DAUGHTER OF NO WORLDS - Carissa Broadbent

4.5 stars

It's a rare thing to find a high fantasy that takes a familiar playbook and shakes something fresh out of the dust. This one does it, and she does it WELL. Don't sleep on this indie fantasy series.

World building: ★★★★
Plot/Pacing: ★★★★★
Characters: ★★★★★
Enjoyment: ★★★★★

When you start Daughter of No Worlds, you're likely going to think about its similarity to a few very popular fantasy and young adult fantasy popular works. That's okay, because this novel does start in a somewhat familiar setting: it's a girl in a world against her, with some unique traits that make her a target who starts at the bottom of the ladder in an oppressed way—and she's going to do something about it.

That's a template that we know. Especially when it is paired with the older male, world-weary yet powerful, who finds himself drawn into the young woman's powerful, world-shaping energy.

But once you move beyond that surface-level introduction, Daughter of No Worlds begins to shine from the deep and grow with intensity with each reveal and new element. This author is playing the long game, and the further you dive in, the prettier the pearls.

A formerly enslaved woman with a need to succeed. A former warrior captain with scars and a weary acceptance of power corrupts. A world on the brink of war. A change in the air.

Enter the world of Daughter of No Worlds. I promise you won't be disappointed, and I promise that the bland blurb that you read—which, yes, I agree is like many a blurb for many a romance fantasy--is hiding some really cool and very unique things.

Tisaanah is a female protagonist that I understood on a deep level. She's not the best at everything, but she doesn't have to work for everything overly hard either. Her passion is deep but her capacity for brute force and single-minded focus allows her to make the difficult calls when others would balk. She's aware of her place in the world, and she's aware that everything between her and her goal is a fight that she needs to strategize to win.

Max is a male love interest/mentor figure who REALLY surprised me. He is no Rowan Whitethorn with his past battles and trauma. (I am the biggest Rowan stan, so let's not slander my man here either, Rowan is great and has his place.) Max is a soft boy with hard edges, less than 10 years older than our protagonist, and he'd rather garden all afternoon than train Tisaanah in the art of magic and power plays—until, of course, push comes to shove and his claws come out. His arc was one of the freshest I've read for this kind of fantasy and I loved that.

And there's a third intriguing character here that stands apart from our two mains and slightly off from our side characters... I won't spill the secret, but let's just say that element took me COMPLETELY by surprise and immediately catapulted this series into another unique level for me. This is where the series deviates dramatically from others you've read before and cracks open into something fresh.

I can't wait to see how this all plays out in the trilogy. Time for book two!