The Summer War by Naomi Novik – Review

Published: September 16, 2025

Publisher: Del Rey

Series: N/A

Genre: Fantasy

Pages: 144 (Kindle)

My Rating: 4 Stars

A copy of this book was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Synopsis:
In this poignant, heartfelt novella from the New York Times bestselling author of Spinning Silver and the Scholomance Trilogy, a young witch who has inadvertently cursed her brother to live a life without love must find a way to undo her spell.

Celia discovered her talent for magic on the day her beloved oldest brother Argent left home. Furious at him for abandoning her in a war-torn land, she lashed out, not realizing her childish, angry words would suddenly become imbued with the power of prophecy, dooming him to a life without love.

While Argent wanders the world, forced to seek only fame and glory instead of the love and belonging he truly desires, Celia attempts to undo the curse she placed on him. Yet even as she grows from a girl to a woman, she cannot find the solution—until she learns the truth about the centuries-old war between her own people and the summerlings, the immortal beings who hold a relentless grudge against their mortal neighbors.

Now, with the aid of her unwanted middle brother, Celia may be able to both undo her eldest brother’s curse and heal the lands so long torn apart by the Summer War.

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I am a casual fan of Naomi Novik in that I’ve read the first Temeraire book and the Scholomance series. I have never actually read any of her more fairytale style works like Spinning Silver or Uprooted, so I don’t really have a good comparison for The Summer War, but I really enjoyed it. This is a good, classic fairytale story with curses, kidnapped ladies, and swordfights galore.

The Summer War follows Celia, a young lady of a powerful noble house who discovers she’s a witch when she accidentally curses her older brother to never find love. Though this is a short book it covers a span of years and follows Celia as she grows up to be a teenager. All the while we watch her form a bond with her middle brother who has been generally disdained and all but ignored for his entire life. He and Celia decide they will put in the effort to love and support one another, even as their father neglects both them and his household as he sinks into a deep depression when Celia’s eldest brother leaves. Eventually Celia and her middle brother decide they need to go find a way to break the spell, especially because Celia is about to be married to the prince and won’t have a chance once that happens. Because this is such a short work, I will leave further details for you to discover on your own!

This is only a novella but I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it and by how whole it felt. Novellas often leave me with a desire for more, whether that be characterization, worldbuilding, or some other element, but The Summer War had just enough of everything. I also think the overall style of the story worked perfectly for this, as it reminded me of a piece of folklore. While it is somewhat ‘classic’ in feel, there are actually a number of things that felt like tropes subverted. Witches are coveted for their great power, the unwanted middle brother never becomes a villain, and the eldest brother’s great love isn’t a princess to name just a few. 

I think The Summer War was a great read and would definitely recommend it for fans of T. Kingfisher’s work, particularly if you liked Thornhedge. I’d like to go back and read both Spinning Silver and Uprooted by Naomi Novik to see if the style is similar and see how much I enjoy those fairytale inspired stories.