The Black Witch (Black Witch Chronicles, #1)

by Laurie Forest

Debut young adult fantasy author Laurie Forest brings a vividly imagined new fantasy realm to life in The Black Witch Chronicles, in which a fiercely determined heroine must embrace a power she never knew she had in order to protect everyone she loves from the darkness sweeping across their world.

A new Black Witch will rise...her powers vast beyond imagining.

Elloren Gardner is the granddaughter and absolute spitting image of the late Black Witch, the most powerful mage her people, the Gardnerians, have ever known. Yet while everyone she meets expects her to live up to Carnissa Gardner's formidable legacy, Elloren is utterly devoid of power in a society that prizes magical ability above nearly all else.

When she is granted the opportunity to pursue her lifelong dream of becoming an apothecary, Elloren joins her brothers at the prestigious Verpax University to embrace a destiny of her own, free from the shadow of her grandmother's legacy. But she soon realizes that the university, which admits all manner of people-including the fire-wielding, winged Icarals, the sworn enemies of all Gardnerians-is a treacherous place for the granddaughter of the Black Witch.

As evil looms on the horizon and the pressure to live up to her heritage builds, everything Elloren thought she knew will be challenged and torn away. Her best hope of survival may be among the most unlikely band of misfits...if only she can find the courage to trust those she's been taught to hate and fear.

• ISBN13: 9781335468864
• Publish Date: 9 July 2020 (first published 1 May 2017)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: GB
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
• Imprint: Mills & Boon
• Pages: 672
• Language: English
• URL: http://harpercollins.co.uk

Reviews

[Brittany]

“Holy Ancient One!” Where do I even begin with this book?? It’s long, it’s drawn out and it’s so good.

Think like Harry Potter- but better???
I think I may only relate this to HP because of the university setting, but my mind kept going back to it so I had to mention it.

The mixing and mingling of different species and magics in this book is phenomenal and the author did an excellent job of explaining each type of magic and species. How could a book possibly be boring with so much going on and explained so well?

Character development and world building is great and some characters transformations come later and are paced out over time and multiple events lead to their growth which I appreciate. Having a character just flip from being one way to another feels unauthentic sometimes, this book isn’t like that. You can feel the struggle some characters go through and understand why they are the way they are. The bonds that are built tear at your heart and you seriously feel the characters as actual people.

The prejudices in this book and how they are addressed is also something that is done amazingly, how the characters change and learn that just because they were brought up to believe something doesn’t mean it’s the truth, and that everyone has a chance to be good or evil no matter their background is a strong foundation I stand fully behind with this book.

Yes, there are parts I could have done without but I don’t think I’d want to extract them if I could? Everything adds to the story in the end in a beautiful way that has you begging for more.

This is the type of book I can sit and read for hours and be mad about having to put down. I was at 90% at 5 am and was seriously so upset that I could no longer keep my eyes open to finish reading it right then.
If you want a binge worthy series this is definitely going to be the one and I’m SO excited to see what’s coming in book 2.

[tweetybugshouse]

Okay this review is going to be tough to write as i feel the book has been unjustly stalked on good reads and been given such bad publicity. When i read the blurb for this one on the Around world arc tour site where i go t the book from to review i was really excited i am a huge fantasy buff and like stories that are different and bush the boundaries of what all ready been done in one fashion or another.

The black witch has racial tones to it, homo sexual innuendos and a white female who is of a royal blo0d line and has been taught all her life that her race is the "chosen" pure race. Now you can not tell me that those themes are left out of many other well known fantasy books. The author did a very good job of showing us the world that our main character is growing up in and her uncle did her great justice i fell by not really exposing her to the world cause i feel she never would of given the friendships she found in college a chance if she grown up like Fallon Bane did.

I really felt this book took an issues that is really hard core in our world and put in a fantasy realm and made us really look at how we as humans really do treat other races. We do look down on co mingled, females doing things that only men should do or even in some ways force our children to find a man to establish their lives. It scary but is it so wrong to discuss these things and if you read the whole book you see that the main character learns just like you hope she would that what she knows is not true.

I was expecting that Fallon who they paint as being the black witch was going to turn out to not be her but our main character would be. She displayed through the whole book as having no magic but some thing is brewing in her body their i believe is magic their to be discovered but it be magic like no one in this world has seen and when that happens the destruction that the resistance does as the end of the book one i sure will pale in comparison. This is a really well thought out thought provoking book so please do not let all the silly one stars let you shy away from giving this book a chance. And i really hope that is gets published on time unlike another book which i read and loved and then saw torn to shreds to the point where the author is redoing the story. Which i think is ridiculous.