn trilogy, they reminded me a lot of the Mistwraiths…

I’m trying so hard not to give spoilers, but I also thought the entire concept of the Mirror world was so interesting. Not that it’s never been done, but the way she used it to retell arguably one of the most well known fairytales was so, so well done. Beware of your reflection and imaginary friends.

And as a cat-obsessed, single girl approaching middle age, I naturally loved Grayling, the one-eyed cat who sometimes decides to be helpful (but he’s not a dog, so he never “performs for treats”). He reminds me a bit of the Cheshire cat, but that could also be from the excellent work of the narrator in the audiobook. Speaking of, the audiobook is fantastic, and I would recommend it on its own or as an immersive read like I did.

Many thanks to Tor and MacMillan Audio for providing ARCs to review. All opinions are my own.

Favorite Quotes:

“It was also safer, as a spinster-scholar, to look like a nun. People did not bother nuns, and sometimes they even listened to them.”

—

“Sometimes you get a miracle. Mostly you don’t, but you still have to make space for the miracle to happen, just in case.”

—

“The problem with being plump, middle-aged, and a woman was that people expected you to be motherly, as if that was your default state. I am not.”

—

“No sense asking why he was like this. He was a cat. If cats were helpful, they’d be dogs.”

—

“It does not matter how many cats there are! Any nonzero number of talking cats is significant!”

—

“If you go around eating random plants without knowing what they are, then yes, sooner or later you’re going to wind up either very unhappy or very dead. Plants aren’t necessarily your friends.”

Hemlock & Silver is everything I love about T. Kingfisher—wry humor, rich worldbuilding, and characters you can’t help but adore. It’s a darkly enchanting fairy tale, laced with danger, dry wit, and just enough heart to make the stakes matter. The magic system feels both fresh and grounded, with folklore roots that give it real texture. I especially loved the banter and unexpected tenderness between characters, which balanced the eerie atmosphere perfectly.

This is a compulsively readable, slightly spooky adventure with Kingfisher’s signature charm. Fans of Nettle & Bone will feel right at home.

Every time I finish a T. Kingfisher book I say, "Wow this has to be my favorite book of theirs." Hemlock & Silver was no different. I feel like Kingfisher's writing just gets better and better. The magical, creepy, and downright hilarious writing style just speaks to me.

This story follows Healer Anja on her mission to figure out who or what is poisoning the young princess, Snow. In this dark reimagining of Snow White, Anja falls head first into a world of mystery and wonder.

If you've read T. Kingfisher books in the past and enjoyed them, I'm sure that this one will hit the spot too. If you've never read anything by T. Kingfisher, this would be an excellent place to start.

I went back and forth between the ebook and the audiobook, loving both. The narrator had the perfect cadence and and expression! Thank you so much to Netgalley and Macmillan audio for this advanced copy.

In a Snow White retelling, an untraditional healer is called to the palace to ascertain if the King’s daughter is being poisoned.

T. Kingfisher is the only fantasy I try out and I never regret it. The characters are always so vivid. There’s mystery, intrigue, and always a touch of humor; this time in the form of a very cat-like cat. It has a touch of romance as well and ends perfectly.

“Mirrors are like blood or bones or oak trees. All the magic is in what is done with them.”

“That’s humans for you, I suppose. In dreadful danger, with the weight of the world crushing us down, we’ll somehow still find ourselves thinking, I wonder if he likes me.”

Hemlock & Silver comes out 8/19.

LeahsBooks confession: I am hopelessly addicted to any and everything that T. Kingfisher writes. I periodically stalk NetGalley to see if there’s anything new from her, and there often is, since she is quite the prolific writer. At least it gives me her backlist to work through while waiting for approval for new books like this one. I was so juiced to read this one, and let me tell you, this is another hit that could only come from the mind of T. Kingfisher. She breathed new life into the Snow White story with her unique take on it.

As many of Kingfisher’s heroines do, Anja lives a peaceful life free of interruptions that take her focus away from her own work: finding cures to poisons that don’t have a cure. We get a little insight into why Anja does this from her younger days, when her cousin accidentally mistook a root vegetable for a poison right in front of her. Seeing the pain that it caused her cousin as well as her family, she vowed to find cures for those substances that people have accepted as fatal. It quickly offers a plausible reasoning for why she researches poison so thoroughly, especially when she finds herself testing the cures on herself. She justifies this by trying the cure on fowl beforehand, but it still places her at a pretty significant risk.

While Anja is puttering away in her little version of paradise, she is summoned to attend to the King, whose daughter is dying, and he’s ready to try anything, which apparently includes summoning an expert on poisons and their antidotes, over bleeding and other methods that have not been shown effective for poor Snow. Anja is brought to the castle by a grumpy guard and her supplies. Instead of jumping to a conclusion, Anja begins to work methodically, examining every single thing that the girl could have come into contact with by any means to identify what is making her sick.

