The Witchling's Girl by Helena Coggan

In a quiet street far from the river, with an ancient tree growing through its walls and floors, is the House of the Dead. There lives the witchling: healer, midwife and conduit between the world of the living and the world below. A witchling must give up her family and friends and spend her life alone, tending to the sick and carrying the dead down dark tunnels to the underworld.

Haley was born with the gift of death-magic, and at the age of seven her mother abandons her to the witchling to be raised as her successor. But as Haley grows older and learns her craft - as invading armies pass through her town, people are born and die on her floor, and loyalties shift and dissolve around her - she finds it harder and harder to keep her vows and be the perfect and impassive healer.

But if she can't, it will be her downfall - and that of everyone she's not supposed to love . . .

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Helena Coggan writes amazing worlds. Everything is so detailed, the rules make sense, the ways people act make sense. I thought that the exposition was much better here than in the last one of hers I read, which tend towards info dumping. This one is much more subtle; information is given out over time, as it becomes relevant.

I did think it was quite long, but given that it covers years where a lot of things happen, the length is probably justified. Just be aware going into it that it's going to take a while to get through.

If you like well crafted, intricate, unusual fantasy worlds with occasionally unlikeable but always well meaning heroines, this is one for you.