• Amanda Reads Mpls
  • Posts
  • Lightning in Her Hands by Raquel Vasquez Gilliland | Book Review

Lightning in Her Hands by Raquel Vasquez Gilliland | Book Review

It is indeed as good as the first.

Author

Amanda Reads
March 03, 2025

Yes, another book from my list of books I’ve bought and want to read from December! Am I getting better at reading my TBR? As long as you don’t count the two NetGalley books I read in February, and the one I downloaded and still need to read, yes.

Why I read it: Witch of Wild Things was one of my favorite books in 2023. It was natural that I bought the second book in the same series, which features another Flores sister—Teal. I picked this one up when I was looking for something to read and it shouted, “Choose me” from the stack near my bed.

Review #insixwords: Just as good as the first.

More:

  • Marriage of convenience! Pining! Friends to lovers!

  • The modern marriage of convenience trope often gets a bad reputation. I’m not really bothered by it—give me a solid “romance reason” for it, and I’m good. In this case, Carter needs to be married to receive an inheritance and of course he would choose his former best friend who he’s been in love with forever.

  • Teal, whose POV we stay in for the entirety of the book, doesn’t know (can’t or doesn’t want to admit to herself?) that he’s in love with her. But for pretty much everyone, it’s fairly obvious.

  • As much as I love the enemies to lovers trope, there’s something special about friends to lovers. Especially when those friends aren’t currently friends because they shared a kiss that scared the crap out of one of them and she ran afraid.

  • In addition to the marriage of convenience, what drives Teal through this book is trying to find her mother, who took something from her, and is very likely the reason that Teal’s emotions affect the weather, something that is not in her control. Definitely not the way her powers should manifest.

  • Between her mother’s abandonment when she was little, being bipolar, and a previous abusive relationship, Teal has self-esteem and self-image issues. She views herself as broken and unlovable.

  • But she’s neither of those things. And it takes a while and some plot things to make her see it.

  • Layered in this story are explorations of friendship (it’s more than who stays) and intergenerational trauma and how it shows up in families.

  • This book also seems to set up the story with the final Flores sister, Sky, and I really need that story to happen.

Recommendation: This book could certainly be read as a standalone, but this book expands the world and characters from the first book—you’re going to get more out of it having read Witch of Wild Things first. But do that! Because it can be very difficult to publish a second book in a series and have it be just as good as the first—and Lightning in Her Hands absolutely is.

Reply

or to participate.