The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo

Feb 17, 2025

Hi! Finally back with a new review, and this time it's for a book! No spoilers ahead, don't worry!

I sat through this audiobook while I did my morning routines, crocheted, cleaned, or anything else that didn't require full thought. I loaned it from my local library through Libby, and I do not regret this read! Starting in mid-January, I picked up this book over 30 times over the month that I had it. It took me a littel over 12 hours to get through it all, and boy this was a tough one to put down there at the end. All I wanted to do was listen to it, which led me to crochet a lot more lol.

This was my first time ever reading Bardugo, despite having known about her through the Grishaverse for years. Lots of my mutuals on social media or other people I followed for other reasons posted A Lot about her works. I had high hopes going into it for that reason. I'm happy to say I've already borrowed a second Bardugo novel from Libby, and I'm slowly falling in love with this one as well. (More on that when I finish it.)

The Familiar is set in the Spanish Golden Age, something I'll admit to not knowing a lot about prior to opening this book. The backdrop of this time period and location did loads to immerse me into Luzia's world and her life. At first, I was confused by some of the politics, but Bardugo does a strong job of clearing that up the further in you get. I wasn't confused for long, especially given the time to ease into the political side of the plot that ramps up in the latter half.

These characters all became so real to me. Luzia in particular became very beloved to me. I didn't know who else to trust besides her for most of this story. Even Santángel, who I fell in love with just like another character did (not spoiling it dw). Valentina surprised me, Marius bored me, Victor frustrated me, and so on and so forth. These characters felt like people I knew. Like I was a part of their interlocking journeys. It made the immersion that more intense.

This magic realism story also had me hooked. Simple magic, easily written off as nothing worth note at first, quickly becomes something bigger than all of them. Luzia inspired me with her quick wit, strength, and amazing abilities that only grew as time went on. This isn't at all what I expected from the BookTok reviews or the (beautiful) cover. I expected maybe…vampires? A vampire and their familiar? No. Way more interesting than that! I'm glad I went in mostly blind. The ending almost tricked me into hating the whole thing, until I actually got to the real ending. Promise it's worth it!

If you've never tried a Bardugo novel, then I highly recommend checking out what she has published. Each story seems so different from each other, and the book I started following this one is already a wildly different tone and tale. Check out which one might pique your interest, or maybe stick around for more reviews? I might just turn into a Leigh Bardugo fan site (joking, but seriously I love her work already).