Review: A Grimoire for Gamblers

A Grimoire for Gamblers by Amanda Creiglow
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A cut above the usual made-from-box-mix urban fantasy, with a sensible, capable (sometimes to the point of ruthlessness) protagonist. It's darker than I really prefer, with a number of tragic deaths of innocents that the protagonist has some unintentional responsibility for and is unable to prevent. The supernatural world is hostile and dangerous to a medieval degree, and only an extraordinarily gutsy move by the protagonist is able to resolve the plot.

There were some weaknesses and unanswered questions for me. For example, the voodoo train. Why would someone make that, and having made it, why would they leave it active, literally an accident waiting to happen?

I groaned when the handsome wizard with green eyes turned up, because that's the universal signal for a love interest, and the protagonist already had a boyfriend who seemed like a decent guy - by her account, anyway; he was absent elsewhere for almost the whole book, and even when he returned he felt like he didn't have much heft to him as a character. He functioned more as an aspect of the protag than a person in his own right. Hopefully the author will figure out what to do with him in future books in the series and give him his own independent reality. I hope he doesn't just become a genderflipped damsel in distress/hostage to fortune/motivating factor/fridge inhabitant. Anyway, the green-eyed-love-interest trope was invoked only to be averted, and I sincerely hope that continues.

The protagonist is smart, and a good problem solver, and while she narrates in a version of First Person Smartass, it's not overdone. She has some genuinely tough stuff to cope with, and does so bravely and resourcefully. I'm not sure if it's a Covid side-effect, a phenomenon whose time had come regardless, or just good luck or good management on my part, but I'm loving the fact that I'm finding so many really competent, pragmatic female protagonists lately.

I'll definitely be looking out for a sequel, though I hope the author manages to make more of the boyfriend next time.

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