Can’t-Wait Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted over at Wishful Endings to spotlight and discuss the books we’re excited about but haven’t yet read. Most of the time they’re books that have yet to be released, but not always. It’s based on the Waiting on Wednesday meme, which was originally hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine.
This week my Can’t-Wait-For Book is The Faithful Dark by Cate Baumer!
Genres: Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Ace-spectrum MC, major transmasc character, major bisexual character
Published on: 2nd April 2024
Goodreads
A gothic fantasy for fans of Hannah Whitten and Caitlin Starling.
In a holy city where sins and blessings can be revealed through consecrated touch, Csilla - born without a soul - is worthless to the Church that raised her. But when a series of murders corrodes the magic that keeps the city safe, the Church elders see a use for her flaw: she can assassinate their prime suspect, a heretic with divine heritage.
The heretic, however, makes a counter-offer; clear his name and catch the real killer, without becoming a target herself, and he'll use his power to get her a soul. When their investigation catches the attention of Ilan, a ruthless Inquisitor demoted for his failure to solve the case, he reluctantly offers his help in order to earn back his position. He’ll bring in the murderer—and failing that, Csilla and the heretic. But as the death toll rises and their hunt pits them against the Faith, Csilla will find that salvation comes at the cost of everything she believes in.
This was first described to me as ‘Queer gothic fantasy with an ace healer, transmasc priest, and chaotic bisexual angel hunting a serial killer in fantasy Vatican’ and yeah, that’s pretty much all I need to hear! I think a lot of queer ex-Catholics – and maybe queer currently-Catholics too? – are kind of obsessed with the decadent aesthetic of Catholicism, the powerful mythology of it, the gilt and velvet and blood and wine, the holy suffering…and how all those things can go with queerness, or just be queered outright.
I am definitely one of those people, so pretty much anything queer set in a fantasy Vatican? Is something I’m immediately interested in.
But what has me HOOKED is absolutely the implications and inferences of what the blurb says about souls. Some people have them! Some people DON’T?! How can you not have a soul? What difference does it make, what kind of effect does its absence have? And what would change if Csilla got one??? Can Csilla murder this heretic because the heretic is immune to anyone with a soul, or is it just that if you have no soul, you can’t be damned for murder? So you might as well send an assassin with no soul, rather than damn someone with a soul by ordering them to commit murder?
How can anyone, even someone with divine heritage, MAKE a soul???
QUESTIONS, I HAVE THEM!
And, inevitably, I want to know all about this religion – who or what do they worship, and is it the same thing the heretic in the blurb is descended from??? How can you be a heretic when you have divine blood? Can you imagine the theological (and political!) fall-out from that kind of situation? I’m evil-cackling already just thinking about it!
I notice there’s no mention of an angel in the blurb…or is the angel mentioned in the pitch I was given the same person as the heretic in the blurb? HMM.
We don’t have much longer to wait for this one – just a bit over a month! – and I am COUNTING THE DAYS!
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