Maia Tamarin dreams of becoming the greatest tailor in the land, but as a girl, the best she can hope for is to marry well. When a royal messenger summons her ailing father, once a tailor of renown, to court, Maia poses as a boy and takes his place. She knows her life is forfeit if her secret is discovered, but she'll take that risk to achieve her dream and save her family from ruin. There's just one catch: Maia is one of twelve tailors vying for the job.
Backstabbing and lies run rampant as the tailors compete in challenges to prove their artistry and skill. Maia's task is further complicated when she draws the attention of the court magician, Edan, whose piercing eyes seem to see straight through her disguise.
And nothing could have prepared her for the final challenge: to sew three magic gowns for the emperor's reluctant bride-to-be, from the laughter of the sun, the tears of the moon, and the blood of stars. With this impossible task before her, she embarks on a journey to the far reaches of the kingdom, seeking the sun, the moon, and the stars, and finding more than she ever could have imagined.
Flo's Review
Wow. This book was a lot of fun! I was a little worried about it going in because the audiobook is about 14 hours long. Usually I start to lose interest in audiobooks that surpass about 8 or 9 hours. I have to really be invested in order to make it through.
Well, turns out I was really invested!
I hadn't closely read the summary when I started it, so when I realized it was going to have the "girl disguises herself as guy" trope, I was pretty into it. Then I read the summary and saw the Project Runway comparison. Oh, all the competition and scheming! There were definitely characters that I loved to hate in there, and it was easy to cheer for the underdog Maia.
Then I got to the second part of the book that focuses on the journey around the three gowns. I liked that part even better than the first one! It was adventurous and magical and romantic -- and I was here for all of it. But definitely the romance. I'm such a sucker for it, and this one was really well done!
The story didn't necessarily end in a cliffhanger, per se, but it did end in a place that makes me want to read Unleash the Dusk immediately! This was the kind of story that as soon as I finished, I wanted to talk about it with someone who had read it. Luckily, it's my book club read of the month, so I was able to do that. It made the whole experience even more enjoyable to be able to talk reaction and theory.
I thought I might like Spin the Dawn, but I was just so pleasantly surprised to have loved it as much as I did. I love when a book does that!
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