Even Though I Knew the End

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Powerful, emotional, stylish and smart, Polk proves themself yet again to be a talent not to be ignored.” — Locus it's such an odd fusion of ideas, but oh my god, everything in this little gem of a novel works together beautifully. the noir setting is effortlessly woven into the language of the book, so we are unmistakably here in this early 1940s world of detectives and femme fatales. polk creates immersion yet subverts sexist tropes of the era, focusing on helen and edith, a sapphic couple whose long term relationship appears to be a friendship to the outside world. But even as the moment I had dreamed of turned into a nightmare, the gears in my skull kept turning. Teddy wasn’t in this alley by chance. They’d been watching the scene all along. Not cops. Not robbers. High magicians, and that was worse.

The spell worked by pairing the principles of contagion and sympathy. My blood activated the luminescent properties of the radium and the living glow of the fungus, connecting it to the blood that had been spilled— The Rebel Accountant Taxtopia: How I Discovered the Injustices, Scams and Guilty Secrets of the Tax Evasion GameHeather Andrews Self Love Elevated: 19 Women share their powerful and vulnerable collection of self-love stories including 60 + lessons learned and mindset tips I’d read this book a dozen times, two dozen. I always held my breath, waiting for Daisy to come to him. Jay hoped every single time, and I hoped right along with him, even though I knew the end. Even Though I Knew the End won the Nebula Award for Best Novella of 2022, [1] and was a finalist for the 2023 World Fantasy Award—Novella, [2] the 2023 Hugo Award for Best Novella, [3] and the 2023 Aurora Award for Best Novelette/Novella. [4] Publishers Weekly commended Polk for their "focus on character development [that] makes every interaction matter [in] a layered exploration of love and power with genuine emotional stakes and a soaring, perfectly bittersweet payoff", and judged that "readers will wish they had more time to explore [the world of the story]". [5]

Many thanks to Tor Publishing and Raincoast Books for sending me an ARC in exchange for an honest review! In an era of pandemic and uncertainty, that sense of infused hope hits home. Because even as readers think they know what’s coming next, there are surprises and twists in the narrative. Even looking out into a scary world, where certain endings seem all but inevitable, there is room for hope. More, there is a necessity to hope, to live like there are greater possibilities, like every day is worth what it took to bring you there.

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Delaney didn’t matter. I was smiling so hard, I could feel the cold on my molars. Ted was here, this week of all weeks. Here, when I thought I’d never see him again. “Teddy. It is you. You transferred out of Ohio? Are you here in Chicago to stay? You’ve got to be an initiate by now; have you earned your third degree?”

I read this by accident. Or rather, I fully intended to read it, had a little speak at the first chapter and then it was a handful of hours later, I was crying, and I’d finished it. That wasn’t right. Kelly McIntyre’s spirit should still be linked to her deathplace. A mediocre spiritualist can talk to the dead for three days, no matter where they end up, and I was a little better than that. She ought to be batting that silver weight around like a kitten, falling over herself to tell me what happened to her. But the pendulum hung straight down, unnaturally still, as if no one had died in this alley. Fans of John Constantine, the occult PI of DC comic books and film fame, will find a lot to like in Polk’s fantastically rendered depiction of a celestial war. With corrupt motivations on both sides, it’s often unclear which is more dangerous. Mortals aren’t defenseless, especially if they can wield magic (enchanted bullets make more than one appearance), but there’s still a constant sense of danger, and humans often end up as collateral damage. And for a wonder, she did. The silver light dimmed as Luna drifted behind that cloud she’d been flirting with for the last eighteen minutes. Time to step on the juice and get out of here. The writing was excellent as was the characterization! I mean, you can pretty much guess in the first minute what it will likely all come down to and yet I was utterly invested and hoped fervently that there was a way out. Whether there was or not, I shall not spoiler.

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