Whether it’s a city I’ve visited a lot or not at all, the setting of urban fantasy stories get polished with possibilities.

But the genre of urban fantasy can return that sense of the world being a magical place. As we age, we lose that sense of magic, and the mysteries become less about evil wizards and more about keeping a roof over our heads. It’s full of mysteries and possibilities. A good story overall and I’m interested to see what happens in the next book and will we get more on what exactly happened in the UK to leave Edinburgh like it is in the book.When we are young, the world is a magical place. This is the first book in the series, and it feels a bit more YA with Ropa being a teenager that has dropped out of school. Ropa is sucked into the mystery as she worries about trying to take care of her family and herself and maybe learn some more magic.

Turns out there are lots of kids that have gone missing, and no one is sure why. She is also being pestered by a ghost for help to find her missing son, the son is still alive but no one is looking for him. She bumps into a former school friend while walking her sister to school and learns about his new job at a secret library. Now rent is past due and she needs to hustle. Things are tough, her bike has been stolen, the police shook her down and took a large payday for her that would have paid their rent. She is supporting her grandmother and her younger sister as they are living in a parked travel trailer on farmland outside the city of Edinburgh. Ropa is a ghost talker, she makes her living giving messages to the living from the dead for a fee. If you enjoy paranormal lite, where the average world is laced with magic, and teens saving the day you'll enjoy this story. I will probably read the next book when it hits Libby just to see if it dives more into the magic and the library. Kind of a 'back to where we started' ending. They mystery ended up being a bit obvious and there isn't really any character growth for those we follow throughout the story. Instead of pulling me through the story it left me wondering why we were even given that information. The magic aspects had a lot of moving parts, many which left more questions than answers. The struggles to make ends meet, cops being the ones to fear, and a vast class separation in quality of life, all well written and really brought the setting to life.

The world built feels like a future we could be facing. The futuristic poverty and crumbling of a society taken over by the elite is well done. I will give it the benefit of the doubt that a lot of it is set up for the series and will be explore further in future books. This book had a lot of potential, but it feel flat for me with all the various 'dazzle' that wasn't explored enough.

The library of the dead huchu