#Review - We Are Blood and Thunder by Kesia Lupo #YA #Fantasy

Series: We Are Blood and Thunder #1
Format: Hardcover, 448 pages
Release Date: March 3, 2020
Publisher: Bloomsbury YA
Source: Publisher
Genre: Young Adult / Dark Fantasy

In this sweeping YA fantasy debut, two girls—one running away, and one returning home—find their magical fates intertwined.

On the edges of a sealed-off city, two girls meet for only a moment. Lena is on the run after being sentenced to death for possessing magic; Constance will do anything to get back inside her former home. But the brief encounter in the misty, dangerous Duke’s Forest is long enough to alter both of their fates.

As Lena finds a place where she can develop her powers, Constance must decide whether to trust her former family and friends. All the while, the girls remain connected through terrifying storm clouds that hang over the land—clouds that only the two of them hold the keys to dispelling. But the truth behind the clouds’ presence is shockingly sinister . . . and could mean that one girl will lose everything.

This rich, immersive fantasy includes a shocking ending that will make readers want to revisit Lena and Constance’s story from the beginning.
 

We Are Blood and Thunder is author Kesia Lupo's debut novel. This story actually features two main characters; Lena and Constance. Lena is a cryptling working for Vigo, the Mortician. She, like others who have deformities, are relegated to the darkness and they must hide their faces if they go outside. They are in all essence abandoned by their families because of their deformities. Cryptlings dedicate their lives to serving the ancestors. The Ancestors are the dead who are given specific rights when they pass from the world. 

When she discovers an unusual metal butterfly, she wonders what makes her so special and keeps it hidden for years. When she learns that she has magic at the most inopportune time, she's found guilty of magecraft and sentenced to die. The cloud that hangs above the city of Duke’s Forest has brought pestilence, death, and misery for the people of Duke’s Forest. With the City under quarantine, 1/2 the city dead, a King who is no longer in control, it's a very bad time for Lena to be charged with being a Mage. 

Justice rules the city with an iron fist. He truly believes that magic is the root cause of the pestilence and preys on the people's fears and exacerbates the entire situation resulting in a manhunt. Thanks to her mentor Vigo, Lena escapes the manhunt, the city and being killed by Justice's Hounds. In the Duke's Forest, Lena meets a young  masked woman who is apparently a mage returning to the city. In the Forest, Lena also meets Emris Lochlade, a huntsmen from the City of Kings who has been searching for the masked mage who Lena encountered. 

Emris calls Lena a Rogue Mage and takes her to the City of Kings where she must either be trained and initiated into a temple, or be killed. The City of Kings provides refuge to Rogue mages, to control their abilities and pledge their allegiance to one of nine temples throughout the city. As Lena begins training Emris, she begins to discover her powers which has given her a new identity as a mage. As she searches for answers, Lena looks in places that she shouldn’t, that Emris has explicitly warned her about, for there are 13 mages who are not beholden to a god, but to the king himself, and when one of them, Lord Chatham, discovers her abilities, he will do anything to have her forcing her and Emris to run back to the Duke's Forest where she will encounter Constance's machinations.

Meanwhile, the masked mage Lena encountered in Dukes Forest is Constance Rathbone, the first born daughter of the Duke who left 6 years ago under mysterious conditions and traveled to the City of Kings where she trained with Emris. Constance is shocked to see what’s become of her hometown after she left 6 years ago. The shops are no longer bright, the people are hidden away, the vegetation is dying and of course, the storm cloud looms  Constance is confronted with her fathers ailing health and the oppression and cruelty of the Justice.

With her father slowly fading away, Constance hopes that with her half brother Winton's help, and other key players, she can petition and win the right to be named Protector of the City. Constance begins a quest to not only get all of the Wise Men to stand behind her, but to find an end to Justice's brutal rule. Constance also believes that she may hold the key to ridding her former home of the pestilence that has touched everyone. But, when the Ancestors begin to rise like the Walking Dead, Constance's unexplained absence raises suspicion among her kinfolk, forcing to admit that she's a mage and has chosen to claim her birthright as heir. 

The chapters alternate between Lena and Constance as they try to search for the answers to their own questions until their stories merge and they find themselves fighting the same battle. But, are they on the same side? What is Constance really doing back in Duke's Forest? Can Lena survive returning to her home? Or, will Justice finally catch up to her? Will Emris, who had a relationship with Constance, and feels that Lena might be his future, change his mind when Constance's machinations are revealed?

Good news! This is actually a standalone! You can read this from beginning to end and know that a resolution is, in fact, coming! You don't have to wait for the second installment which should be called a companion novel. That is unless you want to see what Lupo comes up with next.

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