Review: Katabasis | R.F. Kuang

Summary: 

Two graduate students must put aside their rivalry and journey to Hell to save their professor’s soul—perhaps at the cost of their own.

Katabasis, noun, Ancient Greek: 
The story of a hero’s descent to the underworld 

Alice Law has only ever had one goal: to become one of the brightest minds in the field of Magick. She has sacrificed everything to make that a reality: her pride, her health, her love life, and most definitely her sanity. All to work with Professor Jacob Grimes at Cambridge, the greatest magician in the world.
That is, until he dies in a magical accident that could possibly be her fault. 
Grimes is now in Hell, and she’s going in after him. Because his recommendation could hold her very future in his now incorporeal hands and even death is not going to stop the pursuit of her dreams….
Nor will the fact that her rival, Peter Murdoch, has come to the very same conclusion. 
With nothing but the tales of Orpheus and Dante to guide them, enough chalk to draw the Pentagrams necessary for their spells, and the burning desire to make all the academic trauma mean anything, they set off across Hell to save a man they don’t even like. 
But Hell is not like the storybooks say, Magick isn’t always the answer, and there’s something in Alice and Peter’s past that could forge them into the perfect allies…or lead to their doom. 

Book stats: 
-Published in 2025
-Pages: 541
-Genre: historical fantasy

My opinion: 
Great story with a beautiful writing style. If you've read books by Kuang before, you know that so much knowledge and history is researched for her books. 5/5

What I liked: 
- Alice's story was so impactful, and you can see how much she grows throughout the story.
- The comparisons between the stories of Alice, Elspeth, Magnolia, and Gertrude are beautifully described, and it makes it very clear how different their outlooks on life are from one another.

What I didn't like: 
- The story is full of abstract magic, history and scientific ideas. In addition, the story takes place in the present and the past. This means that you won't finish the book quickly. You also can't put the book down for too long, otherwise you might lose track of the story.

—Iris