Rune of the Witch (The Other Witch, #0.5) by Heather G. Harris Series: The Other Witch 0.5
on August 31, 2023
Genres: Magical Realism, Urban Fantasy, Witches
Format: eBook
Goodreads
Everyone wants to be normal but no one wants to be ordinary.
When my most hated enemy, Bastion, comes to me for help I tell him to take a long walk off a short pier. I’m not helping the griffin assassin that once killed my lover. But when the Crone visits my coven, she tells me that I have to help him find his daughter or else I won’t achieve my full potential.
I want greatness like others want wealth. Keep your fame and fortune, make sure my life matters. I reluctantly agree to help locate the missing griffin. I’m not going to cut my nose off to spite my face. If greatness is on the cards then I’m going to play, no matter who deals my hand.
When a raven with broken wings lands on my balcony, I know that a black witch has entered the game. Finding the griffin suddenly becomes a lot more complicated than I’d thought. I’ll have to awaken my sentient grimoire to help me find the answers I seek, and that always has its price.
Only time will tell whether it is one that I can afford to pay...
Don't miss this witchy series if you like humour, heart and a strong heroine with a slow burn, enemies to lovers, fade-to-black romance.
Written in British English.
Time for another joint review! We read RUNE OF THE WITCH to tick off some bingo squares.
Julie’s Review:
So this was my pick for us to read together, mostly because it was short and a prequel – I figured this should be an easy fun read. We needed a witchy book for BINGO.
But, for a prequel this sure felt like a short story within a series. There was history between the characters that I wasn’t privy to other than the quick explanation of gargoyles kill people. Why do they do that? Why do people’s loved ones get killed by the gargoyles and that’s just normal stuff in this world? What?
I did like the premise, an enemy asking for help, and our witchy main character deciding to help despite her hatred for this enemy. But she doesn’t do it out of the goodness of her heart, though she keeps convincing herself that she’s good and doesn’t always take payment. Here, she not only charges high prices but also believes this good deed will help her in her witchy journey.
The characters were interesting but we only got a surface level view of them. I would hope the full-length novel would give us more of the characters that a novella simply doesn’t have room for. But I’m curious about the non-familiar raven that has claimed her.
The runes are interesting, and I liked the explanations that magic takes careful work and sometimes more. I’m confused though about the two worlds in parallel with a portal between them, and the need to go between them. Again, this was a quick summary in novella form and I’m hoping the world building in the actual novels explains this more.
The story was mostly told, not shown, straight narration and explanation in our main character’s head. Again, I’m hoping the actual novels do better and go deeper. The description also made a big deal of telling you the story was in British English, not sure why. It was obvious and easy to follow. I’m still curious to put more of the series on my endless TBR.
Lynn’s Review:
I have notoriously bad history with urban fantasy. When Julie added a paranormal square to bingo this month, I was dreading this read. But luckily, this wasn’t horrible. Here are my thoughts.
Things I Liked:
Short! My attention span for sitting and reading a book is limited. This 153 page prequel was just the right length to keep me focused.
Characters – There was enough character description and development for me to be interested in these characters. Amber is a straightforward and I appreciated that. Bastion seems like that bad boy who’s really good deep down. We all know that type! And there’s definitely some history between the two that would be worth exploring.
Things that were meh:
Reads like I stepped into the middle of the series and I was missing a lot of backstory. And now that I actually read the FULL description on Goodreads, I can see why. There are 4 different series going on. I’m guessing the backstory is there in those other series.
I don’t get the universe. The magical realm and the contemporary realm are intertwined to the point where they touch? Amber walks through a portal between the realms, but still speaks to characters in the magical realm? I found this very confusing. And again, guessing the other books have more detail\explanations.
Overall, this was a fine read. I’m not sure that I’d run out and read the others, though. Especially if I have to read a bunch of other books to figure out what’s going on. 3.5 Stars.
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