a fantastically odd murder mystery crossed with a journey of self-discovery, healing and acceptance.
magic for liars is a fantastically odd murder mystery crossed with a journey of self-discovery, healing and acceptance. ivy is a standout main character with her achingly human flaws and desires. she’s talented and sharp, yet a part of her always whispers ‘not enough, not enough‘ when she remembers that her sister is magic and she isn’t. even though they were born twins, ivy and tabitha have followed different paths in their lives that have led them to be estranged for over a decade. ivy lives her life out, day by lonely day, until everything changes when she receives a special visitor at her office. a magical visitor with an irresistible offer.
then ivy’s drawn into a world she’s dreamed of and hated for years, the not-so hidden society of mages. this was what i loved about osthorne academy for young mages; there’s murder and mystical magic but there’s also fart jokes and stupid pranks, only enhanced by magic, plus popular-girl cliques and loners, rumours and cattiness. the murder ivy’s been called on to investigate is gruesome – a teacher found split in half in the school’s library. was it a case of experimental magic gone wrong or something entirely more sinister? i’m not going to spoil it here but the chase for clues and evidence is genuinely thrilling! i kept seeing shadows everywhere and i was wary of every other character’s motivations! ivy has a mind for details and ferreting out secrets based on intuition. her back-and-forth interactions with one character especially were interesting (this student turns out to be fairly important later on, and i loved that her archetype is turned on its head).
the magic in magic for liars is so genuinely weird and gross and existential, it’s brilliant! the scene where ivy has her arm blown open (deconstructed?) by mrs webb had my eyes popping out of their sockets. the magical theorems and chants are half-nonsense, half-je ne sais quoi, an essential element that ivy can’t grasp which leaves leaves her feeling a tinge of bitterness and the hollowness of old resentment. i also adored the worldbuilding – we’re thrown into ivy’s world headfirst without so much as an explanation and i loved puzzling out little details about the larger magical world beyond osthorne, such as magical law enforcement (bureaucracy is still the same everywhere) and the government regulating magic, plus other magical schools in other states.
the relationship between ivy and tabitha was so well-executed and heavy with emotion and meaning. i’ve never had a sibling that i’ve envied (indeed, i am the sibling to envy) but sarah gailey captures the feeling of never being enough and trying to be someone else to impress other people so well. their interactions are fraught with tension and years and years of resentment and anger (on ivy’s side) and guilt (on tabitha’s side), though we don’t discover the latter until later in the book. there’s tenderness and longing to be reconciled, to have an amicable relationship where the two of them have brunch and share gossip and secrets. but the elephant in the room, or to say the murder victim in the library, won’t let them.
'An ache gripped my chest, sudden and overwhelming. That’s my sister. Even after everything—even with everything that was still between us, that would probably always be between us—she was my sister. I was born reaching for her.'
magic for liars combines the mystery and magic elements so well with other mundane things, like the headiness of romance and the tentative warmth of a renewed relationship with a sibling. some people found ivy “annoying” but i relate to her so much. there’s always a temptation, when you’re in a new environment with people who don’t know you, to cut away the parts of yourself that you’re ashamed, to try to polish your existence free of flaws and be your best self. that’s what ivy tries to do time and time again, with unexpected results. sometimes i had to cover my face and put my phone down for a bit, despairing over ivy’s increasingly complex web of lies. i wanted to shake her but at the same time, i would have done the exact same thing if given a chance to start over.
i can’t the interview without saying that the lesbian and bisexual rep in magic for liars was fantastic! it’s so casually, brilliantly done. it’s not made into a selling point or fawned over, it just is. the bisexual rep isn’t explicitly stated but it is implied that one male character, who is currently dating a cis woman, has had a romantic relationship with a man before. my little bisexual heart skipped a beat! also, i do believe sarah gailey is writing another book called when we were magic, hopefully set in the same world as magic for liars. more queer witches!!
