Title Strange Grace Series --- Author Tessa Gratton Cover Art --- Publisher Margaret K. McElderry Books - 2018 First Printing Margaret K. McElderry Books - 2018 Category Young Adult Warnings None Main Characters Mairwen, Rhun, Arthur Main Elements Gods, demons, witches

Once, a witch made a pact with a devil. The legend says they loved each other, but can the story be trusted at all? Find out in this lush, atmospheric fantasy novel that entwines love, lies, and sacrifice.

Long ago, a village made a bargain with the devil: to ensure their prosperity, when the Slaughter Moon rises, the village must sacrifice a young man into the depths of the Devil’s Forest.

Only this year, the Slaughter Moon has risen early.

Bound by duty, secrets, and the love they share for one another, Mairwen, a spirited witch; Rhun, the expected saint; and Arthur, a restless outcast, will each have a role to play as the devil demands a body to fill the bargain. But the devil these friends find is not the one they expect, and the lies they uncover will turn their town—and their hearts—inside out.

I read this book for free on rivetedlit.com which is part of Simon and Shuster. I didn't enjoy it at first, I found it was a bit slow going, and I didn't find it was well written, there were times I had to read a sentence more than once to understand it. And it wasn't as if the author was being historical or literary and thus using more complex language, it just wasn't written as clearly as it could have been. To be fair, these free books I have to read sitting at my desktop (doesn't work on the Kindle tablet and cannot be downloaded) so I tend to skim them a bit more than usual books, after a while my eyes burn from staring at the screen!

But as the tale progress, I must admit I was curious as to what was going on. Was this village blessed by the agreement made with the forest Devil? It is worth the cost of one young man's life every seven years to avoid other kinds of misfortune such as stillborn children, crop blights, diseased livestock? One life for dozens saved. Especially given that if your champion is good enough, fast enough, smart enough, he can return and live, the bargain still fulfilled.

But then the Slaughter Moon appeared after only three years instead of seven. Even if you planned to be the sacrifice your whole life, even if you expected it to happen, looked forward to the honour, losing four years you otherwise might have had is a hard blow to Rhun. And perhaps an even greater blow to his friends Mairwen and Arthur.

Mairwen is fighting her own urges as well, as a Grace Witch she is naturally drawn to the forest, as it was one of her ancestors that created the bargain in the first place.

Arthur is haunted and confused as well. As a child his mother convinced everyone that he was a girl, even him, so that he would never be chose as sacrifice. But secrets such as that have a way of coming out, and this left Arthur confused, born and raised to be one way, now having that whole childhood ripped away from him and having to prove his manliness more than anyone other boy in the village. It doesn't help that Rhun likes him...likes him a lot. Arthur doesn't know what he wants, whether to kiss Rhun, leave the village or sacrifice himself so that Rhun doesn't have to.

But since this year is different than the other years, since no one knows if the sacrifice will work or not, the three friends decide to take matters into their own hands to find out and race into the woods and encounter something that shatters their world. The nature of the devil, the sacrifice, the bargain...nothing was what they expected it to be.

This tale is dark, and yet the concept of the devil in the forest fascinated me. Reminded me of The Bear and the Nightingale, or Uprooted, where the forest itself is a kind of malevolent being, and where things are not as they seem, where gods have gone mad, and it's up to someone to try to heal the rift. It isn't as good as the other two but if you want more of the same, this would be one to try out. You have to work a little extra as a reader, as there are amnesia/flashback parts that fill in what happened in the middle of the book until they can sort their memories out by the end, as even the characters that experienced the forest couldn't figure out what happened to them there. It was interesting but challenging and that's where the story really got interesting for me.