"It begins with absence and desire.
It begins with blood and fear.
It begins with a discovery of witches."
A long book that felt like a loooong book.
I was drawn to A Discovery of Witches for many reasons: the title, the cover, the promise of urban fantasy fun, the world of academia and a bunch of interesting supernatural creatures. Like all books that I'm excited about, this one spent a lonely life on my bookshelf for 9 years until I finally decided that it was going to be read. I had high expectations, but now I feel 'meh'.
Diana, the main character, is a Mary-Sue. Her refusal to accept her witch magic is an interesting aspect, but once the romance started, she kept on disappointing me. We are told through other characters that Diana is brave, powerful, independent and smart, but I rarely saw those moments. There's a lot of telling instead of showing and the characters feel distant.
I tried to like the love interest, Matthew, but I just couldn't. I understood his protective instinct and the predator vs prey aspect is interesting, but I couldn't get behind his domineering nature, his mood swings, his withholding of information and his murderous temper. If he wasn't a vampire, I wouldn't be able to deal with him. He is problematic.
I don't like the romance and it takes precedence over plot. Although there is instalove, the progression of the romance in the beginning is natural. However, very early on, the relationship accelerates at an alarming rate and I was wishing for some brakes.
I also couldn't make sense of the plot. The plot progression is weird and there are lots of filler moments. I do not understand how Michael and Diana's actions relate to the plot or why going certain places impact the plot. The main purpose of the plot is to further the romance. I couldn't see the point of anything else.
A Discovery of Witches touches on varied and interesting topics such as history, magic, alchemy, medicine, science, evolution and genetics. It also means there's lots of detail, most of which is unnecessary. There's pages of eating, sleeping, tasting, smelling, wine-tasting, etc. that add very little to the story and there's background info-dumping. The writing and dialogue is dense and getting through this book is tedious.
The world-building is also interesting. The world as we know it consists of four creatures - humans, daemons, witches and vampires. There's reasons for their existence, reasons why they remain hidden and prejudice. I thought I was going to love A Discovery of Witches because of the atmosphere and the little moments in the world of academia (before the romance took center-stage). My favourite aspect is the Bishop house. It's where I got to see some magic and where I got to know some potentially interesting characters: Sarah, Em, Marcus and Sophie.
Am I going to continue with the series? Yes. I have the rest of the series on my Kindle, I have hope that the All Souls trilogy will improve and apparently, I enjoy torturing myself.
"But no Bishop ever turns her back on another Bishop."