Book Review | The Invocations #20booksofsummer24

I’ve had this book waiting on my bedside table since March and I am so glad to finally get around to it.

The Invocations
Krystal Sutherland

FIVE WOMEN ARE DEAD. The killer leaves no fingerprints, no DNA. Police are utterly stumped. In a world where only women can use magic and the men who know about it seek to eradicate them, three damaged young women – one cursed, one hunted, one out for revenge – will team up to track down and take out a brutal supernatural killer.

Jude Wolf is rich as sin and handsome as the devil. But she’s also cursed. Her immortal soul is tethered to a rather hateful demon – and she wants the hell out of the deal. What Jude needs is a cursewriter – and she thinks the string of dead women, all of whom she suspects are messing with the occult, might just be able to lead her to one.

Zara Jones has also been tracking the murders since they began. Her older sister was the killer’s first victim. Zara doesn’t just want revenge, she wants to find a way to bring her sister back. What Zara needs is a witch, a sorcerer, a necromancer – in fact, what Zara needs is a cursewriter.

At the apartment of the fifth victim, Jude and Zara meet by chance, and there they find a clue that brings their paths crashing together: a strange business card bearing three words. Emer Byrne. Cursewriter.

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I knew as soon as I picked up this book that I was going to love it because the description sounded amazing, with all the right elements for a dark yet thrilling witchy story, but also because I loved the last book I read by this author. I was a little surprised by this story too, it leaned a little more into the gruesome side of horror than I expected, which I am not usually that keen on but I didn’t mind it as much in this book.

The author certainly knows how to craft a dark and creepy tale with an element of mystery and London is a fantastically bleak setting. From the very beginning of the book, I felt the terror of the unknown thing chasing down the women and this just keeps building as we are introduced to each of the characters and discover more about the women that have been killed.

Of course, the three women at the centre of the story, Jude, Zara, and Emer, are what really make it, they are all very different but have to band together to figure out what is happening. Emer is the mysterious cursewriter, I loved that she was obviously powerful but didn’t flaunt it and only helped women that were in desperate need. Zara is the one looking for answers and revenge, she is smart and articulate and almost a contradiction to this world that she is about to get involved with but is desperate to make amends. Jude is the rich girl ostracised by her family after a curse that goes wrong and is searching for a way out of it.

All the girls are spectacular beings but I will admit that I have a favourite, I love Jude and her cavalier attitude that masks her feelings, she always wants to be the one doing the risky things to protect the others, even though she wouldn’t admit it. Despite her cheeky chappy and overtly flirty exterior, you can tell that she just wants to know her place in the world and I just kind of love her for that.

I won’t say too much about the details of the story because it is just amazing to experience it as you are reading, however, I loved how the magic worked in this world that it is only women who can wield it, that they become targets for using it, and how they can access it, it was fascinating and very original. I also enjoyed that the girls were chasing down the murderer whilst also working towards their own goals. These sometimes were in opposition to what they were working toward together so it made for some interesting twists in the story.

The Invocations is a fantastic and macabre book that seamlessly blends action, mystery, and fantasy. I honestly didn’t want to put it down and I can safely say that this is a strong contender for one of my top books of the year.