Hello
happy readers! I had this review typed
up for last Friday but after being up for 36 hours helping my mom and running
her to her appointments I was a bit forgetful.
The delayed review is for The Bone Witch by Rin Chupeco which is the
first book in a planned series. I
received an ARC of this book from NetGalley and the publisher and was thrilled
to start this new series. I mean come on
first, this cover is beautiful and the title makes you wonder.
Rating: 3.5 Stars
The
Bone Witch is town from two different perspectives in two different times. One where we have Tea, she is young and
learns she is a bone witch in a rather explosive way. She is both feared and praised depending on
where you look, though many fear what they don’t understand. She leaves her homeland to train under an
older and wiser bone witch and learns to be an asha. We follow her training and get to know her
and her struggles in the world plagued by daeva, beasts who bring destruction. As a bone witch much is expected of her as
there are so few of them left. The other
POV is that of a bard, someone who has sought her out at a time much later on
and is seeking to learn her story.
I
had a bit of trouble finally putting a rating on this book as I was on the
fence about it. I enjoyed the story
overall but I felt the book focuses less on the story and more on
description. I understand we are
building a whole new world and a magical system and that takes time but it felt
at many points like a set up book. I was
interested to see how Tea from the start became Tea telling her story. I liked when things were happening and there
was some type of action to move the plot along.
At the same time I think the last quarter of the book really picked up
and improved for me. This makes me even
more interested to read book two and see what happens with Tea, Fox, Kalen,
Kance, Zoya, Likh, Lady Mykaela and some of the other characters.
The
story itself though if it had been condensed a bit was pretty interesting; raising
the dead, the life of the asha and a bone witch none the less. The political struggles. While reading it I kept imagining a Geisha
(from my limited knowledge of them anyways) with the parties and formality of
the asha life in the asha-ka. Only if
they also trained in magic runes and in combat.
But things like the musical instruments and dancing for sure. I wanted to know more about the daeva, we got
good descriptions of most of them but the azi I felt was covered the most. I did love how the author managed to bleed
some small things in that when reading you see one part of the “future story
teller” Tea more sense. I liked the tale
it told and I even liked the way it was told from the past and present
sides.
I
liked the battle between what is expected and what she desires. She is expected to train and earn money and
then when ready do what is expected of her.
Even as the way things are, sitting on tradition, how they cause harm to
those she has come to care for. I loved
the questioning of gender policies and why only one gender can do certain
things not those that they excel at. I
also loved the buildup of expected romance to happen, though we didn’t get much
of any real romance, just the promise of it to come and wow in a very
interesting way I imagine. A slow build
is nice and it lets you get to know the characters and really develop
connections without any insta-love.
Now
while I liked the story itself I had some struggles here and there where it
would lose me in the pacing with over exaggerated detail of certain
things. On one side I loved the
description of the world and getting into the magic system and the culture, on
the other side it did sometimes drag after the first several in detail
descriptions of the different hua. At
one point the character even makes a comment about going into so much detail
each time and explaining the reasoning which I liked but it didn’t make reading
about it each time after any better.
Overall
I enjoyed the story but this one was a bit of a struggle at times. I think I’ll be checking out book two for
sure and hoping with all the world building being done in this one the next may
have less of that and much more on the story and plot.
Until
next time…
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