Some of this was really quite nice, lots of women with talents and agency, friendships, and an absolutely wonderful mouse.
So maybe I should give it 4 stars, but at some point it really dragged. I finished it because I had come so far, and I'm glad I did, but I was really bored and fed up with it for a little while.
And I was not always enamoured with Delly. It took her a good while to stop seeing Wynn as a prospect. ( )

Fun enough, but crude for my tastes.

The Ruthless Lady’s Guide to Wizardry takes place roughly a generation after the events of C.M. Waggoner's previous Victorian-England-inspired novel, Unnatural Magic. Here we follow new character Dellaria Wells, a down-on-her-luck fire witch who resorts to petty crime and confidence tricks to get by. She gets a job working protection for an aristocratic family which seems like it should be easy money, but of course it turns out to be anything but—and from there Delly gets caught up in nefarious plots, necromancy, revenge, and a burgeoning romance with an attractive part-troll called Winn.

I really enjoyed Unnatural Magic despite some issues with plotting and structure. Here the issues weren't as easy to overlook. The plot grinds to a halt about a quarter to a third of the way through the book and remains static until a damp squib of an ending. I'm kind of baffled as to why Waggoner went in the direction she did. Yes, spending a lot of time on the planning stage of the con/revenge plot gives us time to see Delly and Winn fall for one another. On the other hand, there's a reason why most movies will skip over the planning and logistics stage with a montage—it's just all a bit dull.

And then there's the POV character voice. Now, I actually quite liked Delly as a character. She's a messy bi con artist with a heart of gold who often finds herself doing the right thing either by accident or because she's trying to get into someone else's good graces. She self-sabotages but is also capable of growth, and her burgeoning feelings for Winn are very believable. But the voice Waggoner gives her is such a misfire. When talking to her mam or some childhood friends, Delly speaks in a dialect clearly inspired by Yorkshire English; otherwise, she uses a malapropism-riddled version of London English. It's like listening to a Mary Poppins-era Dick Van Dyke in drag—it doesn't ring true.

If there is a third book in the series, I will read it because Waggoner has created an interesting world and her characters tend to be engaging—but given those plot/structure issues, for now at least it will be on sufferance. ( )

Thank you to NetGalley and Ace for the arc of this book.

This book was incredibly fun to read. The victorian setting paired with fantasy elements created a very whimsical atmosphere. I have to say that Winn was my favorite character by far. She was so lovely. I also enjoyed how much everyone's accents and dialects came through in the writing, I could really hear them speak, especially Dell, our main character. And what a character she was; gutterwitch and petty thief turned bodyguard and bounty hunter. Her relationship with Winn was quite sweet, although not as developed as I would have liked. It seemed that Winn let Dell get away with everything, even when she said hurtful things to her. I would have liked to see a bit more world building, given this is a society where not only humans, but trolls, and half-trolls live. The ending was actually quite anticlimactic and I probably would have given the book 4 stars had it ended less flat. Overall, it was a fun and easy read with a cute sapphic romance, but lacked some depth that I feel would have aided the story in its entirety. ( )

Did not finish book. Stopped at 10%. The writing style just didn't hook me.