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Magic for Liars

Sarah Gailey (Goodreads Author)

3.67 · Rating details · 11,221 ratings · 2,018 reviews

Ivy Gamble has never wanted to be magic. She is perfectly happy with her life—she has an almost-sustainable career as a private investigator, and an empty apartment, and a slight drinking problem. It's a great life and she doesn't wish she was like her estranged sister, the magically gifted professor Tabitha.

But when Ivy is hired to investigate the gruesome murder of a ...more

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Kindle Edition, 336 pages

Published June 4th 2019 by Tor

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· 11,221 ratings · 2,018 reviews

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Mar 18, 2019 Chaima ✨ شيماء rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2019-releases, lgbtqia-rep, fantasy, mystery, adult, fiction, read-in-2019, girls-love-girls, boys-love-boys

Ivy Gamble is not magic.

She will not be whisked away to train in a magician’s school where she will have all the glory her teeth can snatch. She is not the Chosen One, standing over her peers like a towering peak—all the possibilities of life, death, and magic spinning in her head. Instead, she will end up dragging her hopes behind her like a chastised child dragging her stuffed bear thumping up the stairs. Her life will settle into a humdrum rhythm, and some forty years later, she will be ...more

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Jul 31, 2019 Emily (Books with Emily Fox) rated it it was ok

(2.75) Murder mystery in a magical school? Sounds right up my alley!

Sadly I ended up being a bit bored. The story simply wasn't very memorable.

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Sep 27, 2017 Elise (TheBookishActress) rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 5-star, elise-s-reviews-to-come, elise-recs-list, books-released-2019, z-read-in-2019, z-faves-of-2019

i absolutely loved this.

review to come!!

"The Magicians meets Tana French" so hey I haven't actually read either but both sound like My Shit(TM) so yeah this needs to release and be in my hands immediately please serve w morally black characters

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Jun 04, 2019 The Captain rated it did not like it

Shelves: walk-the-plank

Ahoy there me mateys! I received this fantasy eARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. So here be me honest musings . . .

I was excited to read this full-length novel from the author who brought us hippo cowboys. This is a murder mystery set in a magical school. Ivy is a professional PI that spends her time investigating cheaters and such. She has always been upset that her twin sister got the magic and glory and she got the grit and mundane. But this murder mystery could be the step ...more

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Nov 11, 2019 Christina - Traveling Sister rated it it was ok

2, how did a Veronica Mars/Harry Potter mash up end up flopping so hard stars!

Full review featured on my blog Recipe and a Read!

Ivy and Tabitha Gamble are twins. They share parents, DNA, a home and a childhood full of beautiful, loving and happy memories. What they don’t share, is magic. Tabitha (Tabby), Ivy’s twin sister is gifted with powers beyond either of their imaginations and upon their inception Tabby is whisked away to a modern day Hogwarts and eventually begins teaching Theoretical ...more

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May 29, 2019 Meredith B. (readingwithmere) rated it really liked it · review of another edition

4 stars!

It might take a little while to get there, but I'll tell you everything, and I'll tell you the truth. As best I can. I used to lie, but when I tell you the story, you'll understand why I had to lie. You'll understand that I didn't have a choice. I just wanted to do my job.

This was a fun read for me! 1. I got to read something that's completely out of my comfort zone - sci-fi and fantasy (with a bit of mystery) 2. I got to buddy read this with my husband!

Ivy is a detective but right now the extent of her work is only being hired to find out if someone's spouse is cheating on them. Ivy is like any normal person and she has a family but her sister is a little different than yours and mine. Ivy's sister Tabitha was born with magic powers and is able to make things happen with spells, etc.

One day, Ivy gets called in on a special case and it just so happens to be a murder at her sister's school who she hasn't seen in many years. She sets up to move there, and into the dead person's apartment no less, and has to stay on campus until she figures out what happened. She interviews students, staff and even tries to reconcile a bit with her sister. Through her interviews she starts to put the puzzle pieces together. She both is and isn't shocked at all the parties involved in the end but the reasoning behind it really hits home...

I gave this book a 4 star rating and my husband gave it a 3.5 star rating. We both enjoyed multiple aspects of this story such as the detective storyline and the sister relationship that somewhat evolved during the story. I also enjoyed the family story that came about within this book. The author touches on the family story throughout the book and you can see how Ivy and Tabitha's actions today translate to what has happened to them in the past.

I'm glad I took the leap and decided to read something different from what I normally do again. I think the magic aspects of this book were still a little too outside the box for my liking (again just personal preference) but I actually came to enjoy most of the story and the meaning behind it while also opening my imagination.

