Born Wicked (Cahill Witch Chronicles, #1)

by Jessica Spotswood

[Briana @ Pages Unbound]

I know a decent amount of readers never finished this book, and from the beginning, I can completely see why. Frankly, Cate is a whiner. She dislikes the responsibility her mother left her with by dying, and complains about it loudly and often. She is angry at her mother for not leaving her enough instructions, and equally angry with her father for being so often absent—and then insisting she and her sisters begin to act like proper young ladies. It is difficult to say what Cate would like to do, if not be a witch or a normal young socialite.

The second sister, Maura, also has her faults. She is in a rebellious state against Cate, which makes her generally angry and leads her to ignore a lot of good advice out of selfishness. In some respects, she might be a teenager, but her insistence on doing whatever she wants no matter how dangerous the consequences does not make her a particularly likeable character.

Fortunately, the youngest sister is wonderful. She is intelligent, accomplished, polite, and perceptive. She will be many readers’ favorite. And, if you can keep reading long enough, Cate becomes a great character, too. She develops into a smart, strong young lady who will do absolutely anything, including making huge sacrifices, to protect the people she loves. By the end, she is someone readers can admire.

Of course, Cate has her own in-book admirers, including two suitors. There is not really a love triangle, as Cate makes her opinions about the one man quite plain from the start. So the magic is in watching Cate and the other young man fall in love, and the mystery in how they will finally make everything work out. The plan is actually quite clever, and only one of a few plot surprises sprinkled throughout the book. I even have my suspicions as to how the prophecy, an overused plot element, may turn things completely around in the following books.

And now that I have plowed through the beginning of Born Wicked, I really am looking forward to the rest of the series. I finally like Cate. I like her boyfriend. I want to see how everything turns out, since Spotswood left things on a rather exciting cliffhanger.