Genre: Cozy Fantasy, Romance
Reviewer: Ulysses
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About The Book
A struggling alchemist. A small town with ancient secrets. And… a mysterious shadow ferret?
Botanical alchemist Rowan Mosswood didn’t expect much when he finally graduated, so a remote research assignment in Frostfern Valley seemed fitting. With his reputation in tatters after a public alchemical mishap, and his discipline of magic considered antiquated, Rowan agrees to the university’s terms: fix up an old greenhouse, study the mysterious loss of magic, and send regular reports. If he can manage all that, his student debts will disappear.
The assignment sounded Mundane enough, a wrist slap to be endured—until Rowan discovers the greenhouse is falling apart, the crops refuse to grow, and a wily shadow creature has taken up residence in his new home. As if that weren’t complicated enough, there’s Jimson: a too-handsome-for-his-own-good carpenter who seems determined to help… and fluster…Rowan.
With strange magic stirring in the forest, stubborn townsfolk to win over, and a year-long deadline ticking down, Rowan must decide whether to focus on the assignment or the life he’s beginning to build in Frostfern.
Mosswood Apothecary is a cozy queer fantasy brimming with botanical magic, slow-burn romance, queer found family, cottagecore vibes and small-town charm. This edition contains the map and three black and white illustrations.
The Review
We’re in one of those familiar unfamiliar worlds. I love it when authors go about world-building and get to pick and choose what their world looks like. In this world (Valdaes, which seems to be roughly the shape of Great Britain, but as along as a five-day train trip), there is magic; but it is generally referred to as alchemy. I like that, since alchemy is the transformation of one thing into another. The first famous alchemist was Nicholas Flamel (rediscovered in this generation by the Harry Potter books) who created the philosopher’s stone which transformed lead into gold. In this world, there is a Flamel University, where alchemy is taught—but it is named for a woman, Naomi Flamel. Also, there are (at least) three kinds of alchemy—quantum alchemy, metallurgical alchemy, and botanical alchemy. The quantum and metallurgical sorts have helped transform Neosilica, the largest city on this island nation, into a high-tech, heavily metallic metropolis with skyscrapers and automatons—humanoid robots that do a lot of the labor. The botanical variety of alchemy is, apparently, long out of fashion. And you know that can’t bode well.
Not everyone in this world has magic powers. The magic of our three main protagonists are these: Elara Frost is an undergraduate at Flamel, studying quantum alchemy. Her mother is the mayor of Frostfern Valley in the mountainous north. Marley Argentum, from a distinguished family of alchemists, has just gotten her degree in metallurgical alchemy; and Rowan Mosswood has just succeeded in his degree in botanical alchemy. He is nobody in particular, the son of a once-acclaimed herbalist.
Rowan is assigned by the university to a research project in Frostfern Valley, to study why the soil seems to be becoming depleted through a loss of its native magic. He quickly makes friends in the painfully quaint town, and in particular with a family all of whose given names are of trees, like Rowan. On his long trip north, he meets Elara Frost, whose cousin Jimson is an apprentice woodworker in Frostfern Valley and, immediately, Rowan’s destined crush. (Jimson is also the name for Jimsonweed, known as the datura plant, or devil’s trumpet. Hmm…he is in no way bad or toxic, but he is botanical, which suits Rowan’s vibe.) Jimson helps Rowan renovate the long-abandoned greenhouse laboratory owned now by Flamel University.
Rindfleisch manages the expected—nay, required—tropes with reverence and romantic intent. It is, after all, a cozy story, not a horror story. Jimson is large and red-bearded, while Rowan is scrawny and bespectacled. Jimson is physical while Rowan is intellectual. The author also leads us deep into Rowan’s exploration of Frostfern Valley before introducing the bad guys.
The bad guys are, not surprisingly, the tech people, in the person of Calder Steelwright, Rowan’s evil ex-boyfriend, and his very corporate father. It is the metallurgical Steelwrights who are responsible for the skycrapers and automatons. They are also very interested in what Rowan might discover in the forests around Frostfern Valley. No spoilers here!
Rindfleisch has created a very vivid world full of memorable characters. I kept flashing back to Oz and the Emerald City (also, thanks to Wicked’s two films); although the author’s world retains its unique identity. The overall narrative is a classic nature-vs-industry/empathy-vs-greed storyline. It works because the language works with the characters, and the hovering threat of dystopia never quite tips into Blade Runner territory (a movie I hated, by the way). It is romantic and exciting, but never horrifying. Good.
I rather hope there are other stories in this world, since I don’t think we got to explore much of it beyond what we could see from the train.
Four stars.
The Reviewer
Ulysses Grant Dietz grew up in Syracuse, New York, where his Leave It to Beaver life was enlivened by his fascination with vampires, from Bela Lugosi to Barnabas Collins. He studied French at Yale, and was trained to be a museum curator at the University of Delaware. A curator since 1980, Ulysses has never stopped writing fiction for the sheer pleasure of it. He created the character of Desmond Beckwith in 1988 as his personal response to Anne Rice’s landmark novels. Alyson Books released his first novel, Desmond, in 1998. Vampire in Suburbia, the sequel to Desmond, is his second novel.
Ulysses lives in suburban New Jersey with his husband of over 41 years and their two almost-grown children.
By the way, the name Ulysses was not his parents’ idea of a joke: he is a great-great grandson of Ulysses S. Grant, and his mother was the President’s last living great-grandchild. Every year on April 27 he gives a speech at Grant’s Tomb in New York City.
