Amelia Ash

IN A NUTSHELL
Light, fun, cosy fantasy with magic, a talking cat, blackmail, secrets, a murder mystery, and a heroine who has no idea how much trouble she's in.
The beginning was strong,
The middle sagged a little, leaving me waiting for something to happen.
The ending was exciting (for a cosy paranormal).
The mystery that drove the plot was solved, and the stage was set for the next book in the series.

'Witch Slap' is the start of a cosy paranormal series set in a strange little village of show more Hollowbeck in Cumbria, where most of the inhabitants are magic users, and familiars are taken for granted.

This was a fun read. It made me laugh several times. Much of the humour came from the bemusement of the main character, Morgan Winters, who does not believe in magic but keeps bumping into it. I loved Morgan's robust humour. My favourite example is that she calls her always-getting-into-trouble-and-dragging-her-in-after-him brother "Ruiner". His given name is Rainier, but Ruiner seems the perfect name for someone who has managed to get himself turned into a cat.

The humour works. It's part snark, part creative similes that made me smile and part amusement at the fact that our heroine has no idea how much trouble she's in, but we do.

The book started well, establishing her relationship with her troublesome brother and setting both of them up to discover a witch who has been murdered in her own shop. It was fun coming to understand that Hollowbeck is a very strange place, populated with colourful characters, almost all of whom are magic users and not all of whom are human and some of whom may no longer be among the living.

The pace sagged a little once the setup was in place, and for a while, I thought the story was going to stall. Then Morgan became more proactive, the mystery got twistier, tension rose, violence was used, and pretty soon I was having a lot of fun.

'Witch Slap' entertained me well enough to want to read 'One Smart Witch', the next book in the series, so that I can see what Morgan does next. I'll be sticking with the audiobook format as I enjoyed Tamsin Kennard's narration. show less

To my surprise, I'm setting this aside at 35%. I had hoped that this would be another Kim Watt series that would become a comfort read for me, but I'm not getting traction with this one. Instead, I'm becoming impatient with and looking for a fast-forward button.

There are a lot of things about the book that should be pulling me along.

The situation: a magical village that Morgan has stumbled into and can't leave; her brother having been turned into a talking cat, Morgan's emerging role as show more the town witch and an ensemble cast of strange but likeable village residents.

The plot: the idea of a threatening, possibly predatory, semi-sentient magic Carnival with its own rules has a lot of potential. So does turning Morgan into an amateur sleuth.

The humour: some of the dialogue and the descriptions make me laugh and keep me engaged.

So what's getting in the way?

The point of view: Kim Watt normally writes in the Limited Third-Person. This story is told in the first person. That slows the story down, makes exposition more challenging and puts a lot of weight on the quality of the main character.

Morgan and Ruiner: Morgan and her brother, Ruiner, need to carry the story. Morgan doesn't have much going for her. She's nice enough in an everywoman sort of way, but nothing about her stands out. She has no particular abilities that she's aware of, although there are hints that she's a latent magic user. She's fairly passive except when it comes to rescuing her brother. There's not enough to Morgan to keep me engaged. Ruiner is not only hard to like, he's hard to care about. Him being at risk does not cause me any worry. Morgan would be better off without him.

The pace: Maybe it's the first-person point of view, but the pace seems very slow. Imp a third of the way through the book, yet the first body has only just hit, and Morgan has yet to do anything but bemoan her ignorance. I'm sure she's about to do something, but it all takes too long to keep me interested.

So, I'm setting 'One Smart Witch' and the Hollowbeck Paranormal Cosy Mystery series aside. show less