by Mona Hanna

 

By the time I got a couple of Kindle pages in, I worked out that I'd walked into a YA Romance, but the writing was reasonably good so I persevered. Then a line of internal dialogue gave me a hint that there was something original about it and my interest increased. Also it's from the boy's point of view, which is less common.

 

It's a fairly simple story with a few clichés, most notably the boy protecting the girl when she's an all-powerful witch. It's a sweet story, but at times too sweet. I imagine it would be good for romantically dreaming young girls. The world building shows promise and the writing is good, but the plotting and internal thoughts of the main character are definitely too young for me. If it weren't for the sex, I'd say pre-teen level. The sex is mostly off-camera, but still more than I want to read about.

 

My only real complaint is the lack of free will involved. Surely a High Witch, according to the rules of magic established in the story, is too powerful to be compelled? But the author sets the rules so it is as it is. Not my cuppa, but the author shows potential.

High Witch (High Witch Book 1) - 3 stars

Girl Online On Tour - 4 stars

A Clockwork Orange - 3 1/2 stars

Ms. Marvel Vol. 3: Crushed - 5 stars

The Secret to Letting Go - 5 stars

Blood Bound - 2 stars

Harry Potter und der Gefangene von Askaban - 5 stars

All the Light We Cannot See - 5 stars

 

Favorite book(s) of the month:The Secret to Letting Go, Harry Potter (duh!!!), All The Light We Cannot See

 

Books started this month but haven't finished yet: Scintillate (how many months am I dragging this book with me now. UGH), Scardust, Throne of Glass

 

8 BOOKS. Yess. I think that's a really good start into the new reading year.

4 of these books were review copys, 3 were on my normal tbr pile and 1 was a reread.

If I would have finished Throne of Glass, I would have actually read the whole tbr pile I made for January. But oh well, I'm still really proud of myself.

Content wise it was a really up and down, there were some books that I absolutely loved and then there were books that I didn't even really enjoy at all.

Could have made a good book if the author could make up her mind about whether she wanted it to be for adults or middle schoolers. Initially, when I began reading book 1 I thought maybe I could get my teenager to read it then the sex scene came in and I thought maybe not. The story and most of the dialogue was simple, seemingly targeted at young readers but then you have these intimate scenes which just seem so out of place. The potential in the storyline is definitely there but the execution and grammar/ language / sentence construction is immature. It read like the over-emotional overdramatic dialogue of movies from the 30s. An OK read, if you enjoy this style

ARC provided in exchange for an honest review

First things first: I received this book through NetGalley.

 

Oh man, I wanted to love this book so much. Cause it's fantasy, it has witches and it's super short but no, it didn't do anything for me. I didn't hate it, though.

 

Overall I really loved the idea of the book. That there are these high witches who are the most powerful. I also really loved the idea behind the bad guy, cause powerful things always need a big bad guy, who wants to use it for himself, to make himself better. So I was totally on board with the story.

 

But. The love. The romance was just too much for me. I mean it's a short book, so if you want it to have romance in it you need to speed things up. I get that. But it's just not for me. I'm so not a big fan of the 'Hey I just met you and this is crazy...but I have this undying love for you and I will die if I lose you'. Maybe I'm just too cynical for that?! I don't know.

 

I personally would have loved it more if the story had focused more on the training part. Ariel always suppressed her powers, she didn't know what she could do. Brayden on the other hand, knew a lot about these things and he taught her how to control it. That feel a bit short and I just would have loved to see more of that.

 

As characters. Ariel and Brayden didn't really touch me, I couldn't connect with them at all. There was only a little bit of backstory for these two and no character building. Same goes for the world they live in. I couldn't imagine it, cause there was no world building at all.

 

So overall, I loved the idea behind the book but I think there was much more room to really build this story. But, I'm totally gonna read the second book, just to see if maybe things get better and develope more.

This is taking longer than I planned. Not really into the writing and the characters right now. I love the idea behind the story though.