After a month-long reading slump that had me staring at my bookshelf like it had personally betrayed me, I picked up Blood Like Magic again – and suddenly my brain was like, “Yes, this…more please.” I ended up devouring both books like I hadn’t read them before. They hit even harder the second time. These books? Absolute chef’s kiss. They blend magic, sci-fi tech, and generational chaos to perfection.

Let me take you through the mayhem, the magic, and the messiness.

SPOILER-FREE OVERVIEW

The duology is set in futuristic Toronto, and Voya Thomas is about to take her Calling – a rite of passage that determines your magic and your place in your family. Except her Calling is…questionable. She has to sacrifice her first love or her entire family loses their powers. (Not a spoiler, it’s literally in the book’s summary.) Suddenly, she’s thrust into a challenge that forces her to confront love, morality, family expectations, and whether her heart or her head is running the show.

Then in Book 2? Whew. Stakes go from 40 to 1000. Voya wrestles with the fallout and consequences of the previous book as well as more problems that are laid at her feet. The plot slaps, the tension slaps, the magic system slaps, and honestly, by the end I felt like the books slapped ME but in a “thank you, I needed that,” kinda way.

Everything blends: futuristic biotech, ancestral magic, rich worldbuilding, and a family dynamic so chaotic and loving it feels like you’re sitting at the reunion table with a giant plate of food and ten different conversations happening at once. Despite the high stakes, there’s comfort there.

OUR CHARACTERS

Voya Thomas – My Personality Twin and Overthinker Ambassador

Voya Thomas’s energy is definitely Black Girl Magic. She is that girl who’s like, “I’m totally confident,” and then immediately spirals for six chapters deciding whether or not to trust her gut (basically, she’s me). She is SO indecisive that if she’s not a Libra, I’ll be calling the author personally with questions. Voya is also loyal, stubborn, soft-hearted, dramatic as hell, intuitive, and deeply layered.

Her growth across the two books? Chef’s kiss.

She starts as this wonderfully messy girl: a people pleaser raised by a big family with big expectations…to someone who is slowly learning how to trust herself, make hard decisions, and honor her own heart. Watching her step into that confidence felt like watching a cousin finally leave a toxic situationship – you’re cheering even when she’s crying.

And I love – LOVE – that she has a real hobby. This girl cooks like it’s an Olympic sport.

She seasons. Sautés. Experiments like she’s auditioning for a futuristic Food Network.

Most YA protagonists have hobbies like “thinking dramatically in windows,” but Voya? Voya said I have interests, techniques, goals, and a whole culinary personality, thanks.

She’s relatable not just because she has flaws, but because her flaws make sense. She’s trying to grow without losing herself – and sometimes those two things fight like siblings in a backseat.

Voya & Luc – The Most Adorably Chaotic Tech-Magic Romance

Luc is the type of boy who shows up looking like “I’m perfectly fine,” but you know he’s hiding sixteen layers of trauma under a hoodie. Their relationship is a slow simmer – not insta-love but “wait why do I miss you when you’re not here.”

Their dynamic gives:

• awkward sweetness
• low-key bickering
• emotional vulnerability that sneaks up on you
• “I see the real you” energy
• two cinnamon rolls trying so hard

The Thomas Family: Peak Black Family Energy

I love every single member of the Thomas family – even when they were stressing my girl Voya OUT!

This family is huge, loud, loving, dramatic, supportive, judgmental, nosy, and always arguing. They are so real.

Voya lives with:

• her mom
• her dad
• her dad’s new wife, Priya
• her little half-sister, Eden
• her aunt
• her uncle
• her twin cousins both named Keisha (one goes by Keis)
• her cousin Alex
• her granny – the matriarch of the family

Is this confusing? Yes.

Does it somehow work? Also…yes…

Their house feels warm, lived-in, and familiar – like you could walk into their kitchen right now and someone would hand you a plate while arguing about chores.

The family dynamics are foundational to the story – not a backdrop. They shape Voya’s identity, her fears, her decisions, her worldview.

I love that Liselle Sambury understands family can be magic, conflict, culture, and character development all at once.

THE WORLD OF BLOOD LIKE MAGIC

Sambury’s futuristic Toronto feels both recognizable and brand new, like someone took the city and quietly rewired it while we weren’t looking. This is a world where:

• genetic modification is the new beauty standard
• corporate sponsorships make all the difference
• ancestral magic coexists with hypermodern science

This isn’t a distant sci-fi future with flying cards and shiny chrome. It’s plausible. Everything here feels like something we could genuinely evolve into if you just turned the dial on our current reality up a few notches.

There’s also a sharp attention to social class, corporate corruption, and how privilege evolves in a high-tech world. The more powerful witch families treat their gifts like assets, their lineage like intellectual property. It’s capitalism meets ancestry, and Voya’s caught in the middle.

MAGIC SYSTEM

One thing about this series?

The magic system is COOL.

Like actually cool. This is ancestral, blood-bound, culturally rooted magic that feels alive. It’s earned, not given. It has rules. It has consequences. (Oh, boy, does it have consequences.) It has personality.

Every witch has a Gift, and these Gifts range from “okay that’s wild” to “I could’ve lived without that, thanks.” It’s genuinely interesting that your magic could be shaped by your lineage, what you value, your interests, and/or your emotional truth.

But let’s be honest:

Some of these Gifts?

…girl.

Someone can be like: “I can heat water with my mind!”

And others are like: “I can see the future, read your memories, dismantle your soul, and braid hair with telekinesis.”

The power scaling is INSANE and I love it.

REPRESENTATION: MAGIC THAT FEELS LIKE HOME

This series is one of the most authentic, layered portrayals of Black girlhood and family dynamics in speculative fiction. It’s not token diversity – it’s representation that lives and breathes.

Blackness here isn’t a costume – it’s culture. It’s the rhythm of the dialogue, the family hierarchy, the aunties’ side-eye, the cooking scenes I could smell through my Kindle screen. The story embraces Black culture in a futuristic space (not just Black culture but Afro-Caribbean culture) without erasing its roots.

The family structure challenges stereotypes too – it’s blended, big, and full of love and tension. There’s representation for stepfamilies, mixed households, and how love can stretch across boundaries.

Queerness also exists naturally in this world – no big reveals, no trauma arcs, just people being who they are. It’s subtle but powerful representation that normalizes, not dramatizes.

FINAL THOUGHTS:

All in all? This duology is absolutely, undeniably, unequivocally one of my favorite series ever. Like top shelf, VIP section, hall-of-fame spot on the bookshelf.

Voya? That girl is my twin. My literary mirror. My anxious, indecisive, overly-loving, sister in chaos.

And listen…

Liselle Sambury needs to write more in this universe. The Thomas family alone has enough story potential to power an entire Netflix cinematic universe. Give me novellas. Give me spinoffs. I will read anything set in this magical, messy, sci-fi Toronto.

Anyway, if you like:

• soft but strong Black girl protagonists
• huge chaotic but loving family energy
• futuristic worlds
• sci-fi with FEELINGS
• adorable teen slow-burn romance that goes from “cute” to “oh God what do I do with feelings?”
• cooking as emotional language
• ethical dilemmas that make you pace your room
• stories about identity, legacy, and choosing yourself

Then you will LOVE these books.

My rating?

6/5.

Would reread again.

Would cry again.

Would cheer for Voya again.

And would happily live in this universe if someone opened a portal.