This was a great debut by Sarah Gailey and if this sounds like something you'd enjoy then definitely pick it up! It releases June 4th!

Thanks to Tor Books for my ARC and finished copies of this book. ...more

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Sep 05, 2019 Celeste rated it really liked it

Shelves: mystery, urban-fantasy

The cover and synopsis and title of the novel were all immediately intriguing to me. Magic for Liars is a murder mystery on a magical high school campus, told from the perspective of the nonmagical private eye who finds herself on the case. You can see why I was intrigued, right? Noir novels can be very hit or miss, but this one was definitely a hit. It was everything I was hoping for, and more than I was expecting.

Ivy Gamble is a wonderfully developed character. She comes across a bit as a The cover and synopsis and title of the novel were all immediately intriguing to me. Magic for Liars is a murder mystery on a magical high school campus, told from the perspective of the nonmagical private eye who finds herself on the case. You can see why I was intrigued, right? Noir novels can be very hit or miss, but this one was definitely a hit. It was everything I was hoping for, and more than I was expecting.

Ivy Gamble is a wonderfully developed character. She comes across a bit as a down-on-her-luck gumshoe detective at the beginning of the book, but she grows and changes so much throughout the book. When she is approached to look into a mysterious death on the campus of a magic school, the campus where her magical twin sister teaches, no less, Ivy is incredibly conflicted. She has no real relationship with her sister and doesn’t want to encroach on her world, but the pay is too good for her starving coffers to pass up. Ivy suddenly finds herself trying to balance a rekindling relationship with her sister, a burgeoning romance with one of the school’s teachers, the teenage drama running wild in the hallways, the questionable death that brought her to the school in the first place… and lies. Lots and lots of lies.

The mystery elements of this novel were really fun, but my favorite aspect was the setting. I’m a sucker for any kind of school story, especially if that school is magical. What I loved so much about The Osthorne Academy for Young Mages is that it’s not Hogwarts. There’s nothing mystical about it. Osthorne is exactly like a real life preppy, private high school, but where magic is taught alongside your average subjects. I thought the lack of robes and moving stairways and haunted forests was incredibly refreshing, even though I adore all of those elements. I also really liked how scientific the magic was, and the medical implications that were discussed throughout. And the fact that our main character is an outsider looking in on this magical world was a wonderful change, as well. I enjoyed getting to see magic from the perspective of someone incapable of using it.

I really liked Magic for Liars. Is it a book that I’ll remember forever and add to my shelf of lifetime favorites? No. But it was a fun ride that I would have no problem recommending to others. It’s great for what it is, and well worth reading.

You can find this review and more at Novel Notions. ...more

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Jun 02, 2019 Lisa Wolf rated it it was amazing

Shelves: magic, boarding-school-or-college, high-school-setting, fantasy, murder

Magic For Liars may be set at a school of magic, but we're on notice from the very first page that this is not THAT kind of school:

Now they were all downstairs at the welcome-back dinner, an all-staff-all-students meal that marked the end of the first week of classes. They'd joke there about house-elves and pumpkin juice -- or at least the freshmen would. By the time they were sophomores, that vein of humor was worn beyond use.

After a bloody murder at Osthorne Academy for Young Mages (located in ...more

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Jun 02, 2019 Bee rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, my-library, read-in-2019, 5-stars, fiction, queer, arc

Magic for Liarsisn't what I expected it to be. I had impressions from other early readers that it would be along the lines of a murder-mystery in Hogwarts, which turned out to be less-than-accurate. Instead,Magic for Liarsis about the lies we tell ourselves, and each other. It is about the disastrous things that result from these lies, no matter how well-meaning they were, or how innocent they seemed.

It begins with the gruesome death of a staff member at The Osthorne Academy for Young Mages. Magic for Liars isn't what I expected it to be. I had impressions from other early readers that it would be along the lines of a murder-mystery in Hogwarts, which turned out to be less-than-accurate. Instead, Magic for Liars is about the lies we tell ourselves, and each other. It is about the disastrous things that result from these lies, no matter how well-meaning they were, or how innocent they seemed.

It begins with the gruesome death of a staff member at The Osthorne Academy for Young Mages. After an investigation by the authorities concludes the death a suicide, the heads of the Academy are unsatisfied. Enter Ivy Gamble, PI. Ivy isn't like her sister- she isn't magic and she doesn't want to be. Though she spends most of her days following cheating spouses or investigating insurance fraud, she is reluctantly convinced (namely, by a large sum of cash) to re-investigate the death at Osthorne.

