The Bone Witch by Rin Chupeco | Book Review

【 THE BONE WITCH 】

Man I love some fun necromancy.

Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy [necromancy]
Author: Rin Chupeco
Published: March 2017
Publisher: Sourcefire Books
Pages: 413 (paperback)

I was so nervous going into this because I’d heard endless mixed reviews. Some people love this, but others were tearing their eyeballs out over it. So with trepidation I finally picked it up, and I’m pleased to say I loved it!

I totally get why others didn’t though. The structure of this story gives it some really whacky pacing, so beware going into this that you need a touch of patience – and maybe have book two at hand!

We start with some epic necromantic moments, with Tea first discovering her powers by raising her brother from the dead. It’s all shock and horror and you as the reader are mildly disgusted but super fascinated and ahh *turning all the pages*

And then shortly after that you get another epic scene. But for the next few hundred pages it’s a bit slow on the ground in terms of ground-breaking (does that count as a pun?) events. For me, I was totally fine with this because it felt like a baptism of fire and then took a deep breath to explain some things and equip Tea with the skills she needs. It gives us time to explore more characters and get into the nitty gritty of things.

But maybe one or two more epic moments could have been nice.

I thought the flashbacks (flashforwards, I guess?) to Tea at ‘present day’ also added a curious tone to the overall narrative. Tea seems very sweet and innocent in the main (but past) story, but is somewhat twisted in the present. Which I also totally loved.

How did she get like that? Why is she so alone? What happened to cause THAT TWIST at the end? Omg the twist. I need to know. Good thing I have book two at hand.

All I can say is that this is super fun and necromancy is clearly a subgenre of paranormal fantasy I need more of (especially after The Locked Tomb series). So if you don’t mind it being a bit slow at times and you enjoy brewing the character development, I think you’ll like this.