★ 4.5 / 5
I really enjoyed House of Hollow back in 2021, but honestly, people are going to fall head over heels in love with The Invocations. It's wonderfully sapphic and witchy. Everything I loved about Krystal's writing was intensified within this book, and I'm so thankful I was able to read this during October because it's truly such a perfect time of year to read it. The Invocations is also my first official read for 2024 releases, and it's a relief to know the book was a showstopper.
To start, I want to make it clear within this review that The Invocations deals heavily with women fears and violence, particularly violence done on women by men. Emer is the only witch amongst the POVs, but she specifically cursewrites only for women willing to sell parts of their soul for bits of power due to desperate circumstances. The opening scene of this book is immediately triggering because it involves a woman being followed by a man with horrible intentions in the dead of night. That scene not only sets the tone for this book but warns of other moments of horrific treatment of women, notably a massacre that pre-dates the start of The Invocations. Readers are forced to witness the consequences of men's violence against women, so if you do not think you can handle that, I'd highly recommend skipping this book.
TWs: misogyny, homophobia, beating, suffocation/choking, massacre, pregnant woman/fetus deaths, body horror, grotesque skin cutting and stitching, knife violence, familial abuse, child neglect/abandonment, corpse reanimation, grave robbing, following/stalking women, extreme violence and murder of women, large amount of blood imagery and details, death of loved ones, intense grief depictions, and death.
The Invocations brings a completely different energy to the page than House of Hollow, notably through its three POVs. We meet Emer Byrne first, but she is the least utilized of the POVs in the initial first third. Emer is cursewriting for women who come to her for help, but she also lives around Oxford stealing and borrowing supplies for her own health and safety because she does not have a place to live. Initially, she does not know her clients are being murdered, but when she does, this murderer has hell to pay. Of the three POVs, Emer was by far my personal favorite. She's the most complex, and her backstory brought me to literal tears.
Next, we have Jude Wolf who is the daughter of a billionaire and cursed by demons to the point where her body is becoming necrotic. She's desperate to save herself and get back into the favor of her father, but she may be next on the list of victims by this serial killer. She's for sure the comedic relief of the book, so I can already see tons of readers falling for Jude as she snarks her way through the plot.
Finally, Zara Jones found her older sister murdered in her apartment, and she's willing to delve into the world of the occult to bring her sister back to life to get some mental reprieve from her extreme grief. All three POVs point to this apparent serial killer of Emer's customers, so they ultimately team up to find answers and ultimately stop him.
The LGBTQ+ representation is sapphic pining to its absolute fullest. The Invocations does some great build up to the romance between two characters, and their romantic tension overall was a favorite element of this book. It definitely makes me wish that we could get a sequel where the two are actually in a relationship, but I can certainly settle for the moments given in this book. I didn't at first think Krystal was going to make a romance subplot, but it was a pleasant surprise to find. I'm a sucker for any sapphic representation, so it was genuinely one of the best parts. Witchy sapphics were WELL FED here.
Yeah, The Invocations may be a YA book, but it is brutally truthful in how witch hunts are still alive and thriving today—just in a different context and manner than previous centuries. Strong women have always been the biggest threat to the patriarchy-notably why a lot of the witch hunts happened—so I highly recommend this book for anyone craving an occult, folk-horror YA with a twisted ending.
I really enjoyed House of Hollow back in 2021, but honestly, people are going to fall head over heels in love with The Invocations. It's wonderfully sapphic and witchy. Everything I loved about Krystal's writing was intensified within this book, and I'm so thankful I was able to read this during October because it's truly such a perfect time of year to read it. The Invocations is also my first official read for 2024 releases, and it's a relief to know the book was a showstopper.
To start, I want to make it clear within this review that The Invocations deals heavily with women fears and violence, particularly violence done on women by men. Emer is the only witch amongst the POVs, but she specifically cursewrites only for women willing to sell parts of their soul for bits of power due to desperate circumstances. The opening scene of this book is immediately triggering because it involves a woman being followed by a man with horrible intentions in the dead of night. That scene not only sets the tone for this book but warns of other moments of horrific treatment of women, notably a massacre that pre-dates the start of The Invocations. Readers are forced to witness the consequences of men's violence against women, so if you do not think you can handle that, I'd highly recommend skipping this book.
TWs: misogyny, homophobia, beating, suffocation/choking, massacre, pregnant woman/fetus deaths, body horror, grotesque skin cutting and stitching, knife violence, familial abuse, child neglect/abandonment, corpse reanimation, grave robbing, following/stalking women, extreme violence and murder of women, large amount of blood imagery and details, death of loved ones, intense grief depictions, and death.
The Invocations brings a completely different energy to the page than House of Hollow, notably through its three POVs. We meet Emer Byrne first, but she is the least utilized of the POVs in the initial first third. Emer is cursewriting for women who come to her for help, but she also lives around Oxford stealing and borrowing supplies for her own health and safety because she does not have a place to live. Initially, she does not know her clients are being murdered, but when she does, this murderer has hell to pay. Of the three POVs, Emer was by far my personal favorite. She's the most complex, and her backstory brought me to literal tears.
Next, we have Jude Wolf who is the daughter of a billionaire and cursed by demons to the point where her body is becoming necrotic. She's desperate to save herself and get back into the favor of her father, but she may be next on the list of victims by this serial killer. She's for sure the comedic relief of the book, so I can already see tons of readers falling for Jude as she snarks her way through the plot.
Finally, Zara Jones found her older sister murdered in her apartment, and she's willing to delve into the world of the occult to bring her sister back to life to get some mental reprieve from her extreme grief. All three POVs point to this apparent serial killer of Emer's customers, so they ultimately team up to find answers and ultimately stop him.
The LGBTQ+ representation is sapphic pining to its absolute fullest. The Invocations does some great build up to the romance between two characters, and their romantic tension overall was a favorite element of this book. It definitely makes me wish that we could get a sequel where the two are actually in a relationship, but I can certainly settle for the moments given in this book. I didn't at first think Krystal was going to make a romance subplot, but it was a pleasant surprise to find. I'm a sucker for any sapphic representation, so it was genuinely one of the best parts. Witchy sapphics were WELL FED here.
Yeah, The Invocations may be a YA book, but it is brutally truthful in how witch hunts are still alive and thriving today—just in a different context and manner than previous centuries. Strong women have always been the biggest threat to the patriarchy-notably why a lot of the witch hunts happened—so I highly recommend this book for anyone craving an occult, folk-horror YA with a twisted ending.