Ivy Gamble is a hot mess and an absolutely fascinating character. She is morally grey from head to toe and maybe a little bit out of her depth, but at her core intelligent and trying her best. The story unfolds entirely from her perspective as she sleuths around Osthorne, allowing herself to slip in to Tabitha's world. There is some time given to the magic in this world as Ivy peeks into classroom and gets to know staff, but there isn't a deep dive into its limits and intricacies. This seemed to be a sticking point for some readers, but I never found myself bothered by it. The narrator of this story is non-magical, so it felt right that we only had topical glances at the various subjects via Ivy's encounters with them. Their relationships and interactions drive this plot forward without losing any of the atmospheric tension you'd hope for in a good mystery. It beckons you forward page after page and doesn't let go until the very end. I found myself hanging on as I came approached to the conclusion thinking there was no way it was possible, skimming through previous pages making sure I hadn't misread the the final discoveries because I couldn't fathom how it could be. This book doesn't give you that feeling of satisfaction that comes at the end of a typical mystery novel: the evil-doer unmasked, justice is served, our grizzled protagonist reflects with contentment on another case solved. No, the end of Magic for Liars is fucking devastating. It is devastating and brilliant.

While this book sits firmly in both the realms of mystery and fantasy, it subverts both. The evil in this book does not manifest in the form of a sadistic killer, nor is it a dragon to be slain. Ivy Gamble is not our hero, nor is this the story of her redemption. She arrives at Osthorne Academy as a deeply flawed person, and eventually departs in similar form. We don't get to see her redemption. The choices she makes throughout her investigation are not always good, sometimes even amoral, and some of them will even make you uncomfortable. You might even see a little of yourself in their choices.

I received a copy of Magic for Liars from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

P.S. - Sarah Gailey wrote a piece over on the B&N Sci-Fi and Fantasy Blog called "What Makes a Story Queer?" They use Magic for Liars as a jumping off point for this discussion and it's wonderful. Read it here. ...more

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Jun 24, 2019 Sonja Arlow rated it it was ok

Shelves: fantasy, 2019-read

2.5 stars

What a bipolar reading experience this was.

Initially I was doubtful that a story set in a magic school would interest me but once I started I REALLY enjoyed it…… until I didn’t.

It’s such a pity that Ivy turned out to kill my joy with her incessant whining and insecurities about her inability to do magic. The author repeated this fact one too many times for my liking.

What I do think was done well is the way the complex relationship between Ivy and her twin sister Tabitha was portrayed.

...more

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Mar 01, 2019 unknown rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Books that are billed as “like The Magicians” are never like The Magicians in the right ways for me, but this is both like The Magicians in that “magic is actually kind of weird and gross and real” way, and it’s a compelling whodunnit besides. The solution was perhaps a tad obvious, but the emotional weight with which the mystery is treated–it is deeply rooted in the characters’ past traumas and dysfunctions and insecurities–made that matter less. The narrative voice is arresting, and the noir ...more

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Jun 30, 2019 Jenny (Reading Envy) rated it really liked it

Shelves: ebooks, sci-fi-fantasy, reviewcopy, read2019, 2019-sword

A non-magic (muggle) detective is called to Osthorne Academy for Young Mages (Hogwarts) to investigate the mysterious and gruesome death of one of their teachers. It's also where her sister teaches, so it brings up all sorts of memories and what-ifs for her own life.

I would say within the work of this author, I prefer the alternate history hippos, but this had some clever ideas in it. And it takes place largely in a library. But I hear their next book has a librarian MC so I'm looking forward to ...more

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Jun 11, 2019 Fiona rated it really liked it

Shelves: absolute-favourites, happy-place, urban-fantasy, detectives

This time was going to be different. This time was going to be better. This time, I was going to be enough.

Like so many of us readers, Ivy Gamble never had the chance to go to magic school and experience a magical fix for everything wrong in her life. Unlike most of us, she's not really allowed to put the dream aside and move on with life - her twin sister does get that, from her teenage perspective, and when this story begins years later, she's now a hard drinking, hard living PI, who ...more

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May 29, 2019 Darcia Helle rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, review-copies, fantasy-and-sci-fi

I love the combination of magic with a PI and a murder case, so I was looking forward to reading this book. Unfortunately, I didn't love the book as much as I love the concept.

I have low tolerance for characters (and people) who wallow in self-pity. Ivy, the PI and narrator of this story, is queen of the 'woe is me' category. Her whining is a constant throughout the story. I wanted to give her a shake and tell her to grow up, though with less polite wording.

