An NPR Best Young Adult Book of 2016Tor.com’s Best YA SFF of 2016A Bustle Best Book of 2016 SelectionA Paste Magazine’s Best Books of 2016The only way to get her family back is to travel to a land in between, as dark as Limbo and as strange as Wonderland…Alex is a bruja, the most powerful witch in a generation…and she hates magic. At her Deathday celebration, Alex performs a spell to rid … At her Deathday celebration, Alex performs a spell to rid herself of her power. But it backfires. Her whole family vanishes into thin air, leaving her alone with Nova, a brujo boy she’s not sure she can trust, but who may be Alex’s only chance at saving her family.
Praise for Labyrinth Lost
“Enchanting and complex. Every page is filled with magic.”-Danielle Paige, New York Times best-selling author of Dorothy Must Die
..”. enchants from start to finish. Labyrinth Lost is pure magic.” -Melissa Grey, author of The Girl at Midnight
”Magical and empowering, Labyrinth Lost is an incredible heroine’s journey filled with mythos come to life; but at its heart, honors the importance of love and family.” -Cindy Pon, author of Serpentine and Silver Phoenix
“A brilliant brown-girl-in-Brooklyn update on Alice in Wonderland and Dante’s Inferno. Very creepy, very magical, very necessary.”-Daniel Jose Older, author of Shadowshaper
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This book was delightful. I’m really torn between “God, Katee, why didn’t you read this series before now?!” and “I get to binge more books in this series!”
Alex is my favorite kind of heroine. Strong and conflicted and surrounded by a support system that loves the hell out of her. The world-building was phenomenal, and I really, really, really can’t wait to spend more time in this world with these characters.
My experience with this book had two sides.
On one side I really loved the the setting. I love ”witchy”* books and the unique magic systems, lore, deities and what not with different cultures. Córdova wrote the brujos and brujas and their magic beautifully, really highlighting the important cultural aspects and what makes them different from other types of ”witches”. I absolutely want to read more about this, as I was really enchanted by Córdova’s narration.
I also liked the characters and how they interacted with eachother; like actual teens that don’t entirely know what they were doing instead of aged-down adults. There were also only three characters that actually got proper development, as most other characters were only briefly or in short moments present in the book. I actually really appreciated this, as sometimes authors are trying to make all characters relevant in a way, making all characters rather dull.
On the other side, it felt like the plot fell a little flat. As mentioned in the synopsis, Alex is the most powerful bruja in generations, but wants to get rid of her magic to avoid attracting danger to her family. But during an attempt to get rid of her magic, her family vanishes and she has to go TO A DIFFERENT PLANE OF EXISTENCE to save them. That all sounds super epic, right? I was really hyped myself, as it sounded super cool, but somehow this epic-ness did not translate into the text. I have seen characters in books more hyped (or scared, whatever way you want to look at it) to go to a big city within their own country. The reactions of the main character when hearing they had to go to a different plane of existence sounded more like ”No, we can’t do that, we will be out until 9.15 and mom said we need to be home by 9.” I guess what I am trying to say is, it all should have been very epic and awesome, but the writing and characters absolutely did not translate that to me.
May be considered a spoiler:
I also gotta give Zoraida some props for playing an Uno Reverse Card towards all those queerbaiting books and actually create the perfect straightbait. The ”male LI” was right there, perfectly placed to be the MC’s prince charming BUT NOPE. I was actually quite amused when this was ”revealed” as I was already lowkey annoyed at the ”way too obvious straight coupling”.
I am debating whether I am going to continue with this series. This book’s plot was actually really big and everything seems resolved and wrapped up. It could easily have been a standalone novel, but there are two more books somehow and I don’t know what could come next. And both have different POV’s than the first book: the sisters of the MC I know virtually nothing about.
*With ”witches” I mean all types of practitioners of magic (in real life and fictional), often through the means of spells, religion or other types of beliefs, rituals and more. Many cultures have such practitioners with their own cultural influences, nuances, traditions and more. I use the word ”witches” in parentheses as not every practitioner wants to be referred to as witch, (such as the brujos and brujas in this book) and I found there to be a lack of a better collective word for this type of practitioner that didn’t need a lot of subtext to be understood. Please let me know if there IS an official collective word and I will amend the review.
An enchanting Latinx story about magic, family, and being one’s true self. For Latin American people, this is an excellent read. Alex is not only a Latina, but she is also part of the LGBTQ community, and the novel is as much about her learning to love her culture as it is about learning to love herself. The fantasy in the novel is quite reminiscent of Alice in Wonderland, with Alex going through a portal to save her family from a wicked Bruja into Los Lagos, a mystical land.
Admittedly it has a slow start with Alex in refusal of her power, but once she reveals her power, the tension rises between her and her family. All she wants is to be a normal girl since she blames herself for her father, leaving them, but it is never quite that simple. Alex carries the weight of the world on her shoulders, and she does not have to. It reveals much about her personality, how she loves and cares, and how she carries the world on her shoulders.
Córdova does a fantastic job bringing to life the magic in the novel and the history of what it means to be a Bruja. Moreover, the journey into this magical world opens up the door for character development and a journey of self-discovery for Alex. The language, the pacing, the development of the story, they all make for an incredibly vibrant and inclusive read.
I love books with a quest narrative this one was awesome.
I grew up on a steady diet of fantasy books but this was the first time I’ve read a fantasy book featuring a Hispanic heroine. It was wonderful to read about a character with a similar background to my own having a magical adventure.