i hope magic for liars starts a revival in the post-harry potter exploration of magic schools where teenagers act like genuine teenagers. they’re emotionally messy, petulant and involved in intricate dramas. the murder and world-weary, slightly bitter p.i. is icing on the cake. the mystery is quite well done- everyone is a suspect and there’s fairly good foreshadowing in the plot, the little details that add to a skewed picture. there’s hundreds of possibilities that arise from one minor discovery. i don’t usually read murder mysteries but magic adds an extra element and nice spice.
then ivy’s drawn into a world she’s dreamed of and hated for years, the not-so hidden society of mages. this was what i loved about osthorne academy for young mages; there’s murder and mystical magic but there’s also fart jokes and stupid pranks, only enhanced by magic, plus popular-girl cliques and loners, rumours and cattiness. the murder ivy’s been called on to investigate is gruesome – a teacher found split in half in the school’s library. was it a case of experimental magic gone wrong or something entirely more sinister? i’m not going to spoil it here but the chase for clues and evidence is genuinely thrilling! i kept seeing shadows everywhere and i was wary of every other character’s motivations! ivy has a mind for details and ferreting out secrets based on intuition. her back-and-forth interactions with one character especially were interesting (this student turns out to be fairly important later on, and i loved that her archetype is turned on its head).
the magic in magic for liars is so genuinely weird and gross and existential, it’s brilliant! the scene where ivy has her arm blown open (deconstructed?) by mrs webb had my eyes popping out of their sockets. the magical theorems and chants are half-nonsense, half-je ne sais quoi, an essential element that ivy can’t grasp which leaves leaves her feeling a tinge of bitterness and the hollowness of old resentment. i also adored the worldbuilding – we’re thrown into ivy’s world headfirst without so much as an explanation and i loved puzzling out little details about the larger magical world beyond osthorne, such as magical law enforcement (bureaucracy is still the same everywhere) and the government regulating magic, plus other magical schools in other states.
the relationship between ivy and tabitha was so well-executed and heavy with emotion and meaning. i’ve never had a sibling that i’ve envied (indeed, i am the sibling to envy) but sarah gailey captures the feeling of never being enough and trying to be someone else to impress other people so well. their interactions are fraught with tension and years and years of resentment and anger (on ivy’s side) and guilt (on tabitha’s side), though we don’t discover the latter until later in the book. there’s tenderness and longing to be reconciled, to have an amicable relationship where the two of them have brunch and share gossip and secrets. but the elephant in the room, or to say the murder victim in the library, won’t let them.
'An ache gripped my chest, sudden and overwhelming. That’s my sister. Even after everything—even with everything that was still between us, that would probably always be between us—she was my sister. I was born reaching for her.'
magic for liars combines the mystery and magic elements so well with other mundane things, like the headiness of romance and the tentative warmth of a renewed relationship with a sibling. some people found ivy “annoying” but i relate to her so much. there’s always a temptation, when you’re in a new environment with people who don’t know you, to cut away the parts of yourself that you’re ashamed, to try to polish your existence free of flaws and be your best self. that’s what ivy tries to do time and time again, with unexpected results. sometimes i had to cover my face and put my phone down for a bit, despairing over ivy’s increasingly complex web of lies. i wanted to shake her but at the same time, i would have done the exact same thing if given a chance to start over.
i can’t the interview without saying that the lesbian and bisexual rep in magic for liars was fantastic! it’s so casually, brilliantly done. it’s not made into a selling point or fawned over, it just is. the bisexual rep isn’t explicitly stated but it is implied that one male character, who is currently dating a cis woman, has had a romantic relationship with a man before. my little bisexual heart skipped a beat! also, i do believe sarah gailey is writing another book called when we were magic, hopefully set in the same world as magic for liars. more queer witches!!
i hope magic for liars starts a revival in the post-harry potter exploration of magic schools where teenagers act like genuine teenagers. they’re emotionally messy, petulant and involved in intricate dramas. the murder and world-weary, slightly bitter p.i. is icing on the cake. the mystery is quite well done- everyone is a suspect and there’s fairly good foreshadowing in the plot, the little details that add to a skewed picture. there’s hundreds of possibilities that arise from one minor discovery. i don’t usually read murder mysteries but magic adds an extra element and nice spice.