I loved the way the magic was handled. ...more

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Dec 13, 2019 Frank Phillips rated it really liked it

3.5 Stars rounded up. Very solid read! This reminded me of a more mature, slightly less fantastical version of Harry Potter, mainly because of the fact this takes place in a school for magic. Our protagonist is what Potter fans would call a muggle, she has no magic, and she is contracted to investigate the murder of a professor at this wonderful School of magic, and what's her twin sister also works at. This had the obvious element of mystery, as we are trying to figure out who dunnit ...more

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Mar 21, 2019 Janet Newport rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: kindle-books, netgalley, 2019-reads

Thank you NetGalley and Macmillan/Tor-Forge for this arc.

I wish I enjoyed this read more than I did. It sounded like it would be right up my alley. But it just missed out for me. I was so irritated with Ivy's self pity through out the book, that I was tempted to give up by 37%. I found it to be a slow read as it lacked the tension I usually find in murder mysteries and I had a tough time connecting to any of the characters. There was plenty of teenage angst and drama (as expected for a story set ...more

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Jul 10, 2019 Emily rated it liked it

Shelves: san-francisco, mystery-thriller, sci-fi-fantasy

I really enjoyed reading this. A mystery set at a magic school is right up my alley, particularly because the detective, Ivy, is distinctively non-magical and has to solve a case at the school where her estranged twin is teaching. I liked Ivy's voice, and I was particularly drawn into the descriptions of how ordinary the magical high school is (there are several passages about Being a Teenager that rang true and that I appreciated). The author gets away with never quite explaining the rules of ...more

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Aug 12, 2019 Hiu Gregg rated it really liked it · review of another edition

I found this to be a bit of a strange book. It's slow paced in the extreme, and overflowing with mundane description. I'm talking "a few sentences to describe a hand on a doorknob" stuff. And yet...

The level of description did mean that it took me a while to fully immerse myself in the book, but that when I did, I really was immersed in the main character and her story. I've a love for broken things, and this is a story about a broken person trying to mend a broken relationship with her twin ...more

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Jun 10, 2019 Mari rated it liked it

Shelves: 2019, fantasy

I gobbled this up in a day and that readability and the premise are definitely the strongest pieces here. It's a mystery set at a magic school, I mean come on. I was sold immediately. The overall experience was good, but not great.

Because our protagonist was non-magic, it allowed Gailey to handwave over some of her world-building and some of the rules of magic. I was mostly okay with that while reading-- Ivy didn't understand things so we didn't understand things. After reading, I was more ...more

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Jun 23, 2019 Mellie Antoinette rated it really liked it

Magical magicians mysteriously manipulating murderous shenanigans.

Possibly perjerous PIs pandering to perilous culminations.

In short, this couldn’t have been better if Stephen Fry wrote it! ...more

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May 07, 2019 Caidyn (SEMI-HIATUS; BW Reviews; he/him/his) rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: from-publisher-or-author, mystery-horror-thriller, fantasy, arc

This review can also be found on my blog!

I received an ARC from BookishFirst in exchange for an honest review!

CW: murder, abortion, cancer, alcohol abuse, and bullying

For me, this was a case of coverly love that turned into more intrigue when I read the First Look that BookishFirst gave.

Ivy Gamble is a private investigator. Usually, she looks for cheating spouses and other little things like that. But, one day, someone comes knocking on her door. There’s been a murder at a magic school that her This review can also be found on my blog!

I received an ARC from BookishFirst in exchange for an honest review!

CW: murder, abortion, cancer, alcohol abuse, and bullying

For me, this was a case of coverly love that turned into more intrigue when I read the First Look that BookishFirst gave.

Ivy Gamble is a private investigator. Usually, she looks for cheating spouses and other little things like that. But, one day, someone comes knocking on her door. There’s been a murder at a magic school that her twin sister, Tabitha, teaches at. Despite her reservations about magic and the tense relationship the sisters have, Ivy decides to take it.

Let me tell you, this was a fun ride. I haven’t been so absorbed in a mystery in a while! Ivy was a very fun, flawed main character to read from. I loved that there was such a deep past for her that developed more as the story went on. I also loved that it showed a difficult family relationship with so many complicating factors included.

The mystery was also spectacularly woven. There were so many twists and characters that could have done it that I wasn’t sure where to focus my attention on. In the end, I was pleased with what it turned out to be. It was the last thing I expected, too! While I think that some might feel it’s a bit of a lackluster ending, I thought that it really worked for the story. It was hard to read, but it was still something that I enjoyed.

