The Wings Upon Her Back by Samantha Mills

TL;DR: An intense and dark story about a women untangling her faith and herself from an abusive relationship and society.
Source: NetGalley – thank you so much Tachyon!

Plot: A very intense look at how Faith and Abuse can shape and remake someone – and what it takes to break that.
Characters: This primarily focuses on Zemolai – leaving the others as a bit less well drawn, but the story doesn’t require them as much, so it works well.
Setting: I loved the setting actually, dark and broken by a civil war but with sparks of beauty, especially in the moments in Heaven.
Science Fiction: This is classed as SF, but truly reads more like Fantasy to me – the SF being primarily the hints that the Gods aren’t Gods and the development of the copper wings.

Thoughts:

Zemolai is a winged warrior in service of the Mecha God in the city of Radezhda, where the people build towers to reach their sleeping gods. After a brief lapse ‘in judgement’ Zemolai is cast down, her wings ripped from her, and she is left for dead. What follows is her coming to grips with what her life was ultimately in service too. We follow both this timeline and how Zemolai became winged, and the toxic, abusive relationship that destroyed and remade her.

This book was intense, I can’t emphasize that enough. The focus on the book is much less on the world, the gods, and much more on Zemolai and her reckoning with her faith and relationships. Zemolai is the victim of abuse and manipulation by her mentor Vodaya and we see that on page, graphicly. Gaslighting, physical and emotional abuse, abuse of power, it all happens and breaks Zemolai down so far as to loose her family, and turn on those that helped raise her.

If you aren’t ready for something that’s simply exhausting at times from the amount of loss and abuse, this is a definite skip. But if you’re willing to read through that this payoff is great for Zemolai and the final scenes really stick with you.

3.5 Heretical Books out of 5