A Weave of Lies

Overall Rating: 5/5

A madman or a desperate fool?

Semras has led a quiet life, posing as an herbalist for the nearby village... helping them with remedies and other things that might need attention.

They do not know she is actually a witch.

That is, until an Inquisitor shows up uninvited at her house in the woods, on the pretense of consulting Semras' knowledge of poisons.

It is then that she finds out that the Inquisitor is after one of her sisters..., though the inquisitor seems oddly doubtful of her sister's guilt in the crime that she supposedly committed.

Our dark, intensely broody, dangerous Inquisitor... he's been trained to have the instincts of a hunter... to despise those like her ... mounted atop a fearsome half-fey steed...

And Semras,

Equally dangerous, but mixed with kindness, a desire to be good, and a desire to help the villagers around her as best as she can...

Two unlikely souls drawn together by the universe. Ones who are used to telling each other lies... to avoiding each other... and staying out of each other's ways ... suddenly find themselves doing the opposite... falling for each other.

E.M. Riedl has done an absolutely stunning job of weaving together a world that has slight tones of Salem Witch Trials, one in which being a witch like Semras carries some feeling of intense distrust, of intense dislike... and then using that to build a world in which the fey rule.... of fantasy and magic. Of unlikely love between two supposed enemies... The perfect touch of unlikely romance...

If you are looking for something to match that October spooky theme... (although... if you ask me, it's ALWAYS spooky season) mixed with unlikely romance, and a beautifully created fantasy world... pick up A Weave of Lies and let E.M. Riedl entrap you as she has entrapped me...

I look forward to the second novel in this fantastical series.