Meet the two groups of witches in Olivie Blake’s One For My Enemy, the drug-dealing Anotova’s, and the crime syndicate Fedorov’s.

Both families are bitter rivals and have been trying to subtly destroy each other’s business, wealth, and magical influence for many decades. But when Lev Federov and Sasha Anotova meet each other at a bar and instantly fall in love, it’s only a matter of time before the knives come out and the two families go into full-scale war.

This book is fast paced, imaginative and full of memorable characters. Blake fully embraces her inspirations, namely Romeo and Juliet and the Russian folktale of Koschei the Deathless and Marya Morevna. She uses these classic stories to craft the relationships between Federov sons and Anatova daughters, leading to an engaging core theme of taut, troubled, and tragic love. Sasha and Lev are adorable together, (especially through Blake’s choice to convey their dialogue through cutesy text messages), even if their romance moves a little too fast to be realistic.

Blake focuses on five or six leads but introduces several other ancillary characters halfway through the story, who are instrumental, but unfortunately are minimally developed. For a book involving political intrigue between rival boroughs of New York witches, there is very little world-building outside of the two main families. I would have really loved some ‘what, when, why, how’ details on how New York developed into this alternate world.

Despite these potential drawbacks, Olivie Blake has delivered a high-stakes, witchy romance, which will captivate fans of her earlier work and those who enjoy a good love story.

Reviewed by Rachel Denham-White

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