This is a spoiler-free review!
I finally picked up Ace of Shades and I am so glad that I did! With similar vibes to Caraval by Stephanie Garber and Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo, we enter a fantasy world of card games and trickery as Enne goes on a journey to the City of Sin to find her adoptive mother. Along the way, she meets Levi, a con man who is in severe debt, and sees an opportunity to pay off that debt with the help of Enne's payment to find her mother. In an unfamiliar city with all etiquette thrown out the window, Enne is lost and losing hope, but with Levi's help, she may be able to find her mother before it is too late.
I loved the entire environment that Foody takes the readers into -- casinos, cabarets, and city streets where people are up to no good. The reader is really able to immerse themselves into the story through the level of detailing when they are exposed to a new part of the city. You are immediately thrown into the plot as Enne arrives in the City of Sin, and from there the world-building feels never-ending as the author continues to expand on this new world. Both the readers and Enne are experiencing the city for the first time, so you are able to learn everything alongside our female lead.
You can feel the urgency in the city and how the people are cautious about anything and everything, especially when it comes to illegal activity and paying off debts. Levi knows the inner workings of this casino-lead world like the back of his hand, whereas Enne merely has an old guidebook filled with dos and don'ts to help her. These two character could not be more different -- Enne has completed finishing school and is the picture of perfection and elegance, while Levi is in a gang being roughed up and running from debt. As usual, opposite attract and we find ourselves with their dual perspective as they both work toward their end goals -- Enne finding her mother, and Levi gathering up the funds to pay off the ten thousand volts he owes.
The fantasy aspect of Ace of Shades is so intruguing -- characters have two talents, one blood talent and one split talent, with the blood talent being the dominant ability. These talents can vary from dancing, seeing auras, counting, controlling fire, and so much more. I found it so interesting that the talents were a combination of typical skills people could excel in and talents that possessed more magical components. The author did a very good job at not overwhelming the reader with complicated explanations for the talents, and worked them into each character's personality and appearance to the point where you could tell these skills were so incredibly natural to them.
I am always up for a romance subplot, and this book did not disappoint one bit. You can literally see the tension building off the page as the days go on as Enne and Levi work together to accomplish their goals. Especially with getting both of their perspectives, the readers are right inside their heads and are there from the very first thought they have about one another. This is a pretty intense slowburn, and when I say slowburn, I mean it. It had me giggling and kicking my feet until the very end, rooting for even a near touch to happen between Enne and Levi.
You can see Enne's confidence grow as the story goes on, which was so nice to see, especially because she was rather stoic at the beginning of the book. As she got more accustomed to the City of Sin, she begins to adopt more characteristics of her fellow Iron Lord friends she has made along the way. Even from the beginning, she was always assertive and knew what she wanted, and while just a tad annoying during some chapters and lacking a touch of common sense in others, she made a great lead to follow.
Levi is probably one of the most Kaz Brekker-coded characters I have ever come across, while also being quite the opposite of our favorite Crow Club leader. He has got trauma, plays card games, loves money, and has seemingly fallen for a girl who has a skill for acrobatics and dancing. While our dear Kaz does not mind getting some blood on his hands, Levi does not have a taste for that sort of thing. But lucky for him, Enne does not mind having to do what needs to be done in order for the both of them to get want they want.
One qualm I did have with this book is that the made up curse words were absolutely driving me up a wall. Understanding that this is a young adult, you do not need a curse word every other page, but given that we are literally in the City of Sin, it would have been fine to throw in some normal curse words instead of hearing "Muck!" every other page when something went wrong.
This was a great introduction to The Shadow Game trilogy, and readers looking for a romantasy will be pleasantly surprised at the world-building and pacing of this first installment. For fans of Leigh Bardugo and Stephanie Garber, this is for you!
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