I adore gothic novels and while gothic magical realism is my favorite, gothic fantasy is a close second. I really like the creepiness of the cover and was drawn in reading a sample. The book started to unravel and fall flat soon after the sample however. The characters were one dimensional which made them read as boring. None of the relationships were well developed in a way that the focus of the reading was on the relationship. The book had a fever dream aspect which could be cool but the pacing was off and it felt repetitive and frustrating instead. I really wanted to love this one but it missed the mark for me. What did work for me was the magic system and the gothic feel, and due to that I would read this author again, possibly. It might work better with a young audience. Ultimately it wasn’t creepy enough to make up for other things for me at least.