The Alchemary

With this twisty series opener, Vincent (Living Dead Girl) lays the groundwork for a complicated mixture of fantasy, romance, and mystery. Alchemist prodigy Amber Fallbrook awakes one morning to discover she’s lost the last two years of memories, including everything to do with her time as a student in the prestigious and demanding Alchemary of Aethermere. With the dreaded third year Trials fast approaching, she must somehow reconstruct her education and skills from scratch. If she refuses to participate, she’ll be expelled; if she fails, she risks her life. Her only allies are brothers Wilder and Desmond Gregory, her childhood friends, but she’s uncertain how deep her relationship with either of them now runs, or if they can be trusted. As Amber desperately attempts to cram two years of work into six weeks, she also investigates the cause of her amnesia, which may be tied to the Alchemary’s mysterious history. The plot sometimes feels overloaded as Amber is emotionally torn between two very different brothers, swept up by the Alchemary’s secrets, and driven to reclaim what she’s lost, but Vincent does a good job of balancing these elements and crafting subtle tension. While the larger worldbuilding remains murky and answers, when they come, are delivered in somewhat unsatisfying infodumps, the attention to atmospheric detail and alchemical intricacies makes this memorable. Readers will be eager for more. (Apr.)