But as hard as Anja tries, she can’t find anything that could be the cause of Snow’s symptoms. Until she discovers a magic mirror that is a portal to a whole other world, and is forced to explore the dark world to find the poison so she can find an antidote. She winds up being saddled with a one-eyed cat that winds up being beneficial, along with her grumpy guard, who Anja is clearly growing on.

I loved Anja right from the start. She seems to be in the typical European fairy tale setting, but has a special fondness for the scientific method, which didn’t seem to occur to anyone else. Instead, Anja identifies a poison and tries to find a potential cure based on various metrics of comparison. If that doesn’t work, she is back to the drawing board, while if it does, she tries it on a rooster (reluctantly because she’s an animal lover and despises animal testing), and if that works, she tries it on herself. So naturally, she brings her scientific mind to the castle and upends everything in Snow’s life—monitoring and even tasting her food and drinks, checking all of her belongings, and doing everything that would make anyone, especially a teenage princess, feel as though they have no privacy. And Snow was right; even Anja recognizes and admits that, trying to come to some kind of solution.

Perhaps the thing I loved the most about Anja is her witty sarcasm. She constantly has snarky comments that she thinks of saying but tries to keep inside because they probably wouldn’t be appreciated. It had me laughing at identifying with her practical, no-nonsense approach at life. Anja isn’t a young woman, probably in her 30s, and has that typical ‘ugh, what now’ approach to things that is so recognizable for readers who have left their 20s behind. We spend nearly half the book just getting to know Anja and watching her do her usual methodical work, which was fine because I adored her character and couldn’t get enough of her.

Once Anja arrives at the castle, she is promptly assigned two guards, one of whom became a love interest. I really liked the way it developed between them, feeling natural and the opposite of insta-lust…which would be developing a working relationship first and then slowly sliding into a bit of a romance. However, it never overpowers the main plot line and I really had fun seeing Anja and Javier interacting and getting to know each other more and more as they continued to work together. Aside from the handful of side characters, I was surprised that there weren’t more. Kingfisher books tend to have a wider range of side characters than this one did, and I was a little disappointed not to get even more characters to know through Kingfisher’s words.

The pacing was a lot slower in the first half of the book, when Anja is introduced and is getting her footing in the castle, while after the discovery of the magic mirror and alternate world, things move a lot faster. At times I found myself a little more confused and having to reread something, but I was mostly just blown away by how Kingfisher took the barest elements of the story of Snow White (magic mirror, apples, and an evil queen) yet made this story completely her own by placing those elements squarely in the middle of one of her cozy horror/fantasy stories to create Hemlock and Silver instead.

Overall, this was a good book. It just didn’t happen to be one of my favorites by Kingfisher (see Nettle and Bone or A House With Good Bones for books that were more up my alley. This one wasn’t a disappointment at all—I couldn’t wait to find out what was going to happen next from start to finish. I love a good talking animal character in the cast, and this one had it, along with a lot of the elements I’m used to seeing in Kingfisher books, but the pacing and just a little bit more development of the characters, considering how few there were, didn’t resonate with me. I’m still a hardcore Kingfisher fan though, even if this makes me want to go back and reread Nettle and Bone or Briony and Roses.

I tend to be on board to try out anything T. Kingfisher writes, so it was a delight to have another fun fairytale retelling on my list. This one takes the tale of Snow White and flips it on its head, where Snow is a young princess with a mysterious illness that her father, the king, suspects is poison. Desperate, he turns to the kingdom's greatest poison expert: Healer Anja, who is summoned to try to determine the source of Snow's sickness.

But Snow continues to waste away, with no apparent culprit despite Anja's investigation attempts. That is, until she accidentally stumbles upon a world hidden in the mysterious mirrors the late queen brought to the palace, which seems to hold the key. With the help of her brooding bodyguard and a cat that behaves exactly as you would expect a cat to (and my favorite character), Anja races to uncover the secrets of the shadowy mirror world before it's too late.

Hemlock & Silver has really fun world to get lost in, and I loved following Anja and her obsession with poisons. The side characters were also strong, and I liked the romantic subplot. The mirror world was epically creepy, and while I found the overall plot a touch predictable, I still very much enjoyed the ride. Fans of Kingfisher's other work and fairytale retellings should definitely pick this one up! Big thanks to Netgalley and Tor for the ARC.

This was such an interesting read! It was like Snow White meets Alice in Wonderland meets something like I’ve never read before. I listened on audio and the performance was great. The story is so original and I loved the subtle romance aspect as well. I also enjoyed the FMC was 35 and a seemingly average normal human being! It was very well done. I will be picking up future works from the author for sure! Plus, I love a good, sassy side character and Grayling was amazing!