The Black Witch

Living rent free in my mind and can't wait to read the next book

We start off normal and traditional enough, with our FMC living a secluded and quiet life but probably harnessing immense powers that she doesn't know about and a legacy she has to live up to.
When she is finally pushed into the “real” hard world, in her case university for apothecary, she is faced with people's expectations and assumptions about her and her legacy. The university is a place for all sorts of people, races and cultures that obviously doesn't go without clashing. The FMC's culture feels very superior towards other races deemed not even human and acts accordingly, with a history of feeling oppressed and now on the way to their rightful place in the world. While world politics then turn the lives of other races upside down, the FMC feels the brunt of her legacy in something I cannot call any different than bullying. But through it all, she learns. About other cultures and customs, about history and perspectives, about individual vs group identities.
I loved reading about her growth and opening her mind to other perspectives. The background story feels very much like something we as society have experienced in the past and are currently repeating. It's a story about otherness and learning new foreign things, it's a story about friendship and growth, of leaving stereotypes and fear of otherness. It is a story about small acts of kindness and great acts of revolution - or the other way around.