The Bone Brides by Marley Rose-Teter is a sapphic dark portal fantasy. It had some things that I liked, but there were also parts that needed work, and some elements fell into both of these categories.

The absolute best part of The Bone Brides was Jeffrey, who is a skeleton rabbit!! He was adorable and a very fleshed out (no pun intended) animal companion! Was I worried the entire time that an already dead rabbit would die? Absolutely. Was I right to be worried? Absolutely 🙂‍↕️ Did it all turn out okay in the end for Jeffrey? Thank god, yes.

The faery realm itself was so unique, which I loved. Sometimes it gave me Alice in Wonderland vibes, which I am always down for! But at other times, I also wanted more. We are told that there is this ceremony that results in a new faery queen being chosen but I couldn’t quite wrap my head around it. And even though the ascension of the new faery queen was pretty integral to the plot, it also felt removed from the story because the main character, Nola, was not involved in almost any of it. Most of it was happening off page so it was hard to feel any real kind of urgency about it.

It was supposed to be urgent because Nola’s girlfriend, Lumi, could be chosen as the next faery queen. The girls are already in a relationship when the book starts, and spend most of it apart. Except for some random flashbacks, there’s really no development of their relationship, which made it hard to feel invested in their connection.

Nola is dealing with the grief of losing her father, as well as anxiety and depression. A large part of Nola’s character arc is her coming to realise that she is experiencing all of these things and that she needs to let herself feel in order to heal, which I thought was done well.

Overall I liked The Bone Brides, even though it didn’t quite hit the mark on some things. Would I recommend it? If you’re looking for a darker portal fantasy that’s a standalone and sapphic, then yes.