One thing I wish was clear in the book is that it deals with cancer. I might have avoided the book or done a few extra things to mentally guard myself if I had known that. It wasn’t terribly described, but having a family member pass from cancer a month ago, it would have been nice to have that as a warning. It’s a minor critique, but I want it to be clear in my review since I didn’t see it anywhere else.

There are also queer characters in this book! While they’re not exactly main characters, they’re there and I loved reading how seamlessly they were included by the author into the story. No fuss about it, either. It just was the way it was and no one found it odd, which is what I love my queer content as.

Basically, y’all need to pick this book up! It was a very enjoyable read with beautifully flawed characters and a mystery that kept me hooked the whole time. I can’t wait to see what comes from this author next and if these characters will be revisited anytime! ...more

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Jul 04, 2019 Lindsay rated it really liked it

Shelves: fantasy

Ivy Gamble is a private investigator and completely non-magical. Her twin sister Tabitha is magical and a teacher at a magic school. They have a strained relationship for all sorts of reasons, but bitter envy is definitely one of them. When there's a murder at Tabitha's school and Ivy gets called in to investigate after the magic police dismiss the case, Ivy has to confront her difficult relationship with both magic and her sister, all while trying to find a murderer.

As a murder mystery, this is ...more

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Jun 13, 2019 Taryn rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2019-release, fiction, mystery, sff, lgbtq

I haven't read very many fantasy/mystery mashups, but now I want to scent them all out like a hound dog because this was a fabulous reading experience. I loved the setting of a private school for mages paired with Ivy, the adult outsider narrator, because frankly I can only take so much teenage drama. This way you get the fun setting but the angsty bullshit is filtered through a snarky, tough-but-damaged-inside PI who is not going to be drawn in by the schoolkid shenanigans (or is she?). Tons of ...more

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Dec 04, 2019 Jerrie (redwritinghood) rated it liked it · review of another edition

This had a really interesting premise but was more a standard detective novel than a fantasy novel. It was okay, but I wanted more of the fantasy world than was there.

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Jul 29, 2019 Emily rated it it was ok

I desperately wanted to love it. It was a tragedy in the making.

First, some things I liked
Rahul, the main love interest: He must be protected
Magic teenagers being teenagers: YES magic teens would definitely use their magic for the most utterly juvenile things, including lots of penis clouds. A very strong bit of world building from Gailey.

And then... the bad
Alas, ear wax: I find it... insufferable when books reference Harry Potter more than the teensiest amount. This book was, in part, a ...more

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Jun 06, 2019 Lucille rated it it was ok

Shelves: read-2019

between 3 and 4, because I loved the idea of this book and the setting, but also because it was not all that surprising to me. I wanted to not see things coming, to be surprised by twists, but I wasn't really. Though might not be the case for everyone!

Edit: lowering to 2 because I'm still a bit uneasy with the way the book seems to scorn (not sure that's the right word?) at teenagers and lots of other annoying thing I keep thinking about

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Mar 29, 2019 Aidan rated it it was amazing

A thrilling, thoughtful, funny, cutting, and heartbreaking mystery. Like Harry Potter meets Mean Girls by way of Broadchurch.

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Jul 08, 2019 Rumell Khan rated it it was amazing

Shelves: reading-bingo-challenge

I really enjoyed this Mystery Book. I was looking for something like this. I am very satisfied with it.

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Jun 20, 2019 Alice rated it did not like it · review of another edition

First, let me say that I had huge expectations for this. I really enjoyed Sarah Gailey's previous works (I've read both short stories in American hippo) and I've been following them on twitter for a while now and always enjoy what they have to say. I pre-ordered this for more than 20 which makes it my most expensive book this year and I started reading it as soon as it arrived. So all this to say that I was EXCITED. Also of course the cover, the synopsis and even the title of this book all made ...more

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Oct 04, 2019 Kyra Leseberg (Roots & Reads) rated it really liked it

3.5 stars

Ivy Gamble has been a Private Investigator in California for years, working cases mostly involving adultery. She's surprised when the headmaster of Osthorne Academy for Young Mages arrives in her office to hire her to investigate the murder of a teacher in the school library.

The National Mage Investigative Service has listed the cause of death as "a miscast version of a theoretical spell intended to facilitate instantaneous physical translation" - essentially, a spell gone wrong causing ...more

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Bookish First Rea...: Magic for Liars by Sarah Galley	1	4	Oct 22, 2019 12:39PM
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Goodreads Librari...: Please add book cover to alternate edition	8	28	Jun 04, 2019 05:24AM