Carry On, by Celia Lake

July 10, 2025 Book Reviews 4 ★★★★★

Carry On, by Celia LakeCarry On by Celia Lake
Series: Mysterious Powers #1
Published by self-published on 11/25/2020
Genres: Fantasy Romance, Historical Fantasy
Pages: 348
Format: Kindle or ebook
Source: my personal collection
Purchase: Amazon | Bookshop | Barnes & Noble
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five-stars
Also by this author: Pastiche, Weaving Hope, Harmonic Pleasure

Can two war wounded learn how to carry on after life-changing injuries?

No one has told Roland anything useful since he awoke in the Temple of Healing following the battle of Ypres. Muzzy-headed from the potions he's forced to take and with no word from his family or friends, he is entirely alone. He’s only allowed out of his room for command performances, talking about his experience of the War to people who refuse to listen to reality.

When Elen is assigned as his new nurse, Roland assumes she will be gone in a week or two like all the others. She’s still there in a month, stubbornly insisting on doing everything she can to help him recover.

Elen has been sent back from the front after a head injury. She used to know the Temple of Healing well, back during her apprenticeship. Now, nothing works like it used to and she can’t figure out what to do about the fact Roland’s healer is entirely absent from his care. Except, that is, for baffling directives that are not at all in her patient’s best interest.

Together, they must confront Elen’s fear of questioning authority and find out why Roland has been isolated from everyone he knows.

Carry On takes place in the spring of 1915, during the Great War in Albion, the magical community of England, Wales, and Scotland. First in the Mysterious Power series, it has a happily-ever-after ending full of knitting, compassion, and romance.

A quiet, thoughtful, slow-paced and comforting novel

I really love this quiet, thoughtful, slow-paced (but never dull) novel. Technically, it is a historical fantasy romance, but the romance is only one facet of the relationship between the main characters, and only one facet of the plot. There’s also a bit of a mystery threaded throughout, although the book isn’t quite a mystery novel, either. Regardless of labels, I find Celia Lake’s gentle books both soothing and immersive, and Carry On is one of my favorites.

Elen Morris is a Therapeutes (a nurse), send home from the Front after an injury leaves her with debilitating migraines. Her new patient is Major Roland Gospatrick… and that’s about all Elen knows about him. She has been told nothing of his initial injuries or his subsequent treatment; his chart is nowhere to be seen; and his Healer never visits, instead sending junior Healers who ask the same set of uninformative questions and never answer her own. Elen is a good nurse, dedicated to doing her best for her patients, and something feels very wrong about Roland’s treatment and the secrecy surrounding it. As she tries to help him recover, Elen and Roland discover a growing friendship… and hints of a conspiracy within the Temple of Healing.

Elen and Roland are from different classes and backgrounds, although they are both of Albion. Elen comes from a working-class background; the fact that she won a place at Alethorp (the magical school attended by many crafters and healers) and became a skilled nurse rather baffles her family. Roland is from one of the better families of Albion, although not the very highest; he attended Schola, the most prestigious of Albion’s five magical schools. Elen uses magic mostly for small charms that help her patients: warming the sheets, making a bed more comfortable, and so on. Roland’s magic is clearly stronger, although given his condition, we don’t see him use it consciously through most of the book. Yet despite the differences of class and position, they have much in common, particularly a dedication to service. The slow evolution of their relationship, from nurse/patient to a partnership of equals to romantic attraction, seems almost inevitable given who they both are; it unfolds slowly and tentatively, but without conflicts between them. I admire them both as people, and enjoy the quiet blooming of love between them.

Albion is the setting for all of Ms. Lake’s books. It is a magical society existing within and side-by-side with mundane (real-life) Britain, in much the same way that the wizarding world does in the Harry Potter books. Albion was undoubtedly influenced by the wizarding world, but Lake’s worldbuilding and magic systems are more logical and consistent than those in the HP series. Lake’s books and characters are also more diverse and more inclusive than in the HP world; her characters (at least the ones we’re intended to like) are kind, respectful, and supportive of one another, and they are scrupulous about consent. They are also historical fantasy novels, taking place between the late 1800s and around 1950, with the majority set between WWI and the end of WWII. Lake’s attention to research is evident in the historical details, the settings, and even the details of topics ranging from weaving to gemstones to fashion.

I have read Carry On several times now, and I enjoy it more each time I do. I particularly appreciate the setting, Albion’s main hospital (the Temple of Healing), with its mix of healing traditions and practices, some magical, some familiar to anyone who has read about medical treatment during the Great War. The idea that some of the weapons used in the War were magical in nature, or at least affected the magic of injured soldiers, meshes well with the historical realities of trench warfare and the widespread use of gas, which injured real-world soldiers in ways not seen before—initially to the bafflement of medics, doctors, and nurses.

I’m also intrigued by the religious diversity within Albion explored within this book, and the relative freedom of Albion’s citizens to choose their own faith (or none.) As a society, Albion clearly respects multiple faiths as valid and avoids imposing any particular path on anyone. And the ways in which deities or supernatural beings occasionally interact or intervene with humans in these books—through healing; through minor miracles; through quiet, inner knowing—is similar enough to my own few experiences with the divine, as well as the Quaker respect for other’s beliefs in which I was raised, that I feel both comfortable with and comforted by it.

Other books with these characters: If you enjoy the glimpse of Roland’s parents in this book, you can read about their romance in Forged in Combat. Roland makes a brief appearance in the novella Casting Nasturtiums, found in the collection Winter’s Charms.

Challenges: COYER 2025: Out to Lunch

five-stars

Reading this book contributed to these challenges:

  • COYER 2025: Out to Lunch

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4 Responses to “Carry On, by Celia Lake”

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      I wish I could explain why. They aren’t perfect books, and they definitely wouldn’t be to everyone’s taste — a lot of readers would find them not exciting enough, not fast-paced enough, with too little action/adventure or conflict. But there is something very comforting about them; it’s a world I feel at home in. Partly, that’s due to the way the main characters (and a lot of the secondary characters) want the best for everyone, not just themselves; there’s a lot of respect for other people, for other beliefs or ways of doing things (as long as that doesn’t hurt anyone.) Partly, it’s the fact that they are generally slow-paced, thoughtful, quiet books. If there’s a mystery, it’s not a major issue (and never involves murder.) Most of the romantic relationships are slow-burn and low- or no-conflict (though there may be external conflicts that affect the main couple.) And then there’s the competence p*rn, as some bloggers put it: almost all the main characters are good at what they do, and often passionate about it, though they’re not not usually showy about how they go about it. The few exceptions are people who don’t start out knowing what they’re good at or what they care passionately about, but find out during the course of the book. The books are also set in Britain during a time period I find interesting (late Victorian era to post-WWII), so that’s appealing as well. Basically, they are catnip for me! But I realize that wouldn’t be true for everyone.