Scarlett Dragna has never left the tiny island where she and her sister, Tella, live with their powerful, and cruel, father. Now Scarlett’s father has arranged a marriage for her, and Scarlett thinks her dreams of seeing Caraval—the faraway, once-a-year performance where the audience participates in the show—are over.
But this year, Scarlett’s long-dreamt-of invitation finally arrives. With the help of a mysterious sailor, Tella whisks Scarlett away to the show. Only, as soon as they arrive, Tella is kidnapped by Caraval’s mastermind organizer, Legend. It turns out that this season’s Caraval revolves around Tella, and whoever finds her first is the winner.
Scarlett has been told that everything that happens during Caraval is only an elaborate performance. Nevertheless she becomes enmeshed in a game of love, heartbreak, and magic.

Another one of those old hyped books that I'm reading ages after everyone else, but it’s been on my tbr for over a year and I especially liked some cute fanarts I’ve been seeing lately. Even though I wasn’t particularly captivated or impressed by this piece of work, there was still that something that kept me immersed in the story and characters. Garber has an amazing style, balancing her plot with interactive dialogues and character interactions, turning readers’ attention to where she wants it to be while working her finale in the background.

Caraval is set in a high fantasy world of magic and trickery, where once a year, a magical game of Caraval is organized by one of the most famous and powerful people in the world – the Legend. Caraval is just a game of following and finding clues, intertwined with magic that makes it seem almost real – so the most important thing about playing is remembering that it is just a game, or people might go mad believing something that isn’t happening. Scarlett and Tella are two sisters from the island of Trisda, born and raised there by governor Marcello Dragna who has developed a habit of beating his daughters. Scarlett has always wanted to be a part of Caraval, and, after Legend responds to her letter, that dream might become a reality. The only thing keeping her on that island is a promise to her fiancé, but when Tella arranges a journey to Caraval while practically kidnapping her sister, Scarlett has nothing left to do but play the most magical and dangerous game in the world.


There was something refreshing and intriguing that made me really like Garber’s worldbuilding. The idea of a magical game makes both character and reader question reality and solidity of everything they do, opening a way for dozens of possible plot twists. No matter how many times it was repeated that it was just I game I couldn’t see some things not to be real. I loved everything about the game and the way it developed from interesting and tempting to risky and dangerous, but the only thing that didn’t sit quite well was the ending.

I liked both Scarlett and Julian as the main character and the love interest –a romance that began with banter and bickering but turned into a fluffy love story that turned into a quite unexpected direction. I really liked them together and I liked Julian as a character so I got pretty annoyed when it turned out it wasn’t actually him with Scarlett all that time. *spoilers for the ending* I mean, I get it their roles and their real selves were similar, but Scarlett actually fell in love with Julian because of all they went through and all she thought he was, so the real him was far from the real object of her love. Idk, I’m just kind of disappointed and thinking it would have been better if he wasn’t a performer.

I recently realized that I was maaaybe a bit too harsh towards YA books recently so I’m going to lay off of this one and say I genuinely liked reading it. I didn’t like certain parts of the story, but perhaps they’ll play some important role in